Hi Frank ... This popped into my mailbox just as i was about to log off. Glad to see it.
I like the concept. Essentially a nice portrait framing Vivian within the frame of the bike. The background, however, is distracting. It's too busy, and takes away from the impact of the subject. Try shooting with wider apertures when making such portraits. A little softening of the background would go a long way to improve this and similar photographs. Having Vivian stand by the bike rack is a nice touch, yet the rack and the numerous bikes behind her, while adding a bit to the story, take away from the impact of the portrait. Again, a wider aperture, more selective focus, which would still show the bikes and the rack, would be preferable. Now that you've got Photoshop, you can load up the pic and play around with blurring the background and other such manipulations. PS is a good tool for seeing how your photos might look if photographed or presented differently without the need of making numerous trial prints or shooting a gazillion frames of film. While I know that what I'm going to suggest is not what you had in mind when you made this pic, for I'm sure you wanted to show more of the environment, pics like this sometimes look great, and make a stronger statement, when photographed against a more neutral background, such as a wall. There are then fewer distracting elements and the viewer's attention is, literally, focused on the subject. Well, just a few random thoughts. And you got me to think about a few of my bike pics, which I've not looked at for some time. Thanks for posting this one ... it's a nice way to greet the morning, along with my cats and a cup of hot Mariage freres French breakfast tea ;-)) Shel > [Original Message] > From: frank theriault <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=2815736&size=lg > > Comments, as always, are welcomed and encouraged.
