I see snow in your future!by
justamistereComment by surfdabbler: Hi John. Nice work. I love the smoke.
Critique - The colours work well, with the contrast of the blue globe against the warmer hands, although the hands are a little too red. The blue is perfect. The green in the background, I'm not sure about. I'd probably desat it a little, because I hate the green tinge that comes out in some of my shots, but maybe it works OK as it is here. The hoodie works well for character clothing. I'd like to see more of the face here, perhaps closer, and perhaps more lighting from beneath. I'd lose the sunnies too, and just use the light positioning to sculpt the face and eyes how you want them.
I agree with the focus comment. Becky told me to shoot at f/8 for self-portraits, and that actually made a huge difference for me. I always shot wide open to try to blur the background, but never got good results. If you can get enough light for this shot, you could go even smaller, because the close hand will be hard to get in focus. The current focus is on the head, but it's more important on the front hand and the ball. Then use the DOF to control how out of focus you want the head, but I'd put both at the limits of the DOF if you can.
Posing is very hard for self-portraits, but you've done a great job here. I like the off-centre balance. The mirror is a great idea.
Photographer found comment helpful.
