Why, Oh Why?
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The hands look so very cool.
39°26' 41" N, 76°48' 21" W39.444627 -76.805816
Day 171 of 365
My most likely submission for Assignment 3, Week 23 for
Take A Class With Dave and Dave .
Low Key. The opposite of High Key, this image will use darkness and shadow to stress the subject. The few light areas will caryy great weight in these images. We're building on Dave's Dark theme, but now technically and not philosophically.
I've done shots of this type in the past and I really like this style of photography. With the right lighting you can convey a lot of emotion that you can't in a regular snapshot (or at least that is how I feel about it).
Flash fired with ebay remote. 580EX II at 1/16 power 90 deg from camera axis.
Learn how to light at
Strobist .
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Comments
The angst jumps right out of this. The
lighting is fantastic, and the emotion is
raw. Great job.
Posted 13 months ago.
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Great job on the lighting, it really
emphasizes the emotion of the photo.
Posted 13 months ago.
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your chest looks awefully bright for a
low-key image. Maybe angle the light more
from behind, so it catches only the edges of
your body?
Posted 13 months ago.
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I don't think the brightness of the light
areas necessarily negates the shot from being
low-key.
Low key light shows the contours of an object
by throwing areas into light or shadow while
the fill light provides partial illumination
in the shadow areas to prevent a distracting
contrast between bright and dark. For
dramatic effects, one may wish the contrast
to be high — to emphasize the brightness of
the sun in a desert scene, to make a face
look rugged, seamed, and old, or to isolate
details in a mass of surrounding shadow.
I did do some level adjustment to achive a
dramatic effect, yet it still qualifys as a
low-key shot based on my understanding of
what low-key is.
As applied to an image, it refers to one with
overall dark tones. A good low key image
nevertheless shows detail and contrast.
Low key pictures concentrate on the darker
tones, often conveying an atmosphere of
tension or a powerful deep strength.
Although low key often uses high contrast
lighting, most of the subject is likely to be
in shadow, with relatively small areas
brightly lit.
Most of the image is shadow and darkness.
I think I may have stretched the definition
of "relatively small," but in order
to achieve the emotion I was looking to
convey, the high contrast was much more
effective and still left over 75% of the area
in darkness. When I tone down the
highlighted areas you loose a lot of
definition on the face, which I think is
important to the shot. I think under 25% of
the image being highlighted still qualifies
as a "relatively small area" of the
overall image.
The light here is actually slightly behind
me, but still manages to catch my chest when
I'm at a 3/4 frontal stance. When I moved up
more or shot from a profile the effectiveness
of conveying the emotion for this particular
pose was lost. You can see in The Look Back how much more shadow is in the image when I
rotate 90 degs away from the flash, but when
I tried to shoot in that position with this
pose it just wasn't an effective shot.
There is also the fact that I'm quite pale
on my chest. A tan might have helped tone
down the brightness of my body (LOL). I
tried this shot in black and white too, but
the color version struck me as a more
effective overall shot.
Posted 13 months ago.
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Its a great photo....fabulous as always
Posted 13 months ago.
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Hi, I'm an admin for a group called 365 Explored , and we'd love to have your photo added to
the group.
WEll done... this is really cool!
Posted 13 months ago.
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Yes this shot is very impresive , surprising
!
Posted 13 months ago.
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I agree with Sayla in the sense that maybe
too much area is lit (not that it is too
bright). I thought theres some magic number
or percent like you said, but I think its
personal pref. I would think for me that
10-15%, but thats just me.
I like the mood and expressive nature of
your shot and the lowkey can really enhance
that...
--
Seen next to a fellow photo of Take a class
with Dave & Dave. (? )
Posted 13 months ago.
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I can see where both of you are coming from,
but I think it is a very subjective matter.
A few sights that I looked at show a full
color image with a lighter object in the
front and claimed it qualified as low key.
For me that was a bit of a stretch, but it
did meet the basic requirements as given by
the definitions I've found. I think the
amount of lit area depends on the subject.
Based on the definitions I've been able to
find, I still think this qualifies, but like
I said, I think it is very subjective.
I'd love for Protagonist to weigh in on
this........hint hint. LOL
EDIT: Being the dork that I am, I actually
went and figured out the percentage of bright
area compared to dark area and it turns out
that the brighter areas only constitute 13%
of the overall image, so even then if falls
within the 10%-15% range. ;-)
--
Seen on your photo stream. (? )
Posted 13 months ago.
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you are right, great negative space to
emphasize other elements...
cool work and interesting technique!
Posted 13 months ago.
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I agree, I think that it qualifies as lowkey, just personal observation. It is
still a great expressive image!
Posted 13 months ago.
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Thanks, and don't think my defense is
negative in any way. I appreciate the
feedback and enjoy the converstation. It
being such a subjective topic allows for a
broad range of personal tastes and
observations.
OH, and check out the EDIT to my previous
comment.....LOL
Posted 13 months ago.
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Fascinating lighting. Great tension.
Posted 13 months ago.
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Thanks!
Posted 13 months ago.
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Very cool. Power... anger/rage...
I love the look of this.
Posted 13 months ago.
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Me gusta tu reflejo de angustia
Posted 13 months ago.
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this pic speaks back
well done
Posted 13 months ago.
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Hi, I'm an admin for a group called Lenguaje corporal , and we'd love to have this added to the
group!
Posted 2 months ago.
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Buen trabajo.
Posted 2 months ago.
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