It breaks a lot of rules

Dionysus

but, I dunno, for some reason I still like how it turned out. Maybe I'm biased

Morris On Location

i do like...
biased eh?..well maybe not..I do like the picture.. if you cropped it even closer on the right and extended the black on the left it would look like a CD cover...although i do find myself wishing his other arm wasn't even in the picture so we could see more of his instrument..but that may only be because I really like how the light looks on it..

all in all.. i still like how it turned out too.

pyry

I like it too, quite an enigmatic picture

Dionysus

lol that he is me...i had to take a self portrait for the bio. thanks for the positive comments though!

Qarik

what rules? it looks like great capture to me. really nice dramatic lighting an d posing

divamum

Absolutely love it. Great publicity shot! (do I detect another photographing musician on the forum - wheee! Safety in numbers!! )

My only nit is the missing left fingers, but I think the eyes make up for it. You could try cropping it out, however, and see how that works (You know they'll crop it for a program anyway, so you may as well!)

Dionysus wrote:

but, I dunno, for some reason I still like how it turned out. Maybe I'm biased

Angelo

Dionysus wrote:

but, I dunno, for some reason I still like how it turned out.

because it's good!

Darren Troy C

Nice image!

Icebear

I like it too. If it were mine though, I think I'd bring out a little more detail in the left side (as viewed) of the instrument. The data is there. You can see it. As far as the crop, I think I'd give the image to any publication uncropped. As has already been noted, they'll crop it anyway. For my own preference though, I think I'd crop it up to the bridge, and lose the cut-off fingers of your left hand.

Again, a very nice image.

Dionysus

by broken rules I just meant that ideally, if i could do this shot again, I wouldn't have cut off the scroll of my cello, nor would I have my left side all the way to the right to the point of being cut off, and my left fingers wouldnt be cut off.

But I like it because my eyes came out really well, and the cut off hand seems to balance out with the cut off scroll. and i really love how the lighting came out, especially on the cello.

I was going mad last night trying to capture the right photo for the bio. I must have shot a hundred photos, just to get this one i liked. The rest were compositionally superior, but this one I loved above all due to the character, and the slight hint of mischief in my eyes, which is who I am.

Thanks all for the positive comments. It's always hard sharing a photo like this one, because I feel like I did everything wrong in it, but it still came out as a personal favorite.

Thanks again!

PS- everything I am is Music, Martial Arts, and now, Photography. On the music side I started with guitar when I was really young, piano, found the cello in my early 20's (now it is what i consider MY instrument: the instrument i was meant to play). I also play the violin, and have dabbled w/ sax and clarinet, but I found that I am a strings guy all the way.

Andrew Gould

I like it. Who cares about the rules... Excellent capture of the tonal range in this strong image.

Scott_Quier

Angelo wrote:

Dionysus wrote:

but, I dunno, for some reason I still like how it turned out. Maybe I'm biased

because it's good!

- Very good capture. Divamum has what I think is a good idea - cropping from the bottom. But, only a little - maybe across the knuckles.

The tonal range in this B&W is just so spot-on, and the eyes .... WOW. I think you nailed it!

Hackbone

Very nice, I agree with others loose your left hand. The scroll doesn't bother me. It will look great on a CD cover. Yo Yo move over!!

Dionysus

so what's the consensus? crop it where, at the bridge? right above the knuckles?