Lit with a desk lamp from the side to get the strong shadows. I used a pinned up blanket as a makeshift background.
I had trouble with noise, especially since I had to raise the ISO to 100 to maintain a fast enough shutter speed. I hope the noise/artifacts isn't too distracting.
This is one of my first real self-portraits and I'm quite happy with how it turned out. I wanted the strongest elements in the photo to be my expression and the dynamic lighting.
Converted to B/W, levels, sharpened, noise reduction, sharpened, cloned and blurred selectively, resized, sharpened for web, added border. All done in GIMP.
Last minute shot, just finished editing about 15 minutes before the deadline. Editing took over an hour to complete.
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Lighting IMO is ok. Perhaps too dark on the left side of your face. And the straight line shadow on your shoulder should go also. However it seems to me that you oversharpened a little too much. all your detail is lost and there is no detail left to see in the hair or eyes which is where you want detail in portrait work. The crop is great. You have a close up view which is what you also go for in portrait work. Nothing cropped out or cut off that shouldn't be. The background is good also for a quick makeshift one. I really like the fact that you left the wrinkles there. If you would have made the background flat then I believe you woud have lost all the depth to this photo. The border was a nice choice.
Looks like natural lighting which is always a nice way to go. But for me, it is very difficult to read and connect with a portrait without some catch light in the eyes. Also, the focus feels a bit soft on this image.
Just a tad too overprocessed maybe, or over-filtered. But a great portait in terms of lighting, which is very cool and adds drama, and composition. Background could be more out of focus, but it does add interest overall I think. Great photograph nonetheless.
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