Registered: August 2005 Location: in a square room Posts: 10203
(Sun) 6 August 2006 3:28am
the mood is good and i quite like the contrast you have here.
but,
my eyes keep following to the lady on behind. she pulling me away from the gentleman that you focused on. may be wait for her to go away or turn her back to you so the focus point can be more interested.
i found that the part on the right abit too blank. if i would you, may be try to step a few feets to the left or try get more to the right side and frame in the shop for more. one to get rid the emptiness at the right or tell more about the enviroment. some little adjustment like that may be can overcome the bright (almost burn out) background.
since you are using PS. why not try to select the interior of the shop and dodge it up (brighten up) so we can see more details from it? just my suggestion.
anyway, you done a good job here. just i think you still have some space to improve from this shot. keep it up!
maxby Administrator
Registered: July 2004 Location: PJ, Ipoh, Penang, Spore Posts: 24469
(Sun) 6 August 2006 9:11am
Hi Billi,
I love this idea of capturing some traditional cooks at work. Soon with the implementation of health procedures, all these scenes will be behind closed doors of a hygenic kitchen.
I believe if you have asked permission to take this documentary photo, you could get a better vantage point. The 2 pots in the foreground does not lead the viewer's eyes into the scene. On the contrary it momentary stops the viewer from venturing deeper into the scene.
As your focus is on the cook in its working environment, there seem to be too many elements that draws the viewer's eyes away from the main subject, like the bright edge of the stainless steel stove and the background.
The eye is more inclined to be drawn to the woman in the background as sean eng has observed due to lesser contrast range in the left background.
Picking an exposure setting in this high contrast setting is also a challenge. However, if I am faced with the same situation I would have pick an exposure setting on the main subject's face which I estimate would be around EV7-8. This would have overexposed the background and then I would then have done a post flashing to retain some details in the background.
This just my personal opinion, you may defer from this observation.
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