Salon Head Shots

kdog

Hey ya'll, I need a quick critique. I got invited by a salon to take some B&W headshots of their work. Honestly I haven't done a lot of B&W, so I thought I'd throw these out there for feedback before I go off and process more from the shoot. Comments appreciated!

1


2


3


4


Thanks for looking.

kdog

One more, in color, just for me.

Qarik

1st one needs a touch more contrast imo.
3rd one needs the a littl emore detail in the hair that is falling on the left side of her face (the longer hair).

Otherwise pretty damn good!

kdog

Thanks, Daniel! Good points.

zoomer

Looks like some fun girls, good shots except two.
My work monitor is crap so can't speak to the tones.

DarkShadow

I think these are gorgeous Shots and love the catch light in the eyes. Nice work!

kdog

zoomer wrote: »

Looks like some fun girls, good shots except two.
My work monitor is crap so can't speak to the tones.

Thanks, Mike! I know that #2 has its issues, but I really like the dynamics. Appreciate you checking in.

divamum

Very nice. My only nit is the comp on #2, but other than that, super set!

jonh68

As portraits these are great. However, if the intent was to show off the hair, some light for highlights would have been good.

kdog

DarkShadow wrote: »

I think these are gorgeous Shots and love the catch light in the eyes. Nice work!

Thanks, DarkShadow!

kdog

divamum wrote: »

Very nice. My only nit is the comp on #2, but other than that, super set!

Thanks, Diva! Like I told Zoomer, I know #2 has a few nits, but overall I thought the comp works even though it violates the "looking out of the frame" rule. Is that the issue you have with it? Her facial expression isn't ideal either, I know. Too many hair dryers pointed at their head will do that to a person.

kdog

jonh68 wrote: »

As portraits these are great. However, if the intent was to show off the hair, some light for highlights would have been good.

Thanks, Jon! I would have liked to draw out more highlights in their hair. What kind of lighting are you thinking? A hair light? I figured a hairlight would be superfluous or even detrimental in a high key setup. Definitely open to suggestions for next time.

Hackbone

Instead of more light try dodging in some highlights.

divamum

It's actually her chopped off arm/shoulder camera left that bugs me - if the whole body was there, I'd be fine with where she's looking (It's the kind of shot that if I had another frame WITH that arm, I'd probably composite them together so I could recrop to taste....)

kdog

Hackbone wrote: »

Instead of more light try dodging in some highlights.

Yep. Good idea, Charles. I did play around with that on the B&W's, and wasn't particularly successful in coaxing out the highlights. But I just took a run at it with a color image and laid it on pretty heavy. See what you think.

kdog

divamum wrote: »

It's actually her chopped off arm/shoulder camera left that bugs me - if the whole body was there, I'd be fine with where she's looking (It's the kind of shot that if I had another frame WITH that arm, I'd probably composite them together so I could recrop to taste....)

Thanks, Diva. Funny how we see things differently. To me the crop has just enough of the arms so that the hands aren't coming out of nowhere while keeping her head as large as possible. But that's just my own half-baked logic and I value your perspective.

divamum

I'm talking right>left, btw - vertically, it's fine. It's just that she feels like she's falling out of the left side of the image to me

kdog

How's this, better?



Funny, I had actually cropped a bit off the left to make it fit into an 8x10 crop. Guess maybe that was dumb in retrospect, huh?

Thanks!

jonh68

kdog wrote: »

Thanks, Jon! I would have liked to draw out more highlights in their hair. What kind of lighting are you thinking? A hair light? I figured a hairlight would be superfluous or even detrimental in a high key setup. Definitely open to suggestions for next time.

It doesn't have to be powerful, just something to give a touch of light to the hair.

zoomer

problem with 2 is her expresssion. she looks tense and not flattering

divamum

Better. If it were my shot, I'd still go further (ymmv); easy peasy to extend the canvas/add fill layer/gradient tool to feather it to just where you need it on that side so there's just a bit of white bg to the left + tiny cloning job to fill in the tiny bit of arm and done (under 3 minutes to do that, I'd say - sounds more complicated than it is!!)

If it needs to be 8x10, liquify the flying hair so it's "shorter", then crop from the right side instead

YMMV, of course - that's just what I would do. Then again, I'm kind of a crop freak

kdog

jonh68 wrote: »

It doesn't have to be powerful, just something to give a touch of light to the hair.

Thanks, Jon. I'll try that next time.

kdog

zoomer wrote: »

problem with 2 is her expresssion. she looks tense and not flattering

Thanks, I know. :cry But I like the hair flying in that one.

divamum wrote: »

Better. If it were my shot, I'd still go further (ymmv); easy peasy to extend the canvas/add fill layer/gradient tool to feather it to just where you need it on that side so there's just a bit of white bg to the left + tiny cloning job to fill in the tiny bit of arm and done (under 3 minutes to do that, I'd say - sounds more complicated than it is!!)

If it needs to be 8x10, liquify the flying hair so it's "shorter", then crop from the right side instead

YMMV, of course - that's just what I would do. Then again, I'm kind of a crop freak

Yeah, that's doable. However these were just a few quick teasers from the shoot that I grabbed randomly. I'm letting the salon pick any shots they want touched up out of almost 400 proofs from the shoot and I'll spend the effort there. Really I just wanted to see if I was on the right track in general with the look of these and it sounds like I am. Always enjoy your critical eye.

Hackbone

Like it alot.

kdog

Hackbone wrote: »

Like it alot.

Yeah, me too. Thanks for the idea.