Cookie Dusterby
_eugComment by LalliSig: Greetings from the Critique Club :)
I did not vote in this challenge but this is one of the images I would vote a 5.5 if it existed, wich means I think it´s above average but would probably most depend on how I thought it stacked up against the competition in the challenge.
Personally I think you made a good choice to have it b/w, I do think I would have liked it better with stronger contrast though, the whole shot just seems to "gray" for my taste. Lighting is not bad but could be better, seems a bit too harsh as it causes glare on the skin and also that harsh shadow from the nose, could you have used a bigger light source or perhaps put some powder on your skin to reduce that? That way you still would have had all that texture of the skin but more evenly lit.
I tend to not use my lenses at f16 or smaller as the image quality suffers a bit due to diffraction and while it´s hard to say from this web size version I think this shot would have been sharper taken at around f8-11.
I do like the framing/crop but I tried opening it in photoshop and rotated it 90 degrees counter clockwise and liked it a lot better that way, do like you are experimenting with different crops but this time I think normal would have been better. I also like the black backround, adds some mystery to the shot.
Kind regards from Iceland, Larus.
Photographer found comment helpful.