 Michael Wasson |
My First Engagement Portraits I had my first engagement Potrait session a couple of weeks ago. I was a little nervous at first but once we got started it went very smooth. The best part is the couple was very pleased with the results. All are welcome to take a look and give any feedback. I took several more than what I have here but this is a good sampling of some of the better shots. Thanks for any feedback. http://www.betterphoto.com/gallery/free/gallery.php?memberID=163008
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Mark Feldstein |
Howdy Michael: I thought of a few things as I looked at your three shots but certainly if this is a first attempt at this kind of work, you did just fine. IMO, your lighting is a bit on the flat side, no shadows so to me, the lighting is well, dull. The poses, however I think are fine although next time, move them around (if you haven't already) and try different poses, different angles etc. The other thing is it appears to me the guy has rather large ears. There are a couple of ways you can avoid showing how large they may be by changing the camera angle, having him turn his head so both ears aren't quite so apparent, or having his betrothed put her face against his and have him turn his head toward the opposite side. The important thing is to shoot portraits as much as you can, experiment with poses and lighting, and keep asking a lot of questions.
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Michael Wasson |
Thanks for the feedback Mark. I did use a flash bracket to avoid shadows. So my question is in most standard Portraits(although I know there are exceptions) don't you want to avoid shadows? How do you decide when they would be appropriate?
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Denyse Clark |
Hey Michael- nice job!! I have a friend who does this for a living and her shots stink compared to your! lol, seriously! Mark- good call on the big ears, hahaha. I think Engagement 3 is my favorite, and partly it is because his head is turned in a way that his ears are less noticeable. Purposely posing to adjust for ackward features takes a while to master I'm sure. I certainly haven't figured it out yet! Great job, if they were my engagement pics I'd be happy. Hey, you don't happen to be in Western NY do you?
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Mark Feldstein |
Actually Michael, while you can fight to avoid them, shadows in varying degrees enhance a photograpy. They can impart drama, effect mood, impact feelings, just like the lighting effects in the old black and white movies, for example flicks with Peter Lorre and Bella Lugosi as Dracula. So part of controlling light is to be able to either cast a shadow or block your lighting to produce one when necessary for effect. You can do that in a lot of ways including using modifiers like softboxes or umbrellas, reflector panels, small or large, and also in the way you position people to the lighting source or each other in their posing. When you use a modifier like a large softbox, you can block portions of the front of the box using some cardboard or fomecore taped to the front to produce shadows. There are fancier pieces of gear to use of course, but you can take strips of opaque materials to trim down the light output or control it better and produce special effects.
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