first ever senior pics

Still relatively new at this. Used nifty 50 @2.8

they are nice, a couple could have benefited from some fill flash.

I would get rid of the pimples. They are missing something and it might just be some fill light like shanny said.

PP them to get rid of the bad skin... while you are supposed to take pics of them, make them look good. Earn your money and open up PS!

I like em, but the natural lighting is detracting in some.

The lighting on most of those shots could have used more thought.
Shot #1:
His glasses are not level with his eyes.
The sun is camera left slightly behind the subject leaving him with some unflattering shadows on his face. Fill flash could have helped here

Shot #3
The subject is underexpose because the background is brighter than the foreground. Again fill flash could have helped.

First try, there's a lot to learn. You did fine.

Remember, many of us are pros and we have a very picky attitude because we get paid or else, we are perfectionists.

For teenagers (I have 4 sons, 1 is 13 now), you may not want to get rid of all the facial blemishes, but you may wan to minimize them. Just do the heal tool if the clone tool is too much for you. Even thought your shoot is over, you can still do a lot of PP work that can really help. Sharpen the images by increasing the contrast or the black, add some fill-flash, if you shot in RAW, and then do some unsharp mask for sharpening. It's important to remember that a good portrait is all about the eyes and skin tones and focus. The young man has glasses with color, so you have to work with that. 4 and 8 seem the best to me. Do the edits, zooming in to see his face large on your screen and add a lot of contrast, and you should be good.

Oh, and turn on your Images Editing OK so we can help you.

The glasses should be sitting higher, you can’t see his left eye in the first picture.

Note to self: beware of photochromic eyeglasses.

ToddR wrote in post #11074683
Note to self: beware of photochromic eyeglasses.

I have glasses like that, and it's really common. Best thing to do is to shoot in the shade if the person wants to leave the glasses on. And also, make sure the glasses are clean. Good grief! I can't stand it in post when I see they didn't clean them before the shoot, or I forgot to remind them. Mostly, you ask if they can remove them all together. But yes, glasses are always a problem.

What's that blue/green fringing around the leaf and his left shoulder? Almost looks like a channel got shifted or something.

That's what happens sometimes with lenses.

It is a decent edit, so you should be proud. And if the client is happy, you're good.

SuzyView wrote in post #11076313
That's what happens sometimes with lenses.

It is a decent edit, so you should be proud. And if the client is happy, you're good.

It looked a little too pronounced to be chromatic abberation, but I guess it is.
Overall I think these are good for your first time.

some really nice autumn colours there though, would be nice to see the photos cleaned up, mainly skin re-touch