All time best -- Child Portrait

rutt

I've been playing a little game with myself recently, inspired by this dgrin forum. Suppose I had to pick just one photograph in a particular category to represent myself. The best single shot of that sort that I ever took. It's an interesting excercise (though of course ultimately pointless) to figure out what makes for your best work. It's hard and cruel, like having to pick your favorite child. But unlike that excercise, this one does enforce a certain discipline. It's also very fun for me to dig though my shots. I've found lots of good ones that I didn't love at the time for some reason or another.

As a first step, I made a smugmug gallery for my all time best portraits. Then I forced myself to pick just one.... Well, I couldn't quite do that, so I changed the rules a little. Here is my all time best child portrait. I'll start another thread for all time best adults.

lynnma

rutt wrote:

I've been playing a little game with myself recently, inspired by this dgrin forum. Suppose I had to pick just one photograph in a particular category to represent myself. The best single shot of that sort that I ever took. It's an interesting excercise (though of course ultimately pointless) to figure out what makes for your best work. It's hard and cruel, like having to pick your favorite child. But unlike that excercise, this one does enforce a certain discipline. It's also very fun for me to dig though my shots. I've found lots of good ones that I didn't love at the time for some reason or another.

As a first step, I made a smugmug gallery for my all time best portraits. Then I forced myself to pick just one.... Well, I couldn't quite do that, so I changed the rules a little. Here is my all time best child portrait. I'll start another thread for all time best adults.

Its wonderful....what more can I say? looking forward to seeing the others.
Lynn

Win38-55

One of my nephews.

tmlphoto

Child Portrait
Here's mine.

lynnma

tmlphoto wrote:

Here's mine.

Nice shot tmlphoto.. is it a tad blurry? or is it my old eyes.. lovely colors and beautiful baby..
welcome!
Lynn:D

DoctorIt

not quite a portrait, but by far best child shot in my collection:

DoctorIt

lynnma wrote:

Nice shot tmlphoto.. is it a tad blurry? or is it my old eyes.. lovely colors and beautiful baby..
welcome!
Lynn:D

I think thats called "soft", no? You're right though hard to tell, too many baby shots are altered in photoshop to be all angelic and soft. Not to my liking, but hey. The shot in question looks just a touch soft, without being really out of focus or too touched up.

Sandy

Kids are great subjects. This was taken at Chucky Cheese.

tmlphoto

Soft

DoctorIt wrote:

I think thats called "soft", no? You're right though hard to tell, too many baby shots are altered in photoshop to be all angelic and soft. Not to my liking, but hey. The shot in question looks just a touch soft, without being really out of focus or too touched up.

I magnified the image. The sharpest point seems to be the nose with the rest of the head slightly soft. I'm not sure if I was using autofocus or not. Do you think I need to manual focus these types of shots? I did crop & clone background flowers in PS but no blur filter. Does any body have any tricks to ensure sharp focus on the eyes for portraits when using a wide aperture in order to blur the background? Does the whole head need to be in sharp focus? Your thoughts would be appreciated.

TML

Xcellenc

This subject makes it easy
.

DoctorIt

tmlphoto wrote:

I magnified the image. The sharpest point seems to be the nose with the rest of the head slightly soft. I'm not sure if I was using autofocus or not. Do you think I need to manual focus these types of shots? I did crop & clone background flowers in PS but no blur filter. Does any body have any tricks to ensure sharp focus on the eyes for portraits when using a wide aperture in order to blur the background? Does the whole head need to be in sharp focus? Your thoughts would be appreciated.

TML

Really depends what you are going for. In his nature photography books, John Shaw makes a big deal about hitting the focus on the eyes of the subject. Especially when its in motion, blur is ok, but if you nail it in the eyes, you'll have a good picture.

As for tricks... do you have a depth of field preview on your cam? This will ensure that you have all of what you want in focus.

rutt

DoctorIt wrote:

Really depends what you are going for. In his nature photography books, John Shaw makes a big deal about hitting the focus on the eyes of the subject. Especially when its in motion, blur is ok, but if you nail it in the eyes, you'll have a good picture.

As for tricks... do you have a depth of field preview on your cam? This will ensure that you have all of what you want in focus.

Maybe a little sharpening would help this image. I know babies have beautiful smooth skin, but there is so little detail here that it makes the image look a little soft. You could also try the green channel trick I posted I posted. What works for flat faces might also work for the whole baby.

By the way, it is such a good baby picture, that I didn't notice the softness until I read about it. It's a fine ATB the way it is, but maybe there is also a lesson here.

AltPro

tmlphoto wrote:

I magnified the image. The sharpest point seems to be the nose with the rest of the head slightly soft. I'm not sure if I was using autofocus or not. Do you think I need to manual focus these types of shots? I did crop & clone background flowers in PS but no blur filter. Does any body have any tricks to ensure sharp focus on the eyes for portraits when using a wide aperture in order to blur the background? Does the whole head need to be in sharp focus? Your thoughts would be appreciated.

TML

TML:

Forgive me for jumping in here, I’m new to this forum, and don’t want to seem pushy… but maybe this might help?

The “Baby Photo” is really a nice photo, but I agree with the consensus that it is “soft” (aka blurry). Since you say you PS’d in the flowers in the background it is difficult to judge exactly what your aperture was but I am guessing 5.6? Were I to do this “shot” I would critical focus the eyes, this would allow the balance of the face to fall into focus, and not get soft until the ears.

Also, if you are using Photoshop, you can visually enhance what focus you do have by simply bumping up the contrast by 1 or 2 notches.

Hope some of this is of interest.

I remain,
ginette

through the lens, ltd

AltPro

rutt wrote:

I've been playing a little game with myself recently, inspired by this dgrin forum. Suppose I had to pick just one photograph in a particular category to represent myself. The best single shot of that sort that I ever took. It's an interesting excercise (though of course ultimately pointless) to figure out what makes for your best work. It's hard and cruel, like having to pick your favorite child. But unlike that excercise, this one does enforce a certain discipline. It's also very fun for me to dig though my shots. I've found lots of good ones that I didn't love at the time for some reason or another.

As a first step, I made a smugmug gallery for my all time best portraits. Then I forced myself to pick just one.... Well, I couldn't quite do that, so I changed the rules a little. Here is my all time best child portrait. I'll start another thread for all time best adults.


I Love It!! Unbelievable expression, terrific composition, and color.

Great job.

I remain, humbly
ginette

bikehiker

I hope I'm not out of place here but I've got a favorite child portrait I'd like to share too. It's a couple years old and scanned in but is still my favorite.

rutt

bikehiker wrote:

I hope I'm not out of place here but I've got a favorite child portrait I'd like to share too. It's a couple years old and scanned in but is still my favorite.

Welcome. I can see what you like about this one. It has that certain something.

tmlphoto

Sharpen filter

tmlphoto wrote:

Here's mine.

Here is a sharper version with the "Sharpen More" filter in PS. Which do you like better. It did seem to make it much sharper. But I'm not sure if I don't like the first one better. Maybe just an intermediate sharpening filter would be best.

I seems that maybe I need to manual focus these shots. I'm afraid that the autofocus will pick up the nose, rather than the eyes. It's difficult however with a moving child. Maybe a slightly smaller aperture?? This was F6.7 at 1/180s ISO 100. I will try Rutts green channel trick when I get some more time. I'm not very proficient at PS yet.

TML

rutt

tmlphoto wrote:

Here is a sharper version with the "Sharpen More" filter in PS. Which do you like better. It did seem to make it much sharper. But I'm not sure if I don't like the first one better. Maybe just an intermediate sharpening filter would be best.

I seems that maybe I need to manual focus these shots. I'm afraid that the autofocus will pick up the nose, rather than the eyes. It's difficult however with a moving child. Maybe a slightly smaller aperture?? This was F6.7 at 1/180s ISO 100. I will try Rutts green channel trick when I get some more time. I'm not very proficient at PS yet.

TML

Try using the sharpen tool on her eyes. It needs a light touch, but if ther is a glint at all it will help a lot.

"Sharpen more" is a very blunt tool compared to the "unsharp mask" which gives you very fine control.

Here is what I do:

1. Image->Mode->LAB (so you can sharpen without color effects)
2. Channels: select L and make all visibal by checking the eye for LAB
3. Find an interesting part of the image (eyes and hair, e.g.) and zoom in 100%
4. Filters->Unsharp Mask
5. Set the amount to 500 for now (it's going to look ugly for now, don't worry)
6. Set threshold to 0 for now (ditto)
7. Find a good radius. You want the largest value that doesn't lose detail. So the halos for the individual hairs shouldn't overlap.
8. Find a good threshold. You want the lowest vlue avoids noise in plaches you don't want it.
9. Find a good amount. You want the hightest value where it down't look fake. Maybe a little higher if you are going to view at reduced size on the web, maybe a little less if you are going to have poster sized prints made.
10. Viola

For portraits of older people (over say 10) or people with makeup, you may want to try one of Dan Margulis's best tricks -- sharpen in CMYK mode on the black and cyan channels. Skin detail tends to be in the M and Y channels and hair and eye detail tends to be tin the C and K channels. So this trick avoids the leather skin effect.

You can learn everyting (and more) that you ever wanted to know about sharpening form Dan Margulis's book, "Professional Photoshop" This is really a must have for anyone trying to make realistic prints with photoshop.

tmlphoto

Thanks

rutt wrote:

Try using the sharpen tool on her eyes. It needs a light touch, but if ther is a glint at all it will help a lot.

"Sharpen more" is a very blunt tool compared to the "unsharp mask" which gives you very fine control.

Here is what I do:

1. Image->Mode->LAB (so you can sharpen without color effects)
2. Channels: select L and make all visibal by checking the eye for LAB
3. Find an interesting part of the image (eyes and hair, e.g.) and zoom in 100%
4. Filters->Unsharp Mask
5. Set the amount to 500 for now (it's going to look ugly for now, don't worry)
6. Set threshold to 0 for now (ditto)
7. Find a good radius. You want the largest value that doesn't lose detail. So the halos for the individual hairs shouldn't overlap.
8. Find a good threshold. You want the lowest vlue avoids noise in plaches you don't want it.
9. Find a good amount. You want the hightest value where it down't look fake. Maybe a little higher if you are going to view at reduced size on the web, maybe a little less if you are going to have poster sized prints made.
10. Viola

For portraits of older people (over say 10) or people with makeup, you may want to try one of Dan Margulis's best tricks -- sharpen in CMYK mode on the black and cyan channels. Skin detail tends to be in the M and Y channels and hair and eye detail tends to be tin the C and K channels. So this trick avoids the leather skin effect.

You can learn everyting (and more) that you ever wanted to know about sharpening form Dan Margulis's book, "Professional Photoshop" This is really a must have for anyone trying to make realistic prints with photoshop.

Thanks for the great advice. I'll try and dive into Photoshop and see if I can make it work. I thinks I'll check out the Margulis book on Amazon.com as well. Again, thanks for everyones input.

TML

Sandy

Here is another child.

Wings

Kids in Saudi

wxwax

So you're in Saudi Arabia right now? Careful, I think I hear ticking from the second one on the left.

Wings

Hell no I'm not in Saudi. A friend took this in October of '02, I just liked the pic.

wxwax

Damn straight.

Kolya

My Daughter
Here's my portrait.



Cheers,
Kolya
http://kolya.smugmug.com

komet

A lazy spring blossoms....

komet

My favorite picture...

AltPro

Kolya wrote:

Here's my portrait.



Cheers,
Kolya
http://kolya.smugmug.com

Kolya,
What a beautiful portrait. Great balance and composition, well placed for movement of the viewer, and You captured a wonderful expression.

bowKudos!clap
ginette

Bryan

Ok, here is my favorite so far. I shot this right after getting my digital Rebel. I have only had the camera a couple months, and I LOVE IT.

I call it the "The Face of Autism"



And this pic does tell a great story for our family :-)

cmr164

Some work required.....
So I need to dig up the original tiff, crop out the group to the left while cloning some grass over the adult's arm....

GREAPER

my nephew and god son