Gafoto: you might be right. Unfortunately I was working under time constraints, and that idea didnt really formulate in my head until you mentioned it.
I often see shots I wish I had taken or composed differently when I'm looking through things in Picasa. Sucks.
Today was a shit day at work. My coworker and I managed to avoid the worst of the weather for the first half of the day and then we saw a system coming in we couldn't avoid. This is the point where we decided to turn around:
While the rain was busy nuking there were amazing waterfalls all along the road that parallels the Colorado river. Right outside my camp were three waterfalls at least 300 feet tall. I caught this one on the way into town, just after the rain passed:
Nice little mist rainbow in that one.
These are the first photos I've taken with my new 550d. They are all fairly ordinary, but I'm learning a lot! Not sure if they're going to show up huge or not
I love those mossy rocks Long. I miss seeing green. This is the kind of foliage I'm seeing everyday:
Same storm as the picture of the road, just looking at the leading edge.
Did some head shots for a fellow photographer and then my fiance and I started being silly with the lighting setup once we were done with the actual photoshoot.
Yes I am fucking ridiculous. :rotate:
CommunistCow on
No, I am not really communist. Yes, it is weird that I use this name.
I don't really know much about portrait work, but, frustratingly, I'll critique the makeup. With a soft face like she has, I doubt you want to make the eyes so sharp-edged and harsh. I suppose she did the makeup herself, though.
(I've been watching an excessive amount of Project Runway.)
LOL
Yeah she did her own makeup. I also didn't notice the smudged eye shadow/mascara until I was in post. Yet another thing I have to keep an eye out for.
She had very little makeup on to start with but I asked her at least to brighten her lips up a bit as they looked dead.
I took a trip to Sego Canyon today. By far the coolest place so close to an interstate. The canyon is in the Book Cliffs, just a little ways north of I-70. If you have ever driven on I-70 in the eastern half of Utah, you know the cliffs I'm talking about.
The 800 foot tall cliffs around the entrance to the canyon:
These cliffs stretch nearly 200 miles from western CO to central UT.
The main attraction of the canyon is just a couple miles in and is known as the Sego Rock Art Site. The large red figures you see in this panel are of the Barrier Canyon Style and are somewhere between 2000-4000 years old.
Many different cultures have contributed to this panel over the millenia in one form or another. View this panorama at full size, you can't see any of the detail in such a small photo unfortunately.
Near the top of the canyon, just before the Roan Cliffs, aspens are growing. The area is fairly wooded and it was incredible for me to be on BLM land and see so many trees. I saw this carved into one of the aspens:
Near the top of the canyon, just before the Roan Cliffs, aspens are growing. The area is fairly wooded and it was incredible for me to be on BLM land and see so many trees. I saw this carved into one of the aspens:
I'm on an ancient art kick right now so this is really cool.
I doubt the Elk carving is all that ancient at least compared to the rock art. Maybe you're talking about the style?
The top of Sego Canyon is basically a parking lot right now with all of the Elk hunters heading deep into the roadless Roan Cliffs. There were probably 30 Ford F350s with horse trailers parked up there. There was another arborglyph nearby that I snapped a picture of. Not quite as artistic, but still impressive:
It's nice to see something besides "JT SPRINGBREAK 2007" carved into a tree. Kinda makes me want to do some arborglyphs (though I know I should leave the poor aspens alone).
I'm headed up into the mountains tomorrow, I can see the aspens at high elevation are in full swing. It's gonna be gorgeous.
KAJed, a lot of those photos seem a bit too overexposed. It looks like you're trying to use maximum aperture for depth of field, but you need to dial down the shutter speed a bit more. The lighting is really diffused, so you don't really get any definition.
KAJed, a lot of those photos seem a bit too overexposed. It looks like you're trying to use maximum aperture for depth of field, but you need to dial down the shutter speed a bit more. The lighting is really diffused, so you don't really get any definition.
KAJed, a lot of those photos seem a bit too overexposed. It looks like you're trying to use maximum aperture for depth of field, but you need to dial down the shutter speed a bit more. The lighting is really diffused, so you don't really get any definition.
I doubt the Elk carving is all that ancient at least compared to the rock art. Maybe you're talking about the style?
Well, I didn't think they were as old as the rock art, but a couple of hundred years didn't seem unreasonable. I guess you're right though, they're probably much more modern. Still, I love the style. Very cool find.
SheriResident FlufferMy Living RoomRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
KAJed:
I think a few of your shots are pretty unflattering to the model. For example, she's given a double chin in 6. 5 is okay because her head is lifted, but then you're looking up her nose.
I also feel that most of these could be improved with some post processing. Excluding #1, it looks like you haven't really done much to them at all, so all I see are uneven skin and under-eye bags, and a lack of overall color and contrast. Maybe give these a haul through Photoshop and then see how they look. As for #1, I really, really dislike the treatment you've given it. I don't like this particular cross-processing look (and I'm a huge fan of cross processing -- in moderation) -- this one is just unflattering to her skin tone.
I doubt the Elk carving is all that ancient at least compared to the rock art. Maybe you're talking about the style?
Well, I didn't think they were as old as the rock art, but a couple of hundred years didn't seem unreasonable. I guess you're right though, they're probably much more modern. Still, I love the style. Very cool find.
I'm guessing that since the top of Sego Canyon is a major horseback trailhead for Elk hunters that it was some hunter. Could be someone off the Ute reservation though. The tree simply isn't old enough for it to be something outside of the 20th century.
I'm monopolizing this thread something fierce. Not gonna feel bad about it.
A panorama of the Book Cliffs. It's hard to give a sense of scale, but this panorama is probably about 160+ degrees. The cliffs are several thousand feet high.
Best viewed at full size to give you an idea of how damn barren the Cisco desert is.
Schrodinger: There were a few in the set that were a little over exposed, but most of the ones posted show a decent histogram. There are some blown out areas on her dress in #1 though. Also, for MOST shots I try to keep my aperture around 2.8 for a shoot like this. The whole shoot was done with my 50 f/1.8. I find 2.8 offers me good DOF and seems to be one of it's sharpest apertures.
On a note related to the mis-typed polarizer, I was actually going to use one. While it's no ND it still is a little darker (allowing me to keep it at 2.8) and would have helped with some of the color in the shots. I just bought it but I wasn't comfortable having it on my lens for the first time I was doing a shoot like this.
Sheri: Actually I did do some work on the bags under the eyes, but I did not take it in to photoshop at all. I did give her eyes an all round bump though because they were more in shadow than they still are. There are a few shots that I may yet take in to PS and actually do some skin work on though. As for the toning...it's not everyone's cup of tea. I'm not even convinced I like it. I do know that a designer friend of mine loves that look. I'm not sold on it, but I wanted to try it out at least.
Also, I wasn't going for a contrasty look on these. Generally I'm a contrast freak, but I've been trying to move away from strong contrast in every shot I do.
I think my game plan for the next time I'm out like this is to spend WAY more time setting up the shot. I do spent more time on the shutter than I do on the setup. My wife has graciously offered her services, but she despises being in front of the camera so I expect they won't be fantastic.
I appreciate the criticism and comments. I can't get better if I don't know what I'm doing wrong.
EDIT: Also Sheri, I'm no makeup artist, but I did at least ask her to bring some color to her lips after I noticed they were naked. It just wasn't working. I'll have to remember that if I have an amateur model to remind her to at least put concealer under her eyes for a 9am shoot. They got much better as the morning ran down.
Schrodinger: There were a few in the set that were a little over exposed, but most of the ones posted show a decent histogram. There are some blown out areas on her dress in #1 though. Also, for MOST shots I try to keep my aperture around 2.8 for a shoot like this. The whole shoot was done with my 50 f/1.8. I find 2.8 offers me good DOF and seems to be one of it's sharpest apertures.
On a note related to the mis-typed polarizer, I was actually going to use one. While it's no ND it still is a little darker (allowing me to keep it at 2.8) and would have helped with some of the color in the shots. I just bought it but I wasn't comfortable having it on my lens for the first time I was doing a shoot like this.
Sheri: Actually I did do some work on the bags under the eyes, but I did not take it in to photoshop at all. I did give her eyes an all round bump though because they were more in shadow than they still are. There are a few shots that I may yet take in to PS and actually do some skin work on though. As for the toning...it's not everyone's cup of tea. I'm not even convinced I like it. I do know that a designer friend of mine loves that look. I'm not sold on it, but I wanted to try it out at least.
Also, I wasn't going for a contrasty look on these. Generally I'm a contrast freak, but I've been trying to move away from strong contrast in every shot I do.
I think my game plan for the next time I'm out like this is to spend WAY more time setting up the shot. I do spent more time on the shutter than I do on the setup. My wife has graciously offered her services, but she despises being in front of the camera so I expect they won't be fantastic.
I appreciate the criticism and comments. I can't get better if I don't know what I'm doing wrong.
EDIT: Also Sheri, I'm no makeup artist, but I did at least ask her to bring some color to her lips after I noticed they were naked. It just wasn't working. I'll have to remember that if I have an amateur model to remind her to at least put concealer under her eyes for a 9am shoot. They got much better as the morning ran down.
A coworker of mine (who used to be a very prolific photographer before he had a stroke; shot fashion and national campaigns) suggested asking your models to drink just a little bit of lemon juice before they go to bed the night before. Apparently, it helps eliminate under-eye bags.
I understand the whole 'getting away from stuff you always do' mentality, however I feel you've gone too far to the other side. It looks like you haven't bumped ANY contrast. Just because you don't want to over-contrast it doesn't mean you shouldn't at all. This is a situation where contrast would help improve your images. I'm just asking you -- try it. Or let me try it! I'm off all day today, send me a file and let me fiddle with it. There's a happy medium between 'HOLY COW CONTRAST' and 'flat as a pancake.' There's also a happy medium between plastic-looking skin smoothing and absolutely no skin smoothing.
As for the toning, I don't know how you achieved it, but it looks similar to a Nik Color Effects Cross Processing filter. The problem is, it doesn't look like a flattering one. I tend to stick to L02 and L03, which I really love and use in almost all of my photos, but I stay away from the ones with heavy color shifts (in any direction; though yellow is probably the least flattering of those).
It's great that you're thinking ahead to the next shoot, but I still think you can improve these shots with a bit of good photoshop work.
AS for your next shoot: concealer on the under-eye is a good idea, as is a light eyeshadow on under-eye bags. Most girls with makeup (I am not one of them) own a white/light beige/cream eyeshadow. Here's a page with a good step-by-step: http://www.ehow.com/how_6588011_rid-eye-circles-makeup-tricks.html (you could link it to models before you shoot). I also spend WAY more time taking pictures than I do setting them up. That's other people's bag, I tend to like to find the right light and snap away. Not everyone shoots that way, but it works for me; maybe setting up your shots works for you? It's a good time to experiment and find out.
Just for you Sheri I'll do some skin cleanup and bump the contrast on one of my faves and see what you think. I should be able to find some time today.
I don't know what L02, L03 are I do everything in LR3. Is there a preset download I can look at?
I'll have to be more careful about makeup on models in general it's just weird since technically that shouldn't be my job. But of course I don't know a MUA I can borrow sooo.
SheriResident FlufferMy Living RoomRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
Nik Color Effects is a Photoshop plugin. It's super awesome.
Technically, makeup IS your job. If you're the creative mind behind the shoot, makeup is your responsibility, too. Even if you hire a MUA, it's still your job to give that MUA direction, and to know what you want. If you're shooting for a client, that's another story. Same thing if you have a creative director. But if it's just you and a model going out for some pretty photos, yeah, that's your job too. Maybe not in the execution itself, but definitely in the direction.
That is an awesome derail and for anyone who is interested skip to the 15 minute mark for the beginning of the tree story.
KAJed as for the under eye bags I would go with the suggestion of makeup before you try some old wives tales about lemon juice. (Sorry Sheri it just sounds very suspicious) You should also try and do some selective editing with masks in PS. LR is great for a first general pass but it is not a substitute for PS unless you are amazingly good with the adjustment brush tool in LR.
CommunistCow on
No, I am not really communist. Yes, it is weird that I use this name.
Took some pictures of a monster storm system moving across the Cisco Desert today. I tried editing two different pictures. They both leave something to be desired.
I prefer this version, just because it shows the rainfall as a very defined subject.
This version has more foreground interest (there isn't much out in the Cisco Desert to put in the foreground), but the storm had separated out a little more. Also the placement of the horizon makes it slightly funkier.
Posts
Edit: Zuckerberg is kind of a douche so I'm going to play it safe.
Today was a shit day at work. My coworker and I managed to avoid the worst of the weather for the first half of the day and then we saw a system coming in we couldn't avoid. This is the point where we decided to turn around:
While the rain was busy nuking there were amazing waterfalls all along the road that parallels the Colorado river. Right outside my camp were three waterfalls at least 300 feet tall. I caught this one on the way into town, just after the rain passed:
Nice little mist rainbow in that one.
Got some other good ones of people but those are for work.
These are old, I've posted them before but it's kinda funny in a way.
Vignetting like on this lens starts getting pretty noticeable from about 150mm-200mm, it seems.
Ryan M Long Photography
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Here is a peregrine falcon named Mistral.
Ryan M Long Photography
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Same storm as the picture of the road, just looking at the leading edge.
Ryan M Long Photography
Buy my Prints!
Yes I am fucking ridiculous. :rotate:
I've been shooting a lot of comparatively boring stuff to pay the bills lately - no room for creativity. Took a break to shoot some toast:
Here are a few more...
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
http://kaileyjoanette.co.nr
(I've been watching an excessive amount of Project Runway.)
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Yeah she did her own makeup. I also didn't notice the smudged eye shadow/mascara until I was in post. Yet another thing I have to keep an eye out for.
She had very little makeup on to start with but I asked her at least to brighten her lips up a bit as they looked dead.
http://kaileyjoanette.co.nr
The 800 foot tall cliffs around the entrance to the canyon:
These cliffs stretch nearly 200 miles from western CO to central UT.
The main attraction of the canyon is just a couple miles in and is known as the Sego Rock Art Site. The large red figures you see in this panel are of the Barrier Canyon Style and are somewhere between 2000-4000 years old.
Many different cultures have contributed to this panel over the millenia in one form or another. View this panorama at full size, you can't see any of the detail in such a small photo unfortunately.
Near the top of the canyon, just before the Roan Cliffs, aspens are growing. The area is fairly wooded and it was incredible for me to be on BLM land and see so many trees. I saw this carved into one of the aspens:
I'm on an ancient art kick right now so this is really cool.
Not quite. Aspen trees are white.
The top of Sego Canyon is basically a parking lot right now with all of the Elk hunters heading deep into the roadless Roan Cliffs. There were probably 30 Ford F350s with horse trailers parked up there. There was another arborglyph nearby that I snapped a picture of. Not quite as artistic, but still impressive:
It's nice to see something besides "JT SPRINGBREAK 2007" carved into a tree. Kinda makes me want to do some arborglyphs (though I know I should leave the poor aspens alone).
I'm headed up into the mountains tomorrow, I can see the aspens at high elevation are in full swing. It's gonna be gorgeous.
Circular Polarizer could do wonders as well
What would a polarizer do for those shots?
Well, I didn't think they were as old as the rock art, but a couple of hundred years didn't seem unreasonable. I guess you're right though, they're probably much more modern. Still, I love the style. Very cool find.
I think a few of your shots are pretty unflattering to the model. For example, she's given a double chin in 6. 5 is okay because her head is lifted, but then you're looking up her nose.
I also feel that most of these could be improved with some post processing. Excluding #1, it looks like you haven't really done much to them at all, so all I see are uneven skin and under-eye bags, and a lack of overall color and contrast. Maybe give these a haul through Photoshop and then see how they look. As for #1, I really, really dislike the treatment you've given it. I don't like this particular cross-processing look (and I'm a huge fan of cross processing -- in moderation) -- this one is just unflattering to her skin tone.
Sheri Baldwin Photography | Facebook | Twitter | Etsy Shop | BUY ME STUFF (updated for 2014!)
I'm guessing that since the top of Sego Canyon is a major horseback trailhead for Elk hunters that it was some hunter. Could be someone off the Ute reservation though. The tree simply isn't old enough for it to be something outside of the 20th century.
I'm monopolizing this thread something fierce. Not gonna feel bad about it.
A panorama of the Book Cliffs. It's hard to give a sense of scale, but this panorama is probably about 160+ degrees. The cliffs are several thousand feet high.
Best viewed at full size to give you an idea of how damn barren the Cisco desert is.
Here's some more rock art if you're interested:
Anyone using CS 5 know if the magic content aware tools could successfully edit out the front little twiggy branch?
Gafoto, I envy you your aspens.
On a note related to the mis-typed polarizer, I was actually going to use one. While it's no ND it still is a little darker (allowing me to keep it at 2.8) and would have helped with some of the color in the shots. I just bought it but I wasn't comfortable having it on my lens for the first time I was doing a shoot like this.
Sheri: Actually I did do some work on the bags under the eyes, but I did not take it in to photoshop at all. I did give her eyes an all round bump though because they were more in shadow than they still are. There are a few shots that I may yet take in to PS and actually do some skin work on though. As for the toning...it's not everyone's cup of tea. I'm not even convinced I like it. I do know that a designer friend of mine loves that look. I'm not sold on it, but I wanted to try it out at least.
Also, I wasn't going for a contrasty look on these. Generally I'm a contrast freak, but I've been trying to move away from strong contrast in every shot I do.
I think my game plan for the next time I'm out like this is to spend WAY more time setting up the shot. I do spent more time on the shutter than I do on the setup. My wife has graciously offered her services, but she despises being in front of the camera so I expect they won't be fantastic.
I appreciate the criticism and comments. I can't get better if I don't know what I'm doing wrong.
EDIT: Also Sheri, I'm no makeup artist, but I did at least ask her to bring some color to her lips after I noticed they were naked. It just wasn't working. I'll have to remember that if I have an amateur model to remind her to at least put concealer under her eyes for a 9am shoot. They got much better as the morning ran down.
http://kaileyjoanette.co.nr
Speaking of ancient trees, on an unphoto related note, NPR's Radiolab did an awesome story about a really, really old tree. The first half of the segment is on a Harvard experiment, the tree story comes second.
/derail
You could do it with patch and healing brushes fairly easily, although I'm not sure if you really need to.
A coworker of mine (who used to be a very prolific photographer before he had a stroke; shot fashion and national campaigns) suggested asking your models to drink just a little bit of lemon juice before they go to bed the night before. Apparently, it helps eliminate under-eye bags.
I understand the whole 'getting away from stuff you always do' mentality, however I feel you've gone too far to the other side. It looks like you haven't bumped ANY contrast. Just because you don't want to over-contrast it doesn't mean you shouldn't at all. This is a situation where contrast would help improve your images. I'm just asking you -- try it. Or let me try it! I'm off all day today, send me a file and let me fiddle with it. There's a happy medium between 'HOLY COW CONTRAST' and 'flat as a pancake.' There's also a happy medium between plastic-looking skin smoothing and absolutely no skin smoothing.
As for the toning, I don't know how you achieved it, but it looks similar to a Nik Color Effects Cross Processing filter. The problem is, it doesn't look like a flattering one. I tend to stick to L02 and L03, which I really love and use in almost all of my photos, but I stay away from the ones with heavy color shifts (in any direction; though yellow is probably the least flattering of those).
It's great that you're thinking ahead to the next shoot, but I still think you can improve these shots with a bit of good photoshop work.
AS for your next shoot: concealer on the under-eye is a good idea, as is a light eyeshadow on under-eye bags. Most girls with makeup (I am not one of them) own a white/light beige/cream eyeshadow. Here's a page with a good step-by-step: http://www.ehow.com/how_6588011_rid-eye-circles-makeup-tricks.html (you could link it to models before you shoot). I also spend WAY more time taking pictures than I do setting them up. That's other people's bag, I tend to like to find the right light and snap away. Not everyone shoots that way, but it works for me; maybe setting up your shots works for you? It's a good time to experiment and find out.
Sheri Baldwin Photography | Facebook | Twitter | Etsy Shop | BUY ME STUFF (updated for 2014!)
I don't know what L02, L03 are
I'll have to be more careful about makeup on models in general it's just weird since technically that shouldn't be my job. But of course I don't know a MUA I can borrow sooo.
http://kaileyjoanette.co.nr
Technically, makeup IS your job. If you're the creative mind behind the shoot, makeup is your responsibility, too. Even if you hire a MUA, it's still your job to give that MUA direction, and to know what you want. If you're shooting for a client, that's another story. Same thing if you have a creative director. But if it's just you and a model going out for some pretty photos, yeah, that's your job too. Maybe not in the execution itself, but definitely in the direction.
Sheri Baldwin Photography | Facebook | Twitter | Etsy Shop | BUY ME STUFF (updated for 2014!)
http://kaileyjoanette.co.nr
That is an awesome derail and for anyone who is interested skip to the 15 minute mark for the beginning of the tree story.
KAJed as for the under eye bags I would go with the suggestion of makeup before you try some old wives tales about lemon juice. (Sorry Sheri it just sounds very suspicious) You should also try and do some selective editing with masks in PS. LR is great for a first general pass but it is not a substitute for PS unless you are amazingly good with the adjustment brush tool in LR.
I prefer this version, just because it shows the rainfall as a very defined subject.
This version has more foreground interest (there isn't much out in the Cisco Desert to put in the foreground), but the storm had separated out a little more. Also the placement of the horizon makes it slightly funkier.