Night shot - DPChallenge Forums

Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark III

04/21/2010 12:28:33 PM · #1

I know this challenge ended a few weeks ago, but I wanted to post this to get more of a feel for why voters voted the way they did on my night image. With the amount of positive comments I got I thought for sure that it would score better than 5.2, but that's not the reason for this thread.

This is the first time I took a shot like this (at night and with models) and plan on doing some more today and tonight. The setup for this image: The car and models were positioned under a streetlight which was right above the girl on the phones head and I used my SB600 flash bounced of a gold reflector for lighting. As far as lighting the equipment mentioned above is all I have to work with. I also used my 35mm 2.8 lens. I own only that lens and my 17-55 kit lens.

Thanks

edit: sorry, I forgot to add a link to the image

Message edited by author 2010-04-21 13:56:04.

Yo_Spiff

Olympus 12-100mm f/4.0 M.Zuiko ED IS PRO

04/21/2010 12:36:45 PM · #2

Well, I gave it a 7. Not because it wowed me visually, but because it conveyed a story. As far as the photo itself, the comp seems a little awkward to me. Too much empty space at the top that is not doing anything for the scene and the woman on the right seems to me too close to frame edge.

northebound

Pentax K20D

Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC HSM for Pentax

04/21/2010 12:52:53 PM · #3

I also gave it a 7 - i thought it captured one of those moments at night that wouldn't be the same during the day. I think the voters voted yours lower, overall, because there just weren't any pretty colors or lights like they were expecting. I see one b/w slipped in (a good one at that) but a lot seemed to get in w/ color alone.

I also agree with Spiff on the comp. Still - it didn't deserve the low overall that it got.

kirbic

Canon EOS R5

Canon RF 24-70mm f/2.8 L IS

04/21/2010 01:35:59 PM · #4

I remember waffling on this one between giving it a 6 or a 7. I ended up giving it a 6. The two things that drove me in that direction were:

1.) The darkness of the main subject's face

2.) The fact that she is cut off right at the knees.

04/21/2010 01:58:28 PM · #5

Originally posted by kirbic:

Thanks for the advice. I know most people like to see the full shot people and can see where the leg thing could have been an issue. I guess I could have backed her up a little but I was trying to keep the girl in the back and car out of focus. That may have been my mistake.

What techniques could I use to get the main subjects face more evenly lit with the equipment that I have?

Canon RF 24-70mm f/2.8 L IS

04/21/2010 02:05:00 PM · #6

Originally posted by Yo_Spiff:

My computer crashed on me not too long after this challenge and I didn't have time to save the outakes to my external but they are still on my internal HD. I just need to buy an adapter to get the info off it and that won't be for a little while. If I can find them I will show you the outtakes of this shoot. I had some that were fully desat, some that were not desat at all and some close ups. This image was desaturated and then I bumped the blue chanel up to get a little of the car's color back.

As far as the empty space I like it better than the close crop images I tried because I thought it conveyed the "stranded" theme I was going far. I felt that seeing how empty the road was further exemplified the feel of the image. This decision probably hurt the score as I believe I had one comment explaining that already.

kirbic

Canon EOS R5

04/21/2010 03:30:26 PM · #7

Originally posted by SEG:

I'm actually thinking that you may have been better off cropping at mid-thigh. It's usually not a good idea to cut the image off at a joint; it's a psychological thing. In this case, I think a closer crop would have been a good thing. It may also have let you go to a more nearly square format, which would have maximized the image area for DPC presentation, again a good thing.
As far as the lighting, I think the harshness really works, and you don't want to mes with that. In Advanced, I'd recommend just slightly lightening her face. In Basic, you can't effectively do that. Well, you *might* be able to if you do selective color, or tweak your B+W conversion to emphasize a lighter channel more. Dunno, I'd have to see the color image. The alternative is to shoot with a small amount of fill flash; and I do mean a small amount, you don't really want it to be noticeable.