Hi Any, you’re right it all comes down to telling a story. You certainly can tell a story with a self portrait, have a look at Annie Lebovitz’ book a Photographer’s Life, and look at her self portraits. I wouldn’t listen so the criticism about not seeing a vision in your photographs though. Keep shooting and posting, you’re doing great.

Well, first of all I’ve got a question to you:
Did you want to stich these two vertical frames together to one horizontal frame ? To the frame, that you present over here ? And if so, why did you do this ? What was your intention, your idea ?

Hey Andy, good to see your new work! I like the way you did by putting the two photos side by side, It is a trend now in fashion/portrait photography. IMO, when photographers try this type of presentation, they frequently choose two different ”types” of photos, for example, one being a close up shot of the face, one being a full body portrait. Or one shot being part of the body/clothes, one being a full body shot. I think the two photos should complement each other to tell a full story about the subject. I also think that these two photos should be shot at different angles. Between the two photos you chose, I like the right one more but not so much of the left one…I found the grass a bit distracting…It doesn’t quite match the photo beside it and distract viewers’ attention from the portrait. But that’s just my personal opinion.

Whoey, quite a lot of questions Questions with answers that can’t be given just with a few words. Questions touching one of the main discussions going on in photography. Well, in my opinion a photo draws the attention of a viewer, when it is based on these conditions (on one of them or sometimes on several of them): there is a message, that is transported, the photos sort of asks the viewer who can give answers to it based on his/her feelings, knowledge, experience etc. – the photo is individually created (either a special composition or sometimes also a special technique). And viewers often react on photos with subjects that are unknown to them, themselves. It is the final photo, that counts, the way, you get there doesn’t matter that much. Thus it might be right out of cam (as it is said) or it might be that post processing and image processing by PC are used as well, e.g. for improving or ”shaping” the last final details e.g. in lighting.
You present a lot of photos over here, thus it is difficult for me, to give a general statement on them. And I wouldn’t like to do that, because I prefer to look at photos each for its own. Well generally I like the way you are working. But there are for sure things, that can be improved. Take the photo with the boy just above, the horizontal frame, where the boy is placed in front of a wall with graffiti. If you look at the right corner at the top of the photo, you’ll see a unique blue triangle. Now this little triangle over there, which isn’t repeated anywhere in the rest of the frame thus has the effect of cutting away a piece of your frame. As if you would take a scissor and cut away one corner of a piece of paper or a photo. Now this is only a little detail within the whole composition, but if you like to improve, try to avoid such triangles at the corners of your frame. There are several ways to do that.
Now in the third photo below with the boy raising up his hands to the sky and the skyscrapers in the background: I like it, it’s telling a message to me and I do like the technique as well. But I think, I would have positioned the boy a little bit different. As can be seen the top of the highest skyscraper is on his left shoulder close to his head. This has a little bit the effect as if the skyscraper grows out out his shoulder. Maybe if the boy had had his head there and hidden this skyscraper thus the background would have remained a background only.
Well, these are some of my first thoughts.
Looking forward to you response.
So far
Ann-Lisa

IMO the some of the skin processing are a bit overkill…the plastic feeling to the skin makes the PP very obvious, a great PP on skin should make it smooth and subtle at the same time. Lighting use and sharpness are pretty good for someone who have shot only for a yr. Also you have good angles, keep that up!