Call for portrait examples
Wanted: technically good head & shoulder portraits as practice and learning tools for postprocessing. Access to full resolution originals is required. RAW images would be even better, if we can figure out a way to host them (I suspect we can.)
Original here
What you get out of it: Beyond the satisfaction of helping us all learn to make better portraits, you'll also end up with the fruits of our labor. Your ego will be gratified by seeing your photograph over and over again in different states of postprocessing. And at the very end of the process, I'll even make some delux prints of a few of the best examples and send to the photographers and photoshoppers. Think of this as being an honor on the same level as winning a challenge, but even more so, since you get the photoshopping done for you. More like having your image on the cover of a magazine.
Original here
Details: I'm in the process of writing up Dan Margulis' new portrait enhancement technique. This is fairly simple recipe which can make any portrait look more realistic and/or flattering. On the other hand, although the recipe is simple, it contains several decision points and it seems quite a bit of practice is required to get these just right. I have a slightly different forum in mind for this particular discussion thread, borrowed from the format of Dan's classes. We'll pick some originals and all work on the same shots in a competitive format. At the end, we'll compare the edits and try to come to concensus on the best one. I think this format helps everyone get on the same page about what looks right and what doesn't.
Original here
Details about what we need:
Original here
Original here
What you get out of it: Beyond the satisfaction of helping us all learn to make better portraits, you'll also end up with the fruits of our labor. Your ego will be gratified by seeing your photograph over and over again in different states of postprocessing. And at the very end of the process, I'll even make some delux prints of a few of the best examples and send to the photographers and photoshoppers. Think of this as being an honor on the same level as winning a challenge, but even more so, since you get the photoshopping done for you. More like having your image on the cover of a magazine.
Original here
Details: I'm in the process of writing up Dan Margulis' new portrait enhancement technique. This is fairly simple recipe which can make any portrait look more realistic and/or flattering. On the other hand, although the recipe is simple, it contains several decision points and it seems quite a bit of practice is required to get these just right. I have a slightly different forum in mind for this particular discussion thread, borrowed from the format of Dan's classes. We'll pick some originals and all work on the same shots in a competitive format. At the end, we'll compare the edits and try to come to concensus on the best one. I think this format helps everyone get on the same page about what looks right and what doesn't.
Original here
Details about what we need:
- Head and shoulders portraits
- Variety of complexions, genders, and ages
- Original sizes, raw preferable (but jpegs with good contrast and color balance acceptable.)
- Complex backgrounds and group shots add a lot of additional complexity to the basic recipe. I hope we'll progress to work on images of this sort, but I'll try to pick a first set with simple backgrounds and only one subject. Backgrounds blurred by shallow DOF are great for this, as are studio type shots with neutral backgrounds. The shots I've shown here are all pretty easy in this respect.
Original here
If not now, when?
0
Comments
If you want a crack at cleaning up noise and fixing WB issues, I have a several for you in this gallery.
I don't know if you wanted "strict" portraits, but I guess all these could be cropped as such. Just trying to help. If you like any of them, I'll make the original available (for now they are protected to sell a few prints to the organizers of the event).
moderator of: The Flea Market [ guidelines ]
This sounds very interesting. Great idea!! Since I never seem to get it right in camera I rely heavily on postprocessing, and still need to improve a lot in this field.
Here I have 3 pictures from a session I did with my wife a few days ago. Obviously, these pics are straight from the camera, and are desperatly waiting for someone to process them.
The pics were taken in RAW and 'converted' in Picasa. I provide the links to the original RAW files if you are interessted in working with them.
#1
Regards,
Andreas
My Grandkids
If they interest you I can email raw/s
Ben
My Galleries
Flicker
G+
can i post Jpg of 700 KB ?
yes or no i will post them tommorow
My Gallery
or am i way off?
you can see more at binghott.com, i know they're a little dark right now, i didn't touch them up yet.
LINK TO ORIGINAL SIZE JPG
LINK TO ORIGINAL SIZE JPG
LINK TO ORIGINAL SIZE JPG
Lets see what folks can do.
i'm sorry for posting so many!
just tell me which originals you'll want.
http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=22524
in case you are interested. The close crops of the good looking young women are good beginner's fodder. Thanks.
Now I'd like some older people, please, and perhaps other races. Both of these will illustrate important issues with the recipe.
i did not retouched them accept 1st one last is just cropped and converted to BW sorry for blurry eyes :uhoh
big size http://awais.smugmug.com/photos/44781303-L.jpg
Big size http://awais.smugmug.com/photos/44781703-L.jpg
big size http://awais.smugmug.com/photos/44781981-L.jpg
Big size http://awais.smugmug.com/photos/44781305-L.jpg
Old Asians needed ?
My Gallery
Also, we need the highest resolution possible originals. Part of how I'll judge suitability is by how untouched an original is available.
LINK TO ORIGINAL
This one doesn't meet all of your requirements, but it's always baffled me. It's a sentimental shot, not a great one, and I've made it look much better than this, but I've never gotten it to where I like it. This was shot with my Canon G5 in my pre-RAW days. This is the original out of the camera.
Original here.
Dgrin FAQ | Me | Workshops
This one is advanced because of the two faces with different complexions. Let's delay and maybe use after we get some experience with easier ones.
Strictly amature stuff but if you can use it, sorry no RAW but large jpegs. Let me know if you want originals.
Jeez, I didn't do the arithmetic, but it seems that about 99% of the people in the world are female and about 99% are 20 or under. Maybe 80% are Caucasian. Of the others, there are technical flaws (Erik's high noise) or no originals. That's fine for photography, but not for teaching portrait post processing. Come on, people, I know you can do better.
Maybe I didn't make this clear, but there is a [size=+2]darn nice prize[/size] for the pictures we end up using. 1. We'll make the shot beautiful (and you can play along to make sure we make it at least as beautiful as you can.) and 2. you'll recieve a delux print of the best finished version, any size you want up to 17 inches on the short side on either fine art matte or luster paper your choice. And I'll even throw in one more sweetener: you can pick the version for the print, yours, mine, or any of the ones by participants in the portrait post processing discussion.
Actually, by my count, a lot are much younger than 20, younger than 10 even.
gubbs.smugmug.com
The original is available here, not underlined, at this addy:
http://gingerSnap.smugmug.com/gallery/973953/1/44888629
I have the RAW file at this point. I am going to change back to my other external hard drive. Let me know if you HAVE to have the raw file.
ginger
I have the original for this in the same gallery as Santa claus, just go to that gallery for the original. I can't find the finished product, so this is perfect as it obviously is NOT the finished version at the time. I think the RAW copy is around somewhere.
ginger
(And his face is next to impossible to work on, it is red naturally.)
ginger
I will try to find you some old ladies. Unfortunately, I stopped taking photos of me a year or so ago............and I looked so much better then.
I have older women, but I don't know them. I don't want to work on someone I don't know or care about.
I can provide originals and exif if needed. Thanks for looking!
~H
http://hollyclawges.smugmug.com
I'm not linking to the original, since it's been processed already. Rutt, if you want to use it I can post the RAW file or a plain RAW conversion.
Dgrin FAQ | Me | Workshops
Very cute, David, but also advanced for similar reasons as your last.
Anyway, we have what we need for a first set now. I'll choose 6 or so and post instructions in the next day or so. Thanks everyone. Don't stop contributing, but we are ready for group shots and less close crops.
Yeah, I know. I'm looking for a challenge. (Although I'm sure at first a single complexion shot will be challenging enough and I need to slow down...)
Dgrin FAQ | Me | Workshops
I promise you'll have plenty of fun with the first set.
I'll choose at least one more set later on with more difficult shots.
IMPORTANT: Portrait post processors, [size=+2]wait[/size] just a little bit and I'll post on the Chapter 16 thread the locations of the best quality originals or raw versons. Remember, I am planning to make large prints from the winners and that will work much better if we start with the best input we can get.
So here are the images for the first set:
[size=+2]Nordic[/size]
[size=+2]Binghott[/size]
[size=+2]Gubbs[/size]
[size=+2]Ginger[/size]
[size=+2]Hollyc[/size]
[size=+2]Greaper[/size]