Focused

dongjcdongjc Registered Users Posts: 10 Big grins
edited January 28, 2012 in Street and Documentary
First post here in Street & PJ forum. I've browsed the forums quite a bit and do a little bit of shooting myself, so wanted to have a go with it =D. Any C&C is welcome!

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Comments

  • richardmanrichardman Registered Users Posts: 376 Major grins
    edited January 27, 2012
    Before any one who may ask, it's a didjeridu, didgeridoo, or Yidaki, an Aboriginal instrument that's basically a hollow tube. From the look of it, it would appear to be an American made piece rather than from Australia and possibly split and hollowed and glued back.

    With that out of the way :-) Street performers are great starting subject since they don't move much and they expect people to pay attention to them. OTOH, for the same reasons, you probably want to venture out of the "comfort zone" after a bit.

    With this particular image, I'd crop off the woman on the right, and dodge the person's face in under the hat. The picture is also tilted as well so may want to adjust.

    The kid is probably your most interesting prospect and I would have taken more interaction between the kid and the busker. Generally speaking, you are a bit too far away.

    But it's a good snap shot. You got some interesting characters.

    Keep shooting.
    "Some People Drive, We Are Driven"
    // richard <http://www.richardmanphoto.com&gt;
    richardmanphoto on Facebook and Instagram
  • Quincy TQuincy T Registered Users Posts: 1,090 Major grins
    edited January 27, 2012
    richardman wrote: »
    Before any one who may ask, it's a didjeridu, didgeridoo, or Yidaki, an Aboriginal instrument that's basically a hollow tube. From the look of it, it would appear to be an American made piece rather than from Australia and possibly split and hollowed and glued back.

    With that out of the way :-) Street performers are great starting subject since they don't move much and they expect people to pay attention to them. OTOH, for the same reasons, you probably want to venture out of the "comfort zone" after a bit.

    With this particular image, I'd crop off the woman on the right, and dodge the person's face in under the hat. The picture is also tilted as well so may want to adjust.

    The kid is probably your most interesting prospect and I would have taken more interaction between the kid and the busker. Generally speaking, you are a bit too far away.

    But it's a good snap shot. You got some interesting characters.

    Keep shooting.

    Hey, look at that, now I don't even have to write a post.

    +1
  • RSLRSL Registered Users Posts: 839 Major grins
    edited January 27, 2012
    Hi Don?,

    Notice that the brightest part of the picture is the collection of tent roofs off to the right. That's where your eye goes first. The tonality of the picture never draws your eye toward the guy with the yidaki, and he's critical to the composition. I'd guess you intended the kid in the stroller to be the central point of the picture, but there's way too much clutter around him to let him stand out. It was a good thought because the way the kid's focussing on the yidaki player, the two of them would have made a picture if they could have been segregated from the rest of the crowd. But with the cluttered background, nothing, not even f/1.4, could have done that. You had a good idea though. Keep shooting.
    Russ Lewis
    www.FineArtSnaps.com
  • RichardRichard Administrators, Vanilla Admin Posts: 19,961 moderator
    edited January 27, 2012
    Good start. I wonder what you could have gotten had you been shooting from his other side, which would have gotten that tree into the background and made the whole instrument visible. Of course, it's always easy to second-guess--maybe there was an orange garbage truck behind you. mwink.gif. Street musicians usually make it easy to work the scene, i.e., take a number of shots from different angles and distances. Just be sure to drop something into the cup. thumb.gif
    My Pics
  • toragstorags Registered Users Posts: 4,615 Major grins
    edited January 27, 2012
    Nice shot.

    Did you consider straightening?

    Welcome aboard (life jacket advised.. :D)
    Rags
  • bfjrbfjr Registered Users Posts: 10,980 Major grins
    edited January 27, 2012
    Welcome wave.gif

    Lot's of good advice already given but I would add that the simple act of getting
    closer to your intended subject will help your captures and raise your excitment level ! :D
    Benjamin
    My Galleries
    Flicker
    G+
  • dongjcdongjc Registered Users Posts: 10 Big grins
    edited January 28, 2012
    richardman wrote: »
    Before any one who may ask, it's a didjeridu, didgeridoo, or Yidaki, an Aboriginal instrument that's basically a hollow tube. From the look of it, it would appear to be an American made piece rather than from Australia and possibly split and hollowed and glued back.

    and dodge the person's face in under the hat. The picture is also tilted as well so may want to adjust.

    The kid is probably your most interesting prospect and I would have taken more interaction between the kid and the busker. Generally speaking, you are a bit too far away.

    But it's a good snap shot. You got some interesting characters.

    Keep shooting.

    I'm impressed with your knowledge of the digeridoo. This was taken in Australia, so I don't know if it's American made or made in Australia.

    I don't know what dodging is as I have zero experience with photoshop. I only use DPP to do light processing.

    My question here (and this can be directed at others who also commented) is I wanted to focus on the kid's intense focus on the performer, but also get the performer to show what she was looking at. Any way to do that or was it just too cluttered?

    Thanks all for the great feedback!
  • richardmanrichardman Registered Users Posts: 376 Major grins
    edited January 28, 2012
    My apology, since you are from Berkeley, I was assuming the photo was taken in US, and we all know what ASSume contains! :-) Since it was in Aus, then chances are it is an Aussie stick.

    Anyway... dodging just mean putting a specific area more light. Not sure what DPP is, but most photo apps should have something similar. It's a term dated back from the darkroom days.


    And yes, it would be best to show the interaction between the kid and the busker. Whether it's doable or not depends on the location and lighting etc. Give what you show here, you probably need to move in crouch down, and may be get to the other side of the bush. If they face each other all the time, then it's difficult to capture both expressions, but perhaps you can move around to achieve that.

    Basically, not so much of "this is where you should be and this is what you should do," but rather, keep playing with the situation. Keep shooting and then see what you get (try not to chimp) and repeat.
    "Some People Drive, We Are Driven"
    // richard <http://www.richardmanphoto.com&gt;
    richardmanphoto on Facebook and Instagram
  • toragstorags Registered Users Posts: 4,615 Major grins
    edited January 28, 2012
    dongjc wrote: »
    I'm impressed with your knowledge of the digeridoo. This was taken in Australia, so I don't know if it's American made or made in Australia.

    I don't know what dodging is as I have zero experience with photoshop. I only use DPP to do light processing.

    My question here (and this can be directed at others who also commented) is I wanted to focus on the kid's intense focus on the performer, but also get the performer to show what she was looking at. Any way to do that or was it just too cluttered?

    Thanks all for the great feedback!

    Can you move the focus point in your camera? If you can, focusing on the player with an fstop of f8 should be enough depth of field to get both the player and the child in focus. Cranking up you contrast will give more definition to the shot (btw good comments here) Moving to the left a little would have reduced the distance between the two
    Rags
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