Portrait using a single light source

[CraigVTR]

Took a few shots the other night of my son after his sister had "done" his hair. I tried out one of my new lights from the Eagle three light kit to see what effect I would get. The light was to camera left, with umbrella, and a reflective umbrella hand held camera right for some fill from that side. Also used my new 50 1.4.

My self critique is;
a) underexposed by about 1.5 stops, forgot to check the histogram, exposure pushed up with levels, first shot looks like levels were pushed too high making his shoulder look a bit hot,
b) need more fill from right hand side,
c) need a hair light, as that was the purpose of the shoot,
d) watch is a real distraction on second shot.

I quite often forget to check the histogram for exposure because when chimping all shots look well exposed on the lcd. One day I will get it through my thick skull. Notice the right eye looks black on the second shot (on the right) because of the noise. I also noticed when doing a test print of the first shot (on the left) that the majority of the hair spikes could not be seen as it just blocked out to solid black. I suppose that is a product of the poor exposure and the limitation of print.

All comments are welcome and appreciated, I will be redoing this soon in an effort to get a better result.

Here are two of the shots
D70s, 50 1.4, custom w/b. pp Levels, convert to jpeg.

[surenj]

I think you have self critiqued yourself well, I would watch the way that the necklace is intermingling a bit but this is minor detail.. Agree with hair light

[Biggzie]

With the absence of a hair light, a lighter background would have helped too.

[Oz_Beachside]

not sure what side you were punting for here, but chin towards shoulder/chest is quite feminine. if I want to add strength to a male portrait, I would ask to raise their chin, jaw lines can be masculine, and adding the adam's apple too...

[CraigVTR]

I think you have self critiqued yourself well, I would watch the way that the necklace is intermingling a bit but this is minor detail.. Agree with hair light

I agree the chain does look untidy.

With the absence of a hair light, a lighter background would have helped too.

Understood, but for some strange reason I like dark backgrounds.

not sure what side you were punting for here, but chin towards shoulder/chest is quite feminine. if I want to add strength to a male portrait, I would ask to raise their chin, jaw lines can be masculine, and adding the adam's apple too...

Now that it has been pointed out a raised chin would look a lot better and more masculine.

Thanks for the feedback guys I have learnt a lot from a spur of the moment, very rushed and short shoot.