Expecting by Canon DSLR Challenge

Canon DSLR Challenge | all galleries >> Challenge 7: Portraits (Hosted by Joe Reilly) >> Challenge 7: Eligible > Expecting

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Jan 10, 2004	Steve Bohne

Expecting

Spring Arbor (Jackson) Michigan

We do a lot of pregnancy portraits. The young lady is a friend of my daughter. They came in the completely WRONG clothing (paid no attention to our preportrait consultation). To create something visually pleasing, we came up with this. Seems to be no in-between on this image. People love it or hate it. Some say it is sensitive, others say it is bordering on pornographic. We have a rule in our studio: you have to be covered up at least as much as a bathing suit would provide. This sticks to the rule without exception.

Canon EOS 1Ds ,Canon EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM

other sizes: small original auto

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Sony Forums Challenges		25-Jan-2004 22:45
wow. i really like this a lot. you've done really well here. a fantastic portrait, congrats! -- andy williams

Canon DSLR Challenge		22-Jan-2004 04:26
I love how he looks possessive of her, and equally loving, and she looks posessive of the baby. It's perfect... he looks out for her while she looks out for the baby. What a lucky baby! ~ Lonnit

Olaf.dk		20-Jan-2004 20:00
Hey, I'm a mac-kind-of-guy. Never worked on any one of those Wintel-machines, for any longer period, longer than half an hour, say - not at school, home nor at work... Been using macs since 1986... At the university (late eighties), we were using unix-based machines - Now unix has come to mac and mac is better than ever - hardware and software! Yeah, gamma is a problem with these internet-based photo-challenges. I am always uncertain about what my images will look like on other machines and monitors, especially in the shadow areas. I don't think gamma alone would be enough to make the separation as clear as I had in mind with this image though. To make sure, I made a rectangular selection on the side of the man (from under his arm to down below his front pocket) and chose Filter>Blur>Average, then checked the RGB-values: 98,79,60. Same operation on the background to the right of the man: RGB=93,75,57. In other words: not much of a difference. While I had your image in PS anyway, I took the liberty of doing a quick attempt at darkening the background. Not much better: now his hair and the left side of his forehead (his right) blended into the background instead. Finally, I tried leaving the left part of the background as is, and darkening only the right side, where the background fabric looks like a curtain. Didn't care for that either. Conclusion: not as easy to fix as I had first thought. --Olaf

Canon DSLR Challenge		20-Jan-2004 16:13
Thanks for your comment Olaf. Unfortunately, the degree of monitor gamma varies widely. On my LaCie, there is tons of separation between the man and the background. It was prepared on a Mac, so it's set for Mac gamma. I didn't happen to think to convert it to PC gamma in Photoshop--too worried about uploading the pix correctly!

Olaf.dk		20-Jan-2004 08:04
This made me stop, look and think. At first I was questioning their expressions - a little too stiff I thought - but the more I looked and thought about it, the more appropriate their expressions seemed to me: expecting is both exciting and scary all at once. Also, the difference in their expressions - the becoming father looking more happy and proud and the becoming mother looking a little more wary about the situation - makes this an interesting image, telling a story on more than one level. Finally, the one thing I would like different: while I agree the sepia-toning works well, I would have liked a bigger tonal separation between the man and the background. Had it been my shot, I would experiment with darkening the background quite a bit to achieve this. On a different note, concerning EXIF and Adobe PS CS: All my images in the exhibition gallery have been edited and saved from CS (save as, not save for web!) - all have the exif info here in Pbase [please feel free to have a look (and comment!)]. --Olaf

Sony Forums Challenges		20-Jan-2004 06:10
Beautiful in my opinion. I especially like it in sepia tone. Looks like they will soon have a baby to add to their family! Ann C

Guest		20-Jan-2004 01:50
I can't imagine how this would be thought to be pornographic. I think it's stunning. Beautiful pose and their emotions exude through to the viewer. This is wonderful. -- angela :)

Guest		19-Jan-2004 23:34
Stirring.

Guest		19-Jan-2004 23:06
I'm definitely on the pro side of this one... nice work! Re: EXIF at PBase - If you process with PS CS, PBase can't recognize the new Adobe XMP format... bit of a bummer.

Canon DSLR Challenge		19-Jan-2004 18:39
Sure. I don't know what happened to the EXIF information...that showed up on my 10D shot. Any idea why no date appeared on the 1Ds image? Steve

Canon DSLR Challenge		19-Jan-2004 18:34
Steve: A cut out of the ordinary for the CSLR Challenge. Very nicely done. Tastefully done too, I might add. Can I get you to add a shot date, to avoid any confusion? Thanks. --Joe (Host of Challenge 7)