Photo critique

[Chris Saper]

The lighting is just lovely, as are the background and model. I love the simplicity and restraint in the distribution of the values. Because the face and hands are so dramatically light, the placement of the hands is really so important - I think they need to be either together or placed in a way that supports movement within the picture. In the top image, the hands are so far to the right, that there is a bit too much tension, at least for me to feel comfortable. In the lower image the hands read as isolated islands of white, and the splayed fingers are awkward.

I would recommend more photos, paying special attention to the hands. Backing up a bit will help the photo distortion. I think this will be beautiful paintng.

[Jan Keeling]

Thanks, Mischa and Richard.

And thank you, Chris, that's very helpful. Chris, I wonder if you might tell me what it is about the photo that looks distorted? I'm sure you are right that there is distortion, but my eye is not trained enough to see it.

The lens might be a problem, too. I have a Kodak EasyShare DX6490, and it does have a "Portrait" setting, but I didn't have enough light to use it--I used the "Night" setting so I could make use of the natural light.

Thank you for your help (by the way, I learned a lot from your book Painting Beautiful Skin Tones with Color and Light. )

[Chris Saper]

Hi Jan,

In the first photo, the hands and head are on roughly the same plane- ie the same distance from the camera. Their relative sizes look convincing.

Look at the second picture, where the hand on our left looks extremely large compared to both the head and the hand on our right. This distortion is pretty dramatic, given that the hand on our left might be as little (or, in fact, as much) as 12" in front of the hand on our right; the distortion comes from being too close to the subject for the lens you are using.

The "portrait" setting refers to aperture, or how large the lens opening is when the shutter is triggered. Aperture controls the depth of field, so that the face can be in focus and the background fuzzy, but doesn't have an impact on the type of distortion in your photo.

Search the Forum for topics like "focal length", or "photo distortion", to try to maximize the quality of photos for the camera you have.

[Jan Keeling]

Thank you so very much, Chris. Yes. I get it.