1st portrait shots & 1st post!

work2fish

Hello folks,

I am a new member and really like what I've seen so far! I have been in photography since my junior high school days, primarily on the technical side and I could use some help on composition and creativity. I was drawn to this site through smugmug and was hooked when I went through some of the past picture challenges -- there is some real talent here!

I am an avid fisherman who hails from Denver, Colorado area and I love the mountains. As a kid, I had a rangefinder camera that my dad passed along to me, a Canon QL19 and I saved up and bought a venerable Canon AE-1 when I was in my teens. I kept that camera for a while, then purchased a Nikon SLR in my 30s and then went digital by way of point and shoots (Sony F-707 & 828). Last December, I bought my first DSLR, a Canon 40D. I've taken over 2500 shots with it so far which is about as many as I've taken with my last Sony in 2 years time! I guess high fps can really increase the number of shots taken...

I decided to take my first portrait shots which I will share as my first post. I was using my dad's background and lighting equipment. Looking back, I probably should have increased the ISO a bit to increase the shutter speed and close the aperture a bit to deepen the depth of field.

50mm, 1/30th, f/1.8, ISO 100:


50mm, 1/40th, f/1.8, ISO 100:


50mm, 1/30th, f/1.8, ISO 100:



C&C welcome...

dangin

first off, welcome! and there's nothing like a good ol' canon ae-1. it's a great camera!

alright, so onto the images... first off, shooting f/1.8 can be tricky at best. that shallow depth of field may be great for fighting off low light but it's tough on portraits. each of the images lack good sharpness. shooting portraits, you really ought deepen your depth of field. i tend to shoot f/8 - f/11. also, the low shutter speeds may be contributing to the overall softness of the images. i'd recommend no longer than 1/60 if you're not using strobes. but these are both things you know.

*if* you do want to shoot at a shallow DOF, then i suggest changing the camera's perspective to a higher plane where you're looking down on your subject.

otherwise, your snooted off camera lighting is a nice touch. you should probably take a 1/2 step back or so when composing so that you can allow for an 8x10 crop of your images as well.

work2fish

Thanks for the tips and welcome, dangin! After further review of the images in PP, I realized I was a bit to shallow with the depth of field. I guess I was thinking to blur the background as much as possible and keep the subject especially noise free through low ISO.

Next time I will take your advice to heart...