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Shot with the new 85/1.8. Flash bounced off the roof, gold reflector below.

Macka at work

Shot over a month ago, and recently reprocessed by Macka herself.

The 2nd image is AWESOME!!
The 1st one is nice, but I'm not sure if it necessarily 'needed' the gold reflector. Was this shot at 1.8?? Surely not.

Did macka have a pocket full of hot chips in #2? Hot chips always bring in the seagulls.

Second shot is magnificent !!

Glad you are enjoying the lens

Another member into the 85mm club

Nice work Patrick, #1 is engaging, 2 small nitpicks would be both eyes in focus, and her chin not cropped out, other then that I like it.. the addition of the golden reflection works for me.

#2 is a great shot.. so much movement and action frozen here.

What's on the grass on the right? Shadow, burn marks?

Alpha_7 wrote:Nice work Patrick, #1 is engaging, 2 small nitpicks would be both eyes in focus

I agree, the out of focus eye seems distracting. I dont realy like the gold either.

The second image is fantastic..

But after seeing these is the extra money worth it for the 1.4 hmmm....


CHeers
MATT

Patrick - I'm against the majority here.

Depsite it's technical flaws (DOF issues already discussed), that first shot of Kris is a wonderful portrait in my opinion. It has great eye contact and engages the viewer. You can really feel the conenction here between photographer and subject.

I like your use of the reflector. Without it, your ceiling bounce would leave stronger, less natural shadows.

In addition, and more important to adding life to the image (which you have done well), is that if you look at her pupils, they are large, so it must have been dark. Without the reflector, you would not have had much of a catchlight. Catchlight adds a little sparkle/life/energy to it well.

A possible alternative, if your reflector was white or silver on the flip side, flip it over, to match the color balance of the flash bounced off the ceiling.

Patrick, the portrait is great, but I really love the second photo. I could imagine a massive print of this, and spending a lot of time "reading" the photo from LtoR (from the person to the flock of seagulls).

Well done.

Patrick

Patrick, just apply some toning to Macka's portrait to make it look a bit more nostalgic and it's bang on! No need to worry about uneven light or low DOF. It's all about style and intimacy with this photo.

I can tell you're really enjoying the 85/1.8 Patrick. My guess is #1 is taken wide open and up that close there is no wonder you had a shallow dof. The mouth, nose and eye is nicely in focus and I feel the soft focus on the other eye is quite effective and has resulted in a great portrait.

I'd like to see you do some more shots wide open, indoors with natural light, no flash. That's where I enjoyed using this lens. It can produce some very nice results under those circumstances.

Cheers
John

First shot is direct and engaging. It has its own power and is compelling to look at. Good portrait!

I like both Patrick.
#1 has a real connection to the viewer.
#2 is just Ausie all over
Regards Colin

I mostly agree with the other views, even when they differ

I like the first one as Macka has very engaging eyes, and this image really focuses on them and brings them out beautifully. The colour is quite moody but compliments the image wonderfully.

The 2nd image is just plain cool. It's quite an imaginative shot and I like it.

Kudos.

very nice, the second photo looks like a photo for a Pink Floyd cd cover, call me crazy but i feel something sureal in that one, awsome!

Thanks for the comments everyone.

1st was shots at f2.5. I agree with the technical shortcomings (DOF, cropped chin) but think it works anyway. Oz_Beachside, I used the gold side becasue the roof is slightly yellow - I figured having fill light too warm was better than too cold.

Johnd, I'll definitely be using the lens wide open in the future. From these shots and my other first impressions, contrast & sharpness gets a lot better going from 1.8 to 2.8, and after that it's only really more DOF. Lovely bit of glass

PiroStitch wrote:Patrick, just apply some toning to Macka's portrait to make it look a bit more nostalgic and it's bang on! No need to worry about uneven light or low DOF. It's all about style and intimacy with this photo.

What do you mean by 'toning?' Feel free to have a play and post the result.

marcos wrote:very nice, the second photo looks like a photo for a Pink Floyd cd cover

"Overhead the albatross,
Hangs motionless upon the air"
Interesting comment, I can see some "Echoes" in there