Reflections & Punctuation

[Rocco]

Would love to see what critique gets offered on that shot!

Well, I heard back from them both. Predictably, David DuChemin didn't offer much advise about the technical aspects of the photo (was hoping he wouldn't)... He is very much concerned with composition and the feel of a photo. Benjamin Von Wong ripped it apart. VERY appreciated. He noticed things about the color pallet I never would have. I took their comments and made adjustments. First, here's the photo as it was when they critiqued:



And now the critiques (Copied and pasted from Facebook Messenger):

David DuChemin:
Richard - Great photograph. Well done. I love the emotion. Compostion and lighting is great. Lots of energy. Real sense of what you're pointing at. I'm not a lighting guy, so all I can tell you is I think it's strong technically. I'm much more interested in the emotional content of the image, which this has a lot of. My only suggestion, in terms of what I'd love to see, is the dog reacting to, or relating to, the guy with the banjo. Right now there is no relationship between them, other than spatially beside each other. I want that dog to be sharing the moment, maybe being the reason for the laughter. But that's just icing on the cake of an otherwise strong image. Love it.

Lots of flattery here, a compliment from David DuChemin! But more importantly, his comment about the relationship between the two totally carries weight.

Benjamin Von Wong:
Hey mate the photo itself isn't bad. I think what feels off is that there are two seperate color pallets and lighting happening
The light and color on the subjects don't match that of the sky so it feels a little bit funny
we see the presence of the light because of the shadow on the car
i think if u desaturated the entire image by say -30
and re-toned your image with whatever color method you prefer (curves, split toning white balance wtvr)
you could probably even out the image a bit more
The light comign in from the right just looks like its too harsh and strong too
theres no reason a light would be there in the natural world
so if theres some way to tone that done a bit it might help
Last but not least I think compositionally the fact that the model is looking one way and the dog the other is a little bit funny
we don't really know where to look or what to focus on because the lines int he image arent pointing to the same place
hope that helps@

Good points. The differences in color pallets and confusion with the shadows are two things that didn't occur to me. And of course he's right, the light camera right is too harsh. Too heavy handed. And then there's the same comment about the dog. Point taken.

Taking both of their comments into consideration I reworked the image and this is what I came up with:



I did a lot of cloning and frequency separation to eliminate or minimize shadows, put a different head on the dog, and reworked the toning by desaturating -30 as he suggested, and used a spit tone combined with white balance adjustments.

Overall I think it looks much better! I appreciate the help that all of you have continuously given me, and I love how humble all of these pro photogs are in their responses to me. All things considered, I'm a better photographer because of it.

Thanks!

-Rocco