granddaughter & mother at the same age

livinginoz

the first image is the original photo of my granddaughter, and the second is the improved (i hope) version. ironically, i shot a very similar portrait of my daughter at the same age. i had to scan it, and it looks rather soft, but i am not sure quite what to do to make it any better.

before


after


and her mother (my daughter)


thanks for looking

JamesJWeg

Wow, very cool to have those two shots, the look like the same girl to me.

James.

DavidTO

livinginoz wrote:

i had to scan it, and it looks rather soft, but i am not sure quite what to do to make it any better.

Start with our Making Your Photo Pop tute. Read parts one and two (I linked part one, part two is linked at the end of one, so you can read right through). It will make a huge difference in your shot.

After you do that you will find that as flat as the shot is, it's oversaturated. you just can't tell yet. But run through the "pop" steps, and you'll see that at the end you need to pull the saturation down a bit. When you're done, compare it to your original, and it will be like a veil was lifted off your picture.

livinginoz

DavidTO wrote:

Start with our Making Your Photo Pop tute. Read parts one and two (I linked part one, part two is linked at the end of one, so you can read right through). It will make a huge difference in your shot.

After you do that you will find that as flat as the shot is, it's oversaturated. you just can't tell yet. But run through the "pop" steps, and you'll see that at the end you need to pull the saturation down a bit. When you're done, compare it to your original, and it will be like a veil was lifted off your picture.

thank you, i am going to check it out right now.

livinginoz

DavidTO wrote:

Start with our Making Your Photo Pop tute. Read parts one and two (I linked part one, part two is linked at the end of one, so you can read right through). It will make a huge difference in your shot.

After you do that you will find that as flat as the shot is, it's oversaturated. you just can't tell yet. But run through the "pop" steps, and you'll see that at the end you need to pull the saturation down a bit. When you're done, compare it to your original, and it will be like a veil was lifted off your picture.

thank you, i am going to check it out right now.

like this?

DavidTO

livinginoz wrote:

thank you, i am going to check it out right now.

like this?

Well, now it's oversaturated and too yellow. But it's getting better...

livinginoz

DavidTO wrote:

Well, now it's oversaturated and too yellow. But it's getting better...

ACKKKKK........yes, i thought i was kind of over yellow too, plus she has blue eyes and they look brown......back to the drawing board, so to speak.

thanks for the input, i am learning a lot tonight.

DavidTO

Here's what I did.

Set the black point, pulled the highlights end of the curve so that the input 23 became 0.

Then I added a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, lowering the saturation to -15.

Last thing I did was add a photo filter. Image>Adjustments>Photo Filter> Cooling Filter (82) at 25%.

What do you think?

livinginoz

the latest attempt......and i do mean late, it's past my bedtime i just tried a few of the things you mentioned on top of making her eyes blue. i also ran a noise reduction filter on it.

DavidTO

livinginoz wrote:

the latest attempt......and i do mean late, it's past my bedtime i just tried a few of the things you mentioned on top of making her eyes blue. i also ran a noise reduction filter on it.

Close, but the pic is lacking a black point. Can't tell you how important that is...

livinginoz

DavidTO wrote:

Close, but the pic is lacking a black point. Can't tell you how important that is...

is it still? because i ran that before i made these new changes? oh well, ,that will be left for tomorrow. thanks for all the input.

leebase

Wonderful! I actually like the first photo better than your improved one. I like the crop, but not the color treatment.

BTW, you can "flip" your photo so that both your daughter and grandaughter face the same direction, making the photos even more similar.

Lee

livinginoz

one more try
this evening

erich6

Here's a "flipped" version.

I also adjusted the blackpoint, brightness, and color cast a bit in Photoshop. Is this what you are going for? I didn't play around with the eye colors though....

livinginoz

i tried it flipped, and i have looked at that photo for so long the other way, that it does things to my mind to see it in reverse. at one time i created a "real" painting of it using a real airbrush, so i have seen it a lot.

that black point is really elusive, isn't it? because i used it on my most recent effort. do you do it when you are through with everything else? or first thing? my head spins.........

(as does hers )

DavidTO

livinginoz wrote:

i tried it flipped, and i have looked at that photo for so long the other way, that it does things to my mind to see it in reverse. at one time i created a "real" painting of it using a real airbrush, so i have seen it a lot.

that black point is really elusive, isn't it? because i used it on my most recent effort. do you do it when you are through with everything else? or first thing? my head spins.........

(as does hers )

Hmmmm.....I did it first. I guess the secret is to make sure that you don't do anything else that destroys it, or go back to it. It can drastically change the color balance, which is why you want to do it first. If it screws up the picture, don't do it. Then you'll have to find an alternate way to get a black point...like moving up that end of your curves a touch.

erich6

livinginoz wrote:

i tried it flipped, and i have looked at that photo for so long the other way, that it does things to my mind to see it in reverse. at one time i created a "real" painting of it using a real airbrush, so i have seen it a lot.

that black point is really elusive, isn't it? because i used it on my most recent effort. do you do it when you are through with everything else? or first thing? my head spins.........

(as does hers )

Yes...I know what you mean about how something you are used to seeing one way will look so awkward the other way. I didn't think about that when I flipped it.

I did the black point first as I usually do. I think I picked a pixel around the iris of her left eye (dark ring).

livinginoz

erich6 wrote:

Yes...I know what you mean about how something you are used to seeing one way will look so awkward the other way. I didn't think about that when I flipped it.

I did the black point first as I usually do. I think I picked a pixel around the iris of her left eye (dark ring).

i didn't like it at first because it seemed too dark, but now that i see it on my monitor at home, it looks just about right.... i wonder how much difference we all see because of our monitors. i am on a new imac g5 with a 20" monitor, and i makes my flat screen samsung at work look outdated, even thought it's not.

i am also getting used to looking at it flipped. i am making up a slide show of family pix, and i think i will use it flipped. it will be a nice sequence with both photos in there. maybe i should even tone down the one of the granddaughter so they are more similar?

thanks, everyone.