Cattleman ... Could use some feedback please

DaddyO

Could use some of your specialized feedback as I rarely take images of people (hence I never post in people) and I don't do B&W efforts with people often enough in PP to get what I feel is more right than not. Would love some suggestions, advice or whatever you care to give. I have a new to me monitor and I think it may be about 5% too bright so this work in progress result maybe too dark :scratch
Thanks much Michael

Bryce Wilson

The subject has a lot of character. Perfect for black and white processing. I like the composition.

I think the image would be improved quite a bit if there were more separation between the subject and the background. His gnarly beard gets almost completely lost. I noticed by the EXIF that you were using Ap Priority and pattern metering. When doing "portrait" type work, the idea is to showcase the subject and allow them to jump off the image, spot metering may have been a better choice so you could expose for just the subjects face. Manual may have even been better, and off camera flash may have even been better than that.

I would be interested in seeing the image in full color to see if the separation is there because of color differences that isn't happening in the mono version.

theprincereturns

Agree with Bryce. Maybe you could play with some of the color chanels on BW conversion to see if you can reduce the background a bit. Subject is great though.

DaddyO

Bryce Wilson wrote: »

The subject has a lot of character. Perfect for black and white processing. I like the composition.

I think the image would be improved quite a bit if there were more separation between the subject and the background. His gnarly beard gets almost completely lost. I noticed by the EXIF that you were using Ap Priority and pattern metering. When doing "portrait" type work, the idea is to showcase the subject and allow them to jump off the image, spot metering may have been a better choice so you could expose for just the subjects face. Manual may have even been better, and off camera flash may have even been better than that.

I would be interested in seeing the image in full color to see if the separation is there because of color differences that isn't happening in the mono version.

Really nice feedback Thank you. All I have is a handful of excuses why I chose my settings. Won't get into that :D:D
From crw original... No time for comp. Its was just get an image where it lives or don't get it. Another
excuse Gads

DaddyO

theprincereturns wrote: »

Agree with Bryce. Maybe you could play with some of the color chanels on BW conversion to see if you can reduce the background a bit. Subject is great though.

Thank you very much I will go back fairly straight away and try that very thing. Appreciate your thoughts

DaddyO

Hmmm This in the range of following suggestion or is it just a different look that is equally unflattering? Do I give it a rest a couple of days and then quit B&W's all together?