Recent Senior Session

primedigital

These shots are from a recent senior portrait session that I did. You can view the gallery here http://www.primedigitalphotography.com/gallery/2943351

The password is egg roll, and no I'm not a racist. The girl's mom brought me a great big batch of home-made egg rolls when we did the shoot. They were delicious!

Most of these shots were done with 2 550ex's mounted on one light stand and a shoot through umbrella. Some with just ambient light and a 40" silver reflector and a few with both.

Any comments and criticisms are greatly appreciated.

DigiGrin

Well done .. she sure has alot to choose from ..

I liked your site .. I bookmarked it for future ref?
I'd kina like to do somethng very similar to that.
Bout time I've run across a very easy and quick to navigate site.

mr peas

lol, it just happens to be 'egg roll' when the subject is asian. haha.

nah even i dont find that to be demeaning, i love egg rolls, .

cute subject. good lighting. i particularly like the bokeh on some of the close ups. i liked the way you properly mixed the natural lighting with flash.

i would like to add though, to pay attention to detail on her hair, sometimes a few strands of hair are sort of on their own and not flat along with the rest of her hair (pg9), if that makes any sense. but i know thats hard to keep track of sometimes and perfection cant always be achieved in certain times.

overall, id buy some of the photos if i were her or her parents or friends. definitely.

what lens were you using: f-stops, shutter speeds, flash settings?

primedigital

mr peas wrote:

lol, it just happens to be 'egg roll' when the subject is asian. haha.

nah even i dont find that to be demeaning, i love egg rolls, .

cute subject. good lighting. i particularly like the bokeh on some of the close ups. i liked the way you properly mixed the natural lighting with flash.

i would like to add though, to pay attention to detail on her hair, sometimes a few strands of hair are sort of on their own and not flat along with the rest of her hair (pg9), if that makes any sense. but i know thats hard to keep track of sometimes and perfection cant always be achieved in certain times.

overall, id buy some of the photos if i were her or her parents or friends. definitely.

what lens were you using: f-stops, shutter speeds, flash settings?

Thanks for the kind words. I was aware of the hair issue, but it was alittle windy and I just couldn't keep the hair where I wanted it and make it stay.
I did clone out the most objectionable stray hairs on the images she selected but I wasn't going to retouch60-70 images untill I knew which ones she would select.

As far as camera settings/lens, all of these were shot with a canon 70-200 2.8 IS. Most at iso100 manual mode. I meter with a handheld sekonic when I am shooting with strobes and set my f/stop from there. then I use shutter speed to adjust the brightness of the background. Sometimes it works and some times you have to just bomb the subject with light and stop down more to get darker backgrounds. With two 550's I can get enough light to stop down to f/11 or so and make mid-day look like evening.

I've also discovered that at 100-200mm, you don't have to shoot wide open to get good bokeh. As long as you are reasonably close to the subject, even f/8 will produce a very soft background. Especially on a full frame sensor like the 5D.

DavidTO

I've moved this thread from the Whipping Post, which is for one image per person per week, and is intended for your best work to be whipped. A gallery of stuff is better off here, in People.

primedigital

DavidTO wrote:

I've moved this thread from the Whipping Post, which is for one image per person per week, and is intended for your best work to be whipped. A gallery of stuff is better off here, in People.

Sorry Dave, I guess I should have read the rules. Just thought this would be a good place for C&C. Will I still be notified of responses?

DavidTO

primedigital wrote:

Sorry Dave, I guess I should have read the rules. Just thought this would be a good place for C&C. Will I still be notified of responses?

The thread is here and only here. I encourage you to pick the shot you like the best and put it on the Whipping Post for a good whuppin'. But if you're talking about your subscription to this thread...the forum it's in matters not. A thread is a thread is a thread, and that's what your subscription links to.

saurora

Very nice set of shots, Tracy! You did a fantastic job with the lighting. She is a cute gal and photographs nicely. She did seem a bit uncomfortable posing, especially standing up, and looked awkward in some shots. I picked out some shots I particularly liked and realized alot of the ones I chose she was sitting down. She looked more relaxed in these. My favorites were the ones where she is sitting in front of the green doors. The only thing I noticed is a couple of shots were not as good as they could have been because of trees behind her head (the ones on the bench). Paying attention to background is something I forget to do alot!!! Over all a great job and she sure has lots to pick from. My favs: #1-4, 9, 46, 76, 94-96 with 88-90 being my top picks. Thanks for sharing these with us....always great to see what others are shooting.

Elaine

Beautiful set of a beautiful girl! I didn't get to look at all of them, but it looks like you have a lot of keepers in there! I'm sure she and her family will be very happy. Well done!! Love your site!

Bodley

primedigital wrote:

Sometimes it works and some times you have to just bomb the subject with light and stop down more to get darker backgrounds. With two 550's I can get enough light to stop down to f/11 or so and make mid-day look like evening.

Were these shot using two 550's? What about diffusers? I've had a hard time in mid-day sun with my 580/550's unless it's just for fill.

~Jan~

Wow, I think you captured some really, REALLY great shots. NICE JOB! I have some ideas in my head now for my own future shoots.

Maybe I'm incorrect here, because I'm NOT a professional, but 125 pictures seems like an awful lot for proofs! Do you think it's better to choose the best out of the poses that are similar and show them?

~Jan~

Okay I just looked at your galleries and you do something I really like. You have your portfolio galleries going across...mine go down. How do I fix that?