Grandchild Photo - different backgrounds

lifeinfocus

I recently took lots of photos of our 2 year grandchild.

While we were out with her new Radio Flyer wagon I took some shots. One I liked particularly well, but not the background. So, I replaced it with a few standard ones from Photoshop.

C&C welcome.

1 with original background



2


3


4
Cropped version


Phil

Scootersbabygirl

Your granddaughter is adorable, but for my tastes the backgrounds look just too fake. I much prefer the original background. Try doing the portrait crop on the original photo and you'll cut out the annoying truck on the right and the drink cup, possibly giving you a much better shot.

lifeinfocus

Scootersbabygirl wrote: »

Your granddaughter is adorable, but for my tastes the backgrounds look just too fake. I much prefer the original background. Try doing the portrait crop on the original photo and you'll cut out the annoying truck on the right and the drink cup, possibly giving you a much better shot.

Thanks, I have had a few friends and family say the same thing, but a few like the replaced backgrounds.

Would like to know how many like the Photoshop backgrounds?

Phil

TenThirteen

To me the fake backgrounds just look silly... But the little girl is adorable!

jonh68

Don't like any of of the photoshopped backgrounds. Crank up the aperture to melt away backgrounds when you shoot, or try blurring the background you have now.

Darren Troy C

The first shot, on a dirt road, with some overgrown weeds, and a smidgen of "old time" processing. As far as the altered BGs....not digging them at all.

lifeinfocus

Thanks for all your comments. So, I went back to the drawing board, well the tablet, and I cloned, Gaussian blurred and cropped twice.

Always welcome to comments. Thanks, Phil

1 Cloned and Gaussian blur.



2 Same plus cropped some.



3. Ditto and cropped more.

jonh68

Better!

Bryce Wilson

I like the second set MUCH better. Even for a Spartan!

lifeinfocus

Bryce Wilson wrote: »

I like the second set MUCH better. Even for a Spartan!

Yeah, I am a Spartan fan - Go Green, Go White. My partner and I posted almost 10,000 photos of the Spartans games over the last two years as my nephew played on the team.

Thanks for the comments.

Phil

Bryce Wilson

lifeinfocus wrote: »

Yeah, I am a Spartan fan - Go Green, Go White. My partner and I posted almost 10,000 photos of the Spartans games over the last two years as my nephew played on the team.

Thanks for the comments.

Phil

That had to be a lot of fun. They've had a pretty good run the last two years or so. I was on the photo deck when they beat UofM 34-17 at the Big House. Thought I was gonna see Jim Brandstatter cry on the free buffet!

moose135

Your reworked shots look much better to me. I like the second, although it looks like you have a little white edge on the bottom (maybe from rotating it?) that you should get rid of. But I think your third one, the close-up, is my favorite.

lifeinfocus

moose135 wrote: »

Your reworked shots look much better to me. I like the second, although it looks like you have a little white edge on the bottom (maybe from rotating it?) that you should get rid of. But I think your third one, the close-up, is my favorite.

Thanks. I noticed he over cropping on the 2nd one. Easily fixed.

Phil

Scootersbabygirl

I definitely like the second set better - the blurred background is much nicer than the gradient!

ValerieJean

Not digging the gradient background. A lot of times when I'm just out shooting candids ... I take a few extra shots of the backgrounds in the area without the subject in them, as well as at different exposures.... and then I can make a composite from the subject and the BG in case I missed something. In one case, I took an amazing picture of my son splashing at the beach, but the sky was too bright and over exposed that if I slowwed my shutter speed, his face was too dark. So with some layers and some masking, I was able to bring an underexposed of the Bg, and properly exposed subject together and it actually made my son stand out more against a darker background, making the image pop more. In my opinion, gradients are more for adding some pizazz to a background or giving graphics a shimmer, not for being a straight background.

Pardon me for posting a photo, but I thought an example may be helpful to really see the difference it can make.

lifeinfocus

ValerieJean wrote: »

Not digging the gradient background. A lot of times when I'm just out shooting candids ... I take a few extra shots of the backgrounds in the area without the subject in them, as well as at different exposures.... and then I can make a composite from the subject and the BG in case I missed something. In one case, I took an amazing picture of my son splashing at the beach, but the sky was too bright and over exposed that if I slowwed my shutter speed, his face was too dark. So with some layers and some masking, I was able to bring an underexposed of the Bg, and properly exposed subject together and it actually made my son stand out more against a darker background, making the image pop more. In my opinion, gradients are more for adding some pizazz to a background or giving graphics a shimmer, not for being a straight background.

Pardon me for posting a photo, but I thought an example may be helpful to really see the difference it can make.

Great idea! Thanks for some examples too.

Phil

briandelion

Wow, what a difference with the blurred bkgd! That last tight crop hits the spot for me.