Photo Critique

Friday Photo Critique #4

on Oct 30th 2009 with 18 comments

Friday Photo Critique is our weekly community project, where we publish a photograph submitted by one of our wonderful readers, then ask you all to offer constructive feedback on the image.

After a few days, I’ll update the post to feature the most helpful and insightful comments. You will also be credited with a link to your website or portfolio, so be sure to enter it correctly when submitting a comment!

Quick Ground Rules

  1. Play nice! We’ve deliberately chosen photographs that aren’t perfect, so please be constructive with any criticism.
  2. Feel free to offer any type of advice – composition, lighting, post-processing etc.
  3. You can also link to photographs that you feel offer a great example of this type of image shot exceptionally well.

Without further ado, here is this week’s candidate for Friday Photo Critique!

The Photograph

Photo Critique

Photographer: Jessica (Focal Point Photography)

Please let us know what you think in the comments – how would you have approached the scene or taken the photo differently? A massive thank you to everyone who commented last week. The post has now been updated with some of the most insightful comments

The most constructive and helpful comments will be featured on the site, and you’ll also be given priority to feature your own work in a future Friday Photo Critique!.

Feedback and Comments

Here are four of the most useful and insightful pieces of feedback given on this photo, taken from the comments:

Tom Bremer

The positives:

The lighting is nice. I appears you have a single light source from above which is creating some dramatic shadows, yet isn’t too harsh. The skin tones aren’t blown out, and you have some nice earthy colors in the body.

I also like the dark vignette around him—he really stands out in a dark atmosphere.
The sharpness of the image is great. Despite the low lighting, he is in total focus, and the details are sharp.

Your model looks like an interesting character. The tattoo poking out the sleeve gives credibility to his rock-ness, so including it in the image I think helps out.

What to work on:

Although I like the dark atmosphere, I think there is way too much of it. I’d crop down this photo quite a bit—maybe a bit more off the left side than the right, which brings me to my next point:

The model is too centered. The rule of thirds is made to be broken for sure, but in this photograph I feel like the composition is just too static.

Ultimately the photo is a bit boring—this guy is a rocker, yet he is just standing there, I don’t get the feeling that he is actually playing. I think if his pose was a bit more dynamic, plus if you shoot from a different angle—maybe from below, or from up on a ladder you’ll give the viewer a much more unique perspective.

I always try to ask this question—“What would make somebody want to look at this photograph a second time?” And for this photo I don’t really have an answer to that. This may be a bit harsh, so I mean it in the most constructive way possible—I’d really play around more in your next session.

Good luck!

MaximRivers

Here’s something I haven’t seen mentioned and might help with everyone’s desire to un-center the subject.

Part of what is weird is how the subject’s feet are on a flat surface, but the whole photo is slightly tilted. By slightly rotating the image and just a little bit of cropping you can keep him in the middle and it doesn’t feel so awkward.

Suddenly he’s more commanding and the center placement feels grand rather than clumsy.

Just a thought :-p

bArt

I like the lightning of the subject in the photo, but in my humble opinion this is no composition… Everybody with a good camera and some camera knowledge can take this picture (with some luck maybe). Like said before cropping would do great and make the difference. I think there are a number of ways you can crop and make it look good. Now it’s just ‘a’ photo….

Alltough you speak of an action photo, there is not much action going on, its to static… cropping would also solve this.

Overall it’s a good picture camera technically speaking, composition wise it’s not.
It also seems that you are listening to the critiques given but always answer with ‘tried but didn’t liked it’. It seems you didn’t try enough

Stein H

Nice photo, Jessica. You’ve captured the subject well and the light is good. I do however think that the image could do with some cropping.

Here’s a quick example: http://photo.nowhere.no/_tmp/original_sh-edit.jpg

David Appleyard is davidappleyard on Themeforest
 
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  • http://tpbremer.dpchallenge.com Tom Bremer

    The positives:
    The lighting is nice. I appears you have a single light source from above which is creating some dramatic shadows, yet isn’t too harsh. The skin tones aren’t blown out, and you have some nice earthy colors in the body.
    I also like the dark vignette around him—he really stands out in a dark atmosphere.
    The sharpness of the image is great. Despite the low lighting, he is in total focus, and the details are sharp.
    Your model looks like an interesting character. The tattoo poking out the sleeve gives credibility to his rock-ness, so including it in the image I think helps out.

    What to work on:
    Although I like the dark atmosphere, I think there is way too much of it. I’d crop down this photo quite a bit—maybe a bit more off the left side than the right, which brings me to my next point:
    The model is too centered. The rule of thirds is made to be broken for sure, but in this photograph I feel like the composition is just too static.
    Ultimately the photo is a bit boring—this guy is a rocker, yet he is just standing there, I don’t get the feeling that he is actually playing. I think if his pose was a bit more dynamic, plus if you shoot from a different angle—maybe from below, or from up on a ladder you’ll give the viewer a much more unique perspective.
    I always try to ask this question—“What would make somebody want to look at this photograph a second time?” And for this photo I don’t really have an answer to that. This may be a bit harsh, so I mean it in the most constructive way possible—I’d really play around more in your next session. Good luck!

    • Jessica

      Thanks thanks thanks!
      This is actually the RAW shot, I did no editing. I don’t do posed Photography it’s in my license to only do ‘action’ shots, if you will. It was actually taken from below a stage, he started out this song with spot light, super slow, super ‘emotional’ and I did actually think about left-centering him as I do most of all of my photos since I’m not a fan of centered photos, but I actually like it like this. Thanks

    • http://ochuko.wordpress.com Ochuko

      I sincerely didn’t see anything wrong with this shot until I read your comments Tom. Nice analysis. I agree with the cropping part.

  • http://www.flickr.com/Tyrone_michael Tyrone Avnit

    All I would have done was this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tyrone_michael/4057902729/

    A little placement mix!

    Hope all are having a wonderful day and I will remove the photo from the flickr stream by the end of the day unless it needs to be moved immediately. Thought it would be better to show the quick fix than to try explain it.

    Ty

    • Jessica

      I gonna keep it centered since it was on spotlight, I like it. :) (See my reply above to Tom’s comment) thanks though, I’ll take that on board with me!

    • http://en.gravatar.com/userimage/10232660/8a5c30ff448216473bb1cdf82f636202.jpg aggiebabe

      I like it centered! Too much useless black off center.

      • Jessica

        thanks!

  • http://flickr.com/photos/simonbrix Simon Brix

    Jeez, can we please stop this first and second shit? You’re supposed to give some constructive feedback!

    Anywho, back to the picture. I don’t really think that there’s anything extraordinary about your picture – it has a lack of depth, nothing really pops out or catches my eyes.
    What you should have done, was to play around with the colors a little, maybe cropping it different, but you should definitely try and play with the angle – a low angle shot could have been quite interesting!
    But keep it up! You’re almost there!

  • http://Bjanas-Eye-Photography.Blogspot.com Bjana Hoey

    Its a good start to the picture, but i think you could of done better with the composition – maybe move the subject all the way to the left. The lighting is a good effect. But theres still nothing that stands out that says AWESOME photo.

  • Jessica

    Thanks
    This photo was for a local band, what was a second time to look at was his stance during the show, and the fact that he was standing on a lighting kit, but having only had one spotlight on him to work with and the fact that I was actually a lot of feet below him, this is what I got :) & I dig it! Thanks

  • Brett

    I think there is too much black around it and I would like to have seen it closer. It’s just too distant for me. Otherwise looks good, the lighting that’s on him looks nice.

    • Jessica

      I thought the same but seeing as the lighting guys on the set had him spotlighted, I thought it looked odd vertical. With action shots you get what you can :) thanks!

  • http://technology.johnsamuel.in John Samuel

    I like the cropped photo put in the beginning of the post. Since the neck of the guitar is long,the photo should not have been centered. In the cropped photo, the tip of the guitar is pointed towards the vertex. Such a cropping was necessary for the main photo.

  • http://www.theschoolforheroes.com Lori Ann Cole

    There is a lot of potential to this image to make it great. To strengthen this image, the first thing I would do is crop it close… really close. From the top of his head to to the tip of the guitar head down to the right hand on the guitar body and then along the right elbow. I believe that the neck of the guitar has enough length to push the picture dramatically into the “rule of thirds” and the expression and energy of the musician will really pop.

  • http://www.uppercrustmilwaukee.com MaximRivers

    Here’s something I haven’t seen mentioned and might help with everyone’s desire to un-center the subject.

    Part of what is weird is how the subject’s feet are on a flat surface, but the whole photo is slightly tilted. By slightly rotating the image and just a little bit of cropping you can keep him in the middle and it doesn’t feel so awkward.

    Suddenly he’s more commanding and the center placement feels grand rather than clumsy. .

    Just a thought :-p

    • Jessica

      Good thought, I had the same! Tried it and didn’t like it :) the joy of subjectivity

  • bArt

    I like the lightning of the subject in the photo, but in my humble opinion this is no composition… Everybody with a good camera and some camera knowledge can take this picture (with some luck maybe). Like said before cropping would do great and make the difference. I think there are a number of ways you can crop and make it look good. Now it’s just ‘a’ photo….
    Alltough you speak of an action photo, there is not much action going on, its to static… cropping would also solve this.
    Overall it’s a good picture camera technically speaking, composition wise it’s not.
    It also seems that you are listening to the critiques given but always answer with ‘tried but didn’t liked it’. It seems you didn’t try enough

  • http://photo.nowhere.no Stein H

    Nice photo, Jessica. You’ve captured the subject well and the light is good. I do however think that the image could do with some cropping. Here’s a quick example: http://photo.nowhere.no/_tmp/original_sh-edit.jpg