# Pixmedics photo contest XIII "The Perfect Imperfect Portrait"



## pixmedic (Jun 3, 2018)

Its that time again!
Time for the Pixmedic (thisisprobablythelasttimethisisgoingtohappen) photo contest!






The rules are simple.
I will announce a theme. If you wish to participate in the contest, post ONE picture (taken by you) that you feel best fits the theme. Pictures taken prior to the contest are admissible as long as they were taken by you and have NOT been submitted in another of my contests.
The judging is based _*primarily*_ on theme appropriateness and creativity, _*not *_on the technical aspects or difficulty of the shot.
Only one entry per person is allowed, but you ARE allowed to edit your post and change pictures up until the contest closes. Failure to follow contest rules will lead to a disqualification.

to participate in this contest, post ONE photo in this thread that you feel best encompasses your vision of the theme. You can be as literal as you want, or think outside the box with subtlety and innuendo.
The contest will run for approximately one month, and at the end of a very vague and possibly changing time period, the wife and I will decide on a winner.

This months theme is....
_*"The Perfect Imperfect Portrait"*_

The jist of this theme is a portrait that despite having what might technically be considered "flaws", resonates with you in some way that makes you feel that it does not need to be "corrected".
A brief explanation with each entry will be helpful. 

the prize will be the usual (a $50 visa gift card, or $50 by paypal)

the contest will run until the end of *June.*
the wife and I reserve the right to edit, change, add to, subtract from, or cancel this contest at any time for any dumb old reason.


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## pixmedic (Jun 3, 2018)

im going to play along with this one....

I never got the lighting quite right. it was either a little too much light, or a little too much shadow. i never got him to "fade" as well as i would have liked. I struggled with the crop.
however, the pose and facial expression really struck me and this wound up being my favorite shot from the set.





DSCF5230 by pixmedic, on Flickr


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## Cody'sCaptures (Jun 3, 2018)

Self portraits are tough



(Update) This photo is riddled with errors; it's slightly out of focus, the light ratio is off, hotspots are slightly blown out, shirt was bunched up in spots (stamped out most of it), you can see the bottom of my nostrils... My girlfriend really loves this photo because it has my normal crooked smile. I normally try to purposely use my "picture smile" but she was making fun of my "smell the fart squinch" haha!  I personally hate this portrait,  it shows who I am and not who I want to present to others. She definitely was spot on though, on Facebook my family can't stop commenting how "me" it is.


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## JoeW (Jun 4, 2018)

Thanks again for Pixmedic for having cash that is burning a hole in your pocket, er, uh, I mean generously sponsoring this contest!


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## sergezap (Jun 4, 2018)

Suddenly hard light means chiaroscuro and some ornamental pattern sometimes.
It must be a shot with a key light from a generator and a fill from an ambient light. As a result, strobe became a fill, sun became a key.


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## Fujidave (Jun 4, 2018)

Not a great shot, but it is one of my favourites after actually asking before just taking a shot.  She was a lovely lady to talk too and liked the print I gave her.  X-T20 + XF 35mm f2 the end of last month.  This might be my favourite photo I have taken of a lady after asking her, but an expert would say, it`s wrong because of her arm being cut off and the dog is not as sharp as the young lady.  Even though the sun was high in the sky, it might not be perfect for an expert, but for someone like me who is learning I think it is not to bad a start.






Pretty Lady by Dave, on Flickr


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## pixmedic (Jun 6, 2018)

bump!
dont forget to explain why you feel the photo has imperfections and why you feel they either enhance the image, OR, fail to detract from the overall image because of other factors.


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## Parker219 (Jun 6, 2018)

I was doing a photo shoot and after 45 minutes, I guess she was bored or just being a kid and started twirling around.


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## tirediron (Jun 6, 2018)

An old one...  I hope I don't really have to explain it though.


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## pixmedic (Jun 6, 2018)

tirediron said:


> An old one...  I hope I don't really have to explain it though.



needed fill flash.


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## tirediron (Jun 6, 2018)

pixmedic said:


> tirediron said:
> 
> 
> > An old one...  I hope I don't really have to explain it though.
> ...


Exactly!!!!


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## jcdeboever (Jun 6, 2018)

Nikon F3 TriX print. First off, I missed focus on this shot as I was shooting street and thought they were a zone 4ft away, which they were but I had it set at 8ft and forgot. So, no need to focus, just frame and shoot. Fail on the focus. They were in love so I thought it had some merit as a print, which I sent them 3 this week. This one was a triple goof, poor zone focus, too long in the tea bath, poor placement of baby oil on the glass plate. I didn't send them this one but the only one I could scan and submit. However, they loved the prints and said they were sending me a gift card... I just think that love is special, even if it's out of focus. I like this shot for that reason and figured it was a good choice for me to me submit, rather than create one this month.


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## Dean_Gretsch (Jun 7, 2018)

@sergezap  Those whites are definitely blown out, but the beauty of that young lady is so overwhelming, I can look at nothing but her face.


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## pixmedic (Jun 10, 2018)

the perfect imperfect bump!


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## JoeW (Jun 10, 2018)

The sun was setting, creating a lovely golden light and I was outside with my dog Ike on a small landing strip.  He was sitting obediently, looking at me with his head tilted in a very charming and quizzical manner.  Just as I was about to shoot him...SQUIRREL!  And off he went, trailing his lead behind him like a blue line.

I love the shot because it is so him...fast and a blur and spontaneous and very pretty driven--in some ways it's the perfect portrait of him.  As a classic portrait it's an epic fail--he's out of focus, the photo is full of negative space, and you can't even see his face--just a blur of white and sable.


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## pixmedic (Jun 11, 2018)

bump


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## smithdan (Jun 11, 2018)

Coaxing a decent image from an antique non adjustable snapshooter can be more fun sometimes for me than shooting pix with my DSLR.   I find these photographic castoffs abandoned in thrift stores and landfill salvage sheds,  pay their meager ransoms,  then take them out again and shoot a roll or two.

Took this one a few years back with an Ansco Shur Shot box camera of my daughter and her then year old Shiloh Shepherd who luckily cooperated by standing still long enough to accommodate the 1/50 sec. shutter.


. 





Catherine and Freya


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## chuasam (Jun 11, 2018)

most excellent contest.
I am a portrait photographer.
choosing just one was the hardest thing
I couldn't really decide which photo to use
Almost didn't want to use this one incase Mrs PixMedic thought she was too pretty

In the end..

 here it goes

It was sorta dark so I boosted the ISO pretty high so it's grainy
her eyes aren't really in focus
the light is contrasty and behind her

I trained with LifeTouch when I was just out of school so this was my attempt to break away from sharp technically correct photos. I wanted to get an artsy feeling photo.


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## pixmedic (Jun 14, 2018)

bump


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## pixmedic (Jun 15, 2018)

bump


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## pixmedic (Jun 16, 2018)

morning bump


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## pixmedic (Jun 18, 2018)

bump


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## MartinCrabtree (Jun 18, 2018)

Chuasam she kinda looks like a young Grace Slick. Nice.


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## chuasam (Jun 19, 2018)

MartinCrabtree said:


> Chuasam she kinda looks like a young Grace Slick. Nice.


Thanks. i had to look up Grace Slick.
Nah...Grace Slick isn't as pretty.

(another photo from the same shoot but this isn't my contest entry)


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## FrankAnzalone (Jun 23, 2018)

This photo is a complete riddle.
First of all, it wasn't even supposed to look good. This was just a test shot for exposure on a video shoot that I found on my card. It was also in complete natural light, and the cloud came over the sun right as I took the shot. And don't get me started on the composition. It sucks. But somehow it works in my opinion.


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## pixmedic (Jun 24, 2018)

chuasam said:


> MartinCrabtree said:
> 
> 
> > Chuasam she kinda looks like a young Grace Slick. Nice.
> ...


Pity..such a great shot

Sent from my LG-H872 using Tapatalk


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## chuasam (Jun 24, 2018)

pixmedic said:


> chuasam said:
> 
> 
> > MartinCrabtree said:
> ...



It’s too perfect to be imperfect


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## MartinCrabtree (Jun 24, 2018)

It took me a while to decide which photo to submit but here we go. He was a wonderful dog and this says a great deal about who he was. But he's off center,background is cluttered with junk. Not to mention it was shot on Signature cinema film. It wasn't meant to be a portrait but here we are. I miss him every day.


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## pixmedic (Jun 25, 2018)

close to the end now


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## Lord Commander (Jun 25, 2018)

I was taking some cool "neon-like" portraits of my sister for her Instagram and this one's the best of the bunch. I thought it was perfect and beautiful, like her. But then I realized one of the most important things about a portrait is the eyes. And there are no eyes!!


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## pixmedic (Jun 29, 2018)

Only a few days left.

Giggity

Sent from my LG-H872 using Tapatalk


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## JonA_CT (Jul 1, 2018)

It's July now, but this feels like the best thread to share this photo anyways.

I love taking photos of my kids with super-wide focal lengths. It makes them seem so much bigger in the world than they really are, which is exactly the way they think of themselves. This photo seems to capture that in my son well, although the background is a mess (with my friend Taylor in a hot spot in the back, and clutter all over), and despite the fact that he's looking at me instead of the lens. This picture describes his personality all the same.




jackcapecod2018 by jwa04, on Flickr


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## pixmedic (Jul 2, 2018)

wrapping this up today. 
tough one...i've got a few in mind that will be hard to choose from. 
stay tuned for news at 11!


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## JoeW (Jul 2, 2018)

Suspense!  I can hardly wait!


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## pixmedic (Jul 3, 2018)

well ****.
this has been a tough one.
i had my favorites to choose from, the wife had hers....the ferrets weren't much help....for fert reasons. 
in the end we had to consider two things: the severity of the "imperfection",  and how great the photo was despite it. 
a few shots really hit us in the feels, but the wife had very strong feelings about one in particular. she was sold on the pose and expression. I could find no fault with 
her reasoning and therefor acquiesced. 

congratulations @chuasam and his masterful, yet noisy AF, portrait. 





 

PM me with how you would like the prize distributed (gift card or paypal) and ill get that done asap. (sooner for paypal obviously)


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## Dean_Gretsch (Jul 3, 2018)

Congrats! She is stunning.


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## jcdeboever (Jul 3, 2018)

Congrats @chuasam. I had a feeling that one would take the prize.


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## JoeW (Jul 3, 2018)

Congrats!


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## Jeff G (Jul 3, 2018)

Congrats!


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## Fujidave (Jul 3, 2018)

pixmedic said:


> well ****.
> this has been a tough one.
> i had my favorites to choose from, the wife had hers....the ferrets weren't much help....for fert reasons.
> in the end we had to consider two things: the severity of the "imperfection",  and how great the photo was despite it.
> ...



Congrats on a good shot of this beautiful young lady.


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## DanOstergren (Jul 3, 2018)

Well deserved.


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## smithdan (Jul 3, 2018)

Congratulations chuasam.


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## chuasam (Jul 3, 2018)

Thank you everyone, especially Jason for hosting the contest.
Here are a few images that had made my shortlist for the submission.

I was doing a photoshoot for my neighbour and her dog but my dog kept coming in to "help"
 
noted Equestrian Photographer Cara Grimshaw


After training in photography, I wanted to force myself to take blurry "imperfect" images in order to push past the need for static perfectly lit and sharp images.


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## DavidCohen (Feb 18, 2019)

pixmedic said:


> tirediron said:
> 
> 
> > An old one...  I hope I don't really have to explain it though.
> ...



However, it's made perfectly!


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