Sow’s ear…..

A

Alison

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Name
Alison
Edit My Images
Yes
….can someone help me turn this into a silk purse?

8659.jpg


I shot a friend’s 21st party the other week as a birthday gift and attempted to get a decent shot of every guest as a happy record for her to look back on over the years. All but two out of the 120 or so were nicely exposed flattering pics straight out of camera (amazingly, as I was rather “mellow” for most of the evening! ;)). I’ve battered the other binner to death in PP and managed to rescue it well but remain defeated by this one.

The subject is a beautiful girl who thinks she’s ugly – I’d like to try and turn this into a high key image or something she’ll like and which will give her more confidence about her looks.

Crap I know: hate the blocky shadows, noise and everything else (although I quite like the crop/angle) but this is the best I’ve been able to come up with:

Copyof8659.jpg


Please give this a whirl and share your recipe; I’d really like to show this lady how pretty she is.

Thanks in advance for your input and help,
Alison
 
Alison,
How on earth did you manage to defeat the fool-proof camera to produce such results?

You seem to have worked actively against it's best judgements.

Did you shoot raw (I really hope you did). Please post a link to a raw file if you did and we can see what is really there.

Graham
 
3821235918_2a2be3130b_o.jpg

I havent got a clue how to repost here so this image is in my flickr account for a few mins so you can view it on here
 
this was a 2 minute rework, she has a real meg ryan look and has nothing to worry about on the looks front! boosted the eye and sharpened it softened the image boosted the lips with a exposure +1 layer
 
I quite like Flashes third one down. Heres my B+W take on this shot.

3821305744_db91a42a02_o.jpg
 
Thought i'd give it a go too, i do think she has nothing to worry about as far as looks go she's stunning. ;)
sorry i couldn't do more about the noise.
showphoto.php
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Shadows / highlights and USM

copy_8659.jpg


BTW she is a pretty girl :thumbs:
 
She's charming.

8659.jpg


Curve to adjust individual RGB's (red was untouched) Eye used as reference points for highlight & shadow.
Hue/Sat layer pulled the yellow down a shade further
Dodge & burn to remove spot on chin
Hue/Sat layer just for the hair to take green hue out
Curve to brighten eyes
Curve to exaggerate eye and lip colour
High pass to sharpen eye (overdone by the look of it)
Curve to lighten hair highlights (blend luminosity, mask from red channel)
HiRaLoAm used to tighten skin
Cropped

Under 10 minutes ;)

It's a small 8 bit jpeg, otherwise we'd have way more scope to play with.
 
Nice takes everyone, love each and every one and can’t choose a favourite. Thanks so much for taking the time to look and help :)


blue max said:
Alison,
How on earth did you manage to defeat the fool-proof camera to produce such results?

You seem to have worked actively against it's best judgements.

Did you shoot raw (I really hope you did). Please post a link to a raw file if you did and we can see what is really there.

Graham
Click to expand...
Of course I shot RAW! Not sure how to post a link to it here though but if somebody can talk me through the process I will do so. The image shown was just converted to Jpeg and resized for the forum.
 
She's a fox anyway... :shrug:

3822426483_51dd1b83da_o.jpg


Warmer version..

3822460383_e83dd7f63c_o.jpg
 
JasonRS said:
It's a small 8 bit jpeg, otherwise we'd have way more scope to play with.
Click to expand...
Yet another fantastic edit JasonRS. I've asked before in this thread but as yet not received an answer - how can I provide the unedited raw here, straight out of camera for people to work on? :shrug:

CT – how did you get the catchlight in the subject’s right eye?
 
Alison said:
Yet another fantastic edit JasonRS. I've asked before in this thread but as yet not received an answer - how can I provide the unedited raw here, straight out of camera for people to work on? :shrug:

CT – how did you get the catchlight in the subject’s right eye?
Click to expand...

Thanks, I try to be gentle with my retouches :)

If you've got the original RAW already hosted online then just paste the link into a thread and we'll worry about the rest.

If not, drop me a PM, and I'll give you the details of my FTP site and you can send it over to me and I'll both host the RAW and retouch it for you.
 
Really nice edit CT,the warmer version is defo nicer although maybe the hair needs cooling to lose the cast, other than that; best of the bunch! really nice subtle edits... still...... you need good photoshop skills when you use inferior camera brands i guess:p:p:p
just think how great youd be if you used nikon!:D
 
oskanoears said:
Really nice edit CT,the warmer version is defo nicer although maybe the hair needs cooling to lose the cast, other than that; best of the bunch! really nice subtle edits... still...... you need good photoshop skills when you use inferior camera brands i guess:p:p:p
just think how great youd be if you used nikon!:D
Click to expand...

Thanks - I think! :D

Alison -I just cloned the highlight across with a soft feathered clone brush.
 
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