My third consecutive DPC submission. My first B&W. It was really tough for me to come up with a good "B" subject. (Maybe this subject would have done better in the "At Work" challenge...)
Anyway... I was on my way to get my hair cut and decided to bring my camera along (which I do a lot since joining DPC!) I asked everyone there if I could take a few pictures, and this is the shot I liked the best. (I did get the email address from the dad of the cute red-headed kid getting his hair cut and sent them a couple shots.)
Believe it or not, I was shooting in low-light the previous night and I inadvertently left my camera on ISO 1600 for all my barber shop pictures! I didn't even notice until I got home. I hate when I do that. I was pretty amazed at how well the pictures turned out given they were at ISO 1600...
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I actually did experiment with a vertically-oriented crop of the barber/boy on the left... the problem was the arm of the barber on the right was still in the frame (unless I cut off the boy's shoe), and it bothered me, so I went with this shot instead.
I was backed into the corner of the barber shop and had a pretty limited area in which to shoot. Two other things were working against me in this relatively small space: the 1.6X crop factor of the 10D, and my lack of a real ultra-wide-angle lens (my widest is 24mm, or almost 39mm on the 10D).
B/W works well for this shot. You might experiment with a different, more unusual point of view to increase the drama, but this shot works well for me.
I think the black and white is more than a gimmick, though. It helps the composition. I don't thinkI would like this photo in colour...I have a feeling it would be too 'busy'. With the b&w it's very elegant, and the contrasts carry it well.
What a sweet composition, especially with both a boy and a man getting their hair cut. A bit of a levels or a contrast adjustment would help because all the tones are in the greys right, without anything that is truly black (though there are true whites I think)
Hmm. There's a kind of busy-ness in the similarity of mid-grey tones - perhaps a slightly different angle when shot could have gotten the barbers against the mirror, or just one barber with a less muddled background or surroundings to distract the eye from where you want it to go? 5 (fits topic well enough, no glaring technical flaws, but not eye-catchingly appealing either).
The black and white really helps to set a mood to this shot. I think another option (though not necessarily better) would be to show just the little boy and the barber -- that is an awesome expression on his face.
Inspired by 'the Man Who Wasn't There'? The boy's expression is what makes this picture for me. There is too much going on in the picture though for the composition to really hang together. Too much clutter... perhaps by stepping left you could have cut out a lot of the sistracting elements, and have had the chairs lined up. The eye just doesn't know where to focus. Great character shot though. Perhaps a little more sharpness could have helped as well. 6
IMHO, there's a very nice picture here but it's lost. I'd focus on the pair in the foreground - the boy and his barber - the expression on the lad's face is great. The rest of the shot is a distraction. I'd like to see a crop with just these two.
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