I took a B&W class last fall at a local community college and one of the assignments was a self portrait (ugh!) with some color selectively added back in. After a few attempts at "traditional" portraits and nothing that I liked, I decided to strap a camera to the nose of my kayak and have some fun. Here is what I came up with. I used a Nikon V1 with the 6.7-13mm lens, 2 sec remote and a Platypod Ultra for support. I like the result, but I'm also interested in critique.
Thanks,
Tom
Hi Tom
Solid image. Good leading lines, good overall tonality. This is not a critique but my comments for whatever they are worth… I fully acknowledge that it is not easy to take a perfect picture when you are not holding the camera in your hands.
What I would have done in the post processing:
1 ) Cleaned up the water to me all the foam at the surface of the water is distracting
2 )I would have limited the color to the paddle blade. After all it is a BW picture with only a slight touch of color. The sign on the wall is red, the tuque is blue, the face is pink, the paddle blades are yellow, there is too many colors for a BW picture …
3 ) the shadow in the face is distracting and the tonality is too dark using curve and the dodge tool in photoshop I would have adjusted the tonality and eliminate the shadow all together.
4 ) The line of the roof and somewhat from the dam come off the head. For this photography to move towards a 4 the head would have been slightly higher and to the left of the building
5 ) I To follow the rule of thirds, I would have change the crop moving you to the right to get your nose and the line on the kayak nearer the third line and move up a touch to bring the left paddle in the left corner of the picture and your eyes at the intersection of the horizontal and vertical line (rule of thirds)
6) Probably before doing all of this, in Lightroom I would have tried to correct the distortion by correcting the line of the building and the top of the dam. Like it is now it gives the impression that the horizon is not straight.
Congratulation! you have a strong black and white photography
gc
Thanks for taking the time to comment. Much appreciated. I realize that this is pushing it a bit for a b/w photo, but this seemed like the most appropriate forum. As to your comments, my original photo had only the paddles colorized, but it seemed a bit lacking for the "portrait" assignment. Coloring the face without the hat (tuque) also looked strange. As for the sign, I threw that in for fun as it seemed small enough not to be a distraction. The composition was a total crapshoot. The turbulence from the falls made it difficult to get into position. I took a few dozen shots, and this seemed the strongest to me. It's cropped about 10% along the top and right edges to remove a distracting tree and empty sky. I look forward to trying some of your suggestions. Thanks again.
I really like the composition. Can't say I've ever been a fan of selective color, though I realize you're doing it for an assignment so you're not to blame there.
I know people like it, but I just find selective coloring distracting.