On 4/18/05, Shel Belinkoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Hi Frank ... > > Didn't see the original post. > > I'm of mixed feelings about this one. My first comment is that the > tonality is awful and really needs to be less contrasty and show some more > detail, which I know is within the photo.
You know, I "opened it up" a bit, but ended up not touching the levels at all. It just "looked better to me" that way. I kind of like the contrasty look, maybe because I like the "PJ look" (as I think Paul Stenquist called it WRT another of my flash portraits) for that kind of candid portrait. > I like the statement made by the background. However, not showing Leah's > eyes, her not looking wither at the camera, or at something, lessens the > impact that this portrait could have had. I like the potential, but not > the execution or the final statement. The background and the piercings are > at odds with the posture, and if you wanted to show the softer side of > Leah, I'm not sure that the background you chose does the best job. I > guess I feel an ambiguity ... which isn't a negative in and of itself, but > I don't think it adds to the portrait. My feeling about the ambiguity may > change ... Hmmmm... I'm not sure what to say. I was initially going to say that I didn't "choose" either her posture or the background, but that would be wrong. Let's say that I reacted to what was there, and snapped when it looked "right". She didn't know that I had the camera on her, and with the 135mm, I was maybe 15 feet away, in a crowded room. I had the camera on her for maybe 30 seconds, and when she looked down, I felt it was the right time to snap. So I guess I did choose, but I'm not sure how conscious I was about why I thought (or felt) it was right. It may be that the things I like about the photo are greatly influenced by what I know of Leah, how she tries to present herself to the world, and how different she seems in the photo. But, those things don't make a photo good or bad, I guess. Thanks for some thought provoking insights, Shel. cheers, frank -- "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept." -Henri Cartier-Bresson
