Fine Art Portraiture

Jesh de Rox inspired me for this post. Although he captures very sweet moments, what he does with those images afterwards is what makes his work fine art. I feel like I see so many wedding photographers just slap on the title "fine art" to their weddings, but there is so little merit behind it. Jesh really takes his images to the next level, and by being an exlusive wedding photographer (ie only taking in a small number of jobs each year), he is able to really spend the time to create these amazing pieces of art. So, I tried my hand in Photoshop to see what I could come up with. Tell me what you think.

The first image is untouched (embarassingly, what I showed my client on Pictage)... but, it really does not tell the moment as I saw it when the shutter closed. I saw Jane, my dear and absolutely beautiful friend, in a peaceful and pensive moment right before she walked down the aisle to a new life. She looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her; she just glowed! But, I didn't want to just put a glow effect on her... Anyways, the first image barely communicates what I saw. The second image is just tweeking that I would do on a current order through our new (but not yet released) online gallery system. And, the third... still a work in progress, but it is my attempt at making this moment into fine art... weddings are filled with fantasy-like moments where the world just seems to stop, so shouldn't the images from them communicate that?