Baby Portrait - The "EYES" Have it..... Bad Pun I Know!!

[point*break]

Hey All,

I took this really quick last night (accidentally took at ISO 1600 :mad2: ) and an amazingly quick edit and thought it came out quite good. would love to hear all and any frank C & C about it so i can improve to the level of many posters here.

Love to you all..

Alex

[photophorous]

Hi Alex,

This is great! Such a cute shot. However, I could tell you've applied some heavy noise reduction before I even read that you shot it at 1600 ISO. I'm not sure but it might be a tad bit oversharpened too. I would try a re-edit with a little less noise reduction and a little less sharpening, but those are minor things and maybe just my personal preference. It's very good as is.

Paul

edit: On second look, I think the only place that the noise reduction bothers me is in the eyes. It just takes away a little to much detail. So, I would do the noise reduction selectively and apply a little less on the eyes.

[livin4lax09]

yeah the skin looks a little too processed for me. I like high key images, so I'm fine with the tone of the skin and eyes, but it looks too smooth and there is a loss of detail.

[Alison]

ISO1600! I've made that mistake before lol.
I'm actually wondering why you used the flash at all as your ISO was set so high. You may have gotten away with not using it at all.

I, personally, love the airbrushed look but have recently tried to tone it down alot by applying mine to a duplicated layer and then turn the opacity down, even when using a noiseware filter.

I also try to make the eyes in my portraits look believable by lassooing them > layer via copy > overlay > filter > other > high pass (and turning the opacity down if necaessary).
Getting cc in here has made me realise all of these things on my own portraits.

On your portrait...

I'm not keen on the flash shadow under her chin. (But then I'm not keen on using my own flash, just my personal preference).

Rule of thirds looks pretty good and I love the way her face is off-centre.

All in all you have created a lovely high key portrait of your beautiful little girl.

[point*break]

I too hate the shadow under the chin. reshoot i think...

[Alison]

Did you use the on-board flash or external speedlite?

[mjs1973]

Hey Alex,

To be honest, this photo kinda creeps me out a bit. They eyes are so vivid and sharp compared to the rest of the photo, it makes the image look very unnatural to me. It reminds me of one of those rubber dolls that have stickers for eyes. I'm sure this is a result of the post processing. I think if you toned it down a little, it would be better.

[berrywise]

It is a bit unsettling for me as well. It looks as though the eyes were copied and pasted into the photo.