C&C: Ansley

Posted for comment and critique.

Submitted to class as part of "light and time" assignment.

Canon 350D, 28-135mm lens at 56mm, ISO 100, f/5.6, 1/100 sec.

My Ansley, about 30-45 minutes before sundown. Just simple sidelighting from the sun. There was just a sliver of sun left in the backyard, had her sit in it while everything else was dark. My in-camera meter was trying to overexpose, so I put it in manual.

(update 1/7/2008 instructor's comments: Hi Brad,Light at this time of day is often ideal for most subjects, especially portraits as it imparts a natural warmth to the subject's skin. Your shot of Ansley is a good example of this effect; photographer's often refer to light in the first and last hour of the day as the "golden hour" and you can see why!

Exposing for the highlight areas has caused those regions not lit by the sun to fall to reasonable dark shadow, which has helped to isolate your subject as has the limited depth of field from using a moderately wide lens aperture. Finally, the shot benefits from your composition placing Ansley off center. I have a couple of tips for you if shoot a similar picture in the future; first, try to get your subject in a position so that the shadow side of their face does not have highlight spots such as those below Ansley's eye, and second use a reflector (a sheet of card, or even a newspaper will work) to throw some light back in to the shadows to reduce the level of contrast. Regards, Simon)