this is my first fashion photography, and I don't know what it's look like haha, what do you think? I really need some of your advice guys, thanks :)
this is my first fashion photography, and I don't know what it's look like haha, what do you think? I really need some of your advice guys, thanks :)
Great first fashion shoot. I'm not sure if your goal was to make this feel old fashioned but it does to me. For your next shoot work on making your lighting a little more dynamic (more shadows) and playing with your model's expression.
I agree that the image isn't quite right, but suggesting that an entire change of style to something with more shadows is needed is a little odd - shadow can be very problematic in fashion and simple clear lighting predominates. I mean, this is a genre where the God of the genre shot with a hammerhead flash on the side of his camera. And of probably the top three living shooters, EVU works with a single beauty dish above her camera, some of Testinos most famous shots are direct flash on a compact, and Creepy Terry favours on axis flash.
As for expression - sure if you want to do your version that way, do it. But telling someone it's necessary? Again, no - and I can link images from Penn, Avedon, Helmut Newton and the Asos catalogue as evidence.
You have to distinguish between fixing problems and hammering a photograph into being taken in the style you would use. Even more than that, you have to avoid distorting someone's idea of a genre - and saying that fashion has to have more expression and shadow than this shot is like telling a would-be film maker that he shouldn't make cuts of under five minutes or use theme music. Sure you could make a film that way - but it would be a very unusual one and isn't the default way to fix a minor lighting and post problem.
The actual problems:
There isn't enough contrast here - the image is muddy. That simple. I'd expose a little more and put a curve on in post and/or turn up the light on the model. Or for advanced class, add beauty dish turned low and pointed at the model's face, to the existing light set up.
And the image is un-sharp because the OP - or the site uploading software - have over-compressed it. The version I downloaded is only 55kb, which is insane.
If the OP gives me a link to a raw - or posts a higher quality jpg - I can probably knock out a tweaked version for you in a couple of minutes.
But pose, styling, composition - really solid work in classic fashion style.
When prepare a version for upload, do something like resizing to 1000x1500 and then save as a 90% quality jpeg.
For your first fashion, shoot you've done better than most. Much better than I did during my first fashion shoot.
My first suggestion would be the lighting. The purplish, magenta hue would be awesome just on the background. Separating the model and her beautiful dress with respective lighting is a must.
I'm not quite sure if this was your intention, but I will work on the basis that it may not have been.
I would use an 18% gray card and do a custom white balance to start. This ensures the most accurate colors in an outfit.
Fashion designers HATE when you get there colors wrong. Imagine their customers saw a pink dress in the image you photographed that is now on their web page, then they received a salmon color dress in the mail upon ordering based off this image.
Secondly, you could separate your lights enough to ensure you're lighting model and background respectively. A light meter would assist you in this area, but if you're on a budget simply shoot an image with the BG light on and ensure you get a full silhouette without getting spill onto your model.
Next, the image is dark. I would say it's underexposed by a stop. Again this is where a light meter really comes in handy.
Lastly, I would clean up a small area on the floor where there is a bit of dirt and the frizzed hair on the crown of her head in post production.
Hope this helps. Good luck shooting and keep up the good work.