Greetings from the Critique Club
by strangeghost
The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.
TECHNIQUE
The first thing that struck me about your picture is the relative darkness of the face. With a portrait like this, the face is automatically where the eye goes upon first looking, so it has to live up to the attention it's going to get. Your lighting and the subject's dark complexion has left the face in deep shadow. It is a fascinating face, with much detail that unfortunately, seems to be lost in the rest of the image. I like the choice of black and white - a duotone would have worked well too. Focus looks good; a nice clean image, but the darkness of the face puts me off a bit. Did you try to shoot with a fill-flash??
COMPOSITION
The composition is unusual and I'm not sure it's balanced enough. I like the fact that you got close, but I think you could have tightened it up even more. I love the placement of the left hand but the chopping of the guitar neck and the entire right arm feels odd. The background is also not desirable so I would have probably chosen to get closer and really fill the frame with the face and upper body. Maybe a different perspective to preserve some of the guitar too (looking down the neck toward the person, etc.).
EMOTIONAL IMPACT
People shots are some of the most emotionally hard-hitting shots and this one does a good job, but would have been much more impacting had the face been more prominent and/or better lit. The expression on his/her face is very intriguing. I can't tell if it's a smile or a frown about the break out. The sunglasses are cool but I bet the eyes would have been awesome too.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Your title does a good job of providing some context. Your final score of just above five is what I would have predicted. I bet with more emphasis on the face in both technique (lighting) and composition, you would have pushed six. |
Add photograph to your favorites
Add photographer to your favorites
Photographer found comment helpful.
