First Self-Portrait...harsh C&C required

First self-portrait I've ever taken. Exif data should still be available but if not 1/200, f/8, ISO100 I believe (either ISO100 or 200). Taken as RAW with T2i and 70-200 f/4L IS.

Lemme know what I could have done better. I was forced to use pop-up flash because I had no batteries...but still seemed to work alright. This *is* post edit btw

Removed the background as it was probably distracting

Did you fix the redeye, or so something else to your eyes? Its pretty much impossible to take a decent self portrait with the popup flash.

Your eyes are a beautiful blue, but because you were in a dark room, your pupils dilated wide to allow as much light as possible in them. The flash duration is so short that they didn't have time to close up. The result? You have huge black pupils in this shot, instead of nice blue iris. That is one of your best features, and you've lost most it in this photo because you were in a dim room. Having said that, you could jacked up the ambient light in the room, and if THAT wasn't enough, you could look at bright lights long enough to constrict your pupils, allowing more blue iris to show. Or you could wait until day time and use indirect window light for the portrait, which is also very flattering, as it gives such a soft light....

for starters you could use a different lens, or get farther from the camera, also look at the ears, youj can see the sharpening, that would bother me to no end. what is this picture going to be used for? if its just facebook or something than its fine.

Well I created it because my friends complained that I hadn't changed my profile picture on facebook in well over a year. I just didn't care. On the road I was curious about portrait photography. I've never taken portraits and just wondered about how to go about taking them.

This *was* cropped down a bit (about 50% if I'm not mistaken) but only because the background was really distracting (moreso than the original photo).

As for my eyes, I really wish I could have used my other flash but unfortunately I had no good batteries in the house and I'm too lazy to go get some =P Actually I did very little sharpening in PP. Most of it was taken straight from the camera. I actually blurred out a lot so it wasn't too noticeable.