Portrait editing - always second guessing myself

Ann McRae · May 30, 2005

Okay - I have spent the day on this and still cannot put my finger on what really needs to be done. Even did 2 blended exposures, and pitched them both!
Original (I have the RAW files still):

JPEG with curves adjustment:

What is it that I am missing?

ann

wxwax · May 30, 2005

It's a tough shot to make really good, because she's so backlit.

Your crop is good on the second one. But she's too bright. How much have you tried darkening the background?

mercphoto · May 30, 2005

Ann McRae wrote:

Okay - I have spent the day on this and still cannot put my finger on what really needs to be done.

I prefer the colors and tones of the first one, with the crop of the second. What bugs me most is that purse.

Andy · May 30, 2005

cough it up, ann ... jpg processed from raw -O size (linky) and let's see what we can do

Ann McRae · May 30, 2005

Only if you show me the steps along the way, andy. How's a goil to learn???
ann

andy wrote:

cough it up, ann ... jpg processed from raw -O size (linky) and let's see what we can do

Andy · May 30, 2005

Ann McRae wrote:

Only if you show me the steps along the way, andy. How's a goil to learn???
ann

yeh, yeh.. that's the idea

if you put up the linky i'll move this to ps shenanigans and we'll see what folks can come up with - of course with the steps along the way

wxwax · May 30, 2005

andy wrote:

yeh, yeh.. that's the idea
if you put up the linky i'll move this to ps shenanigans and we'll see what folks can come up with - of course with the steps along the way

Good idea.

Ann McRae · May 31, 2005

Hope this works - I have originals turned on, but am not getting a link to them, so just used the -L link and added O.
Now, from RAW, I changed the EC and sharpening to make this .jpg

Here is a question to start - what would you change on the original when converting from RAW?

Let me also say that I am not at all unhappy witht he backlighting, but trying to lighten up her face and hair results in really over doing the background. I am also not sure I want to lighten her up this much. So where should I start with the conversion process?

http://canadian-ann.smugmug.com/photos/23473306-O

ann

wxwax · May 31, 2005

Ann McRae wrote:

Hope this works - I have originals turned on, but am not getting a link to them, so just used the -L link and added O.
Now, from RAW, I changed the EC and sharpening to make this .jpg

Here is a question to start - what would you change on the original when converting from RAW?

Let me also say that I am not at all unhappy witht he backlighting, but trying to lighten up her face and hair results in really over doing the background. I am also not sure I want to lighten her up this much. So where should I start with the conversion process?

http://canadian-ann.smugmug.com/photos/23473306-O

ann

I'd make at least two exposures from RAW - one for the background and one for her.

Bandit959 · May 31, 2005

So...does this help or make it worse?

Ann McRae wrote:

Hope this works - I have originals turned on, but am not getting a link to them, so just used the -L link and added O.
Now, from RAW, I changed the EC and sharpening to make this .jpg

Here is a question to start - what would you change on the original when converting from RAW?

Let me also say that I am not at all unhappy witht he backlighting, but trying to lighten up her face and hair results in really over doing the background. I am also not sure I want to lighten her up this much. So where should I start with the conversion process?

http://canadian-ann.smugmug.com/photos/23473306-O

ann

Hi Ann and Folks;
Well, I’ve been lurking since I signed up for the board here, trying to get a feel for the people and the place. But I figured that it was about time to make a post, so I’ll throw in my $0.02 worth.

Overall, I like the shot. But like mercphoto, I tend to like the first color with the second cropping. But overall, it’s a good shot, nice depth of field, but I tend to think it needs just a little tweaking. I suspect that everyone will want to basically get to the same place with the image that is
- Try to do something with the background and
- Do a little cropping.

I get the impression that you’re a beginner with Photoshop, so I’ll do just a basic amount of adjusting. There is more that you can do when you learn about the layers and the different types of layers. I’m sure that others will have different ways to attack the problem, but these are a few basic steps you can take to polish up a good photo and make it a great one.

The first thing to remember in Photoshop is it isn’t like working with a camera. You don’t need to work the image as a whole, as a matter of fact, you want to work at it in different ways in different layers,

That said, here’s my walk through with some tutorial like comments. ?

1) Opened the image in Photoshop CS and rotated 90 degrees. ;-)
2) I personally like to have options when I work in PS. One of those the things I automatically do is convert the background to a layer simply by double clicking the layer. The Background changes from “Background” to “Layer 0”.
3) Next I duplicate the layer, rename it to something appropriate (in this case “Layer 1” works) lock it and shut off the visibility. This way, I still have an original to return to if needed. (BTW, there are advantages and disadvantages to leaving the layer as a “background”, but the bottom line is you have something to go back too.
4) The first thing I take a look at is the LEVELS. This brings up a histogram and it tells you a variety of information about how your image uses the colorspace including the shadows on the far left, the midtones in the middle and the highlights on the right. If you’re not familiar with the histogram, there are numerous tutorials that you can find on the web. Suffice it to say that in general, you want to see the entire histogram with data from the shadows to the highlights. Remember, that’s in general.
5) Let’s looks at your image. In the RGB space, of the red, G or blue alone, there is information “missing” in the shadow area. So we need to change that.
6) In most cases, you can do the auto adjust. There are lots of reasons why you should and shouldn’t trust the auto levels. But in an image such as this one, it’s mostly the shadows that need adjusting. So I auto leveled the image.
7) I noticed that you used the curves to try to adjust the color. This is the most common way to do color adjustment. But I should say that it takes some time to learn the subtleties of it. So I’d encourage you to experiment!
8) OK, if you want to see the difference, you can use the new 2 layers. First you need to make Layer 0 visible. Then click on and off the visibility of Layer 1. You will be able to see the difference and determine if you like what you just did.
9) So, we made a small adjustment and it has made a big difference in the image. We could crop it there and call it a day. But that doesn’t really address the blown out background.
10) OK, here’s where it gets real interesting. We can try to blow out the background even more and then readjust our subject OR we can darken the background. A quick and easy way to just change the background is with the dodge and burn tools. One lightens, while the other one darkens. So, it’s up to you at this point which way you want to go. Either way, you can choose a large brush size, and work the shadows, midtones and highlights separate. You’ll have to play around a bit, but I find that this might give too much of a spotlight effect. You’ll have to be the judge.
11) An alternate method that gives you more control is to extract the subject from the background. First, create a copy of Layer 1 then apply the extract filter to Layer 1 copy. I used a brush size of 20 pixels, and you basically trace the outline of the subject using the marker pen. You don’t have to worry too much about all those stray hairs. Our goal here is to create a cheep version of a mask that we will use to select the background only. (along the lines of your 2 exposures) When you think that you’ve finished tracing, make sure that there are no openings, and then fill the subject with the paint bucket. And poof…you have the subject extracted, well mostly.
12) There maybe some extra areas that you don’t want to have extracted that ended up being lost in this process. To check this out, I create a layer that I call FLOOD and flood it with a bright color that isn’t in the image. In this case, bright red. Then I examine every edge to make sure nothing got erased that I didn’t intend. If so, I make sure that Layer 1 copy is active and use the History Undo brush to put back what was lost. OK, so now I have a clean copy of the subject pulled from the background that I will use as a mask.
13) Next, I’ll make another copy of Layer 0, this will be called Layer 0 copy 1 by default. Here’s where that cheap version of a mask will come in handy. I should mention that my layers are built up as follows….
a. Layer 1 copy
b. FLOOD
c. Layer 1
d. Layer 0 copy
e. Layer 0
14) I’m going to skip the real mask mode discussion and just use the simple select tool at this point. On Layer 1 copy, use the magic wand tool to select all of the blank area around the subject. Once I have that area selected, I inverse the selection. This means that I now have the subject selected, not the area surrounding the subject.
15) Now let’s make Layer 0 copy active. Now hit the delete key. This will knock out the subject and just leave the background. There’s only so much you can darken the background (or backplate) before it becomes overpowering and doesn’t look like a real photo. It’s the dark pants that are the problem here. So, let’s pull up the Levels again and do an adjustment. Again, we’re “missing” the shadow information. So let’s readjust there.
16) By doing the simple histogram, the backplate became too cool for me. So, I wanted to warm it up slightly. I ran warming photo filter (85) at 25% to take the edge off the cold building. Just a minor tweak.
17) Now activate the following layers
a. Layer 1 copy (subject only)
b. Layer 0 copy (new backplate)
18) Now flatten the image and crop. Here’s the new image.

http://home.comcast.net/~r.salemi/MiscImages/23473306-O_revA.jpg

WHEW, there was a lot there, but this only scratches the surface. I hope that there was enough info for you to walk through it in PS. If not, I can get you some screen grabs too and I can answer questions. Just let me know!

- Rick

BTW, notice that the stray hairs are still in the shot because of the way the backplate and the subject were recombined. :-D

adrian_k · June 1, 2005

welcome to DGRIN Rick - good first post, there's alot of useful info there.

Ann, I took a more simplistic route.

First I cropped off the top, nothing I can do about the bag ;-)

Duplicate the BG (NewLevel) and change the blending mode to mutiply.
You could stop here, but I wasn't happy. It was a bit too contrasty so I reduced the opacity of NewLevel to ~80%. That's better.

You could stop here, but I wasn't happy.

I backed off the opacity again, now down to 69% then I added an adjustment layer to NewLevel and moved the middle master slider to the right, not a great deal just to 88 (++ see note below<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/headscratch.gif" border="0" alt="" > )

You could stop here, but I wasn't happy.

I brought up the levels box (double click) and chose the Blue channel and moved the middle slider to 0.87. This small change warms the pic alot.

Now I'm happy:D

Well, she does benefit from from USM, but that doesn't show at this size (297, 1.3, 11 if you're interested, but the above version is not sharpened.

HTH

<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/headscratch.gif" border="0" alt="" > ++ I can't quite get my head round this bit, maybe if I sat down and thought about it.........
Increasing the opacity of the multiplied layer has different effect to adding an adj. layer and increasing master level while reducing opacity to compensate.<img src="https://us.v-cdn.net/6029383/emoji/headscratch.gif" border="0" alt="" >

<edit> Ann, I forgot to say - it's a really nice shot, which is 90% of the battle.

and the orig.

david_h · June 1, 2005

My 5 minute bash at it.......
1. Open in PS
2. Rotate image
3. Covert to CYMK
4. Duplicate layer
5. USM - 20/50/0
6. Curves - there seems to be too much magenta and not enough yellow in the skintone so up with yellow/down with magenta
7. Flatten image
8. LAB sharpen action - sharpen L chanel 150/0.6/0
9. Darken edges action
10. Save for web.

Oops - crop should be in there somewhere, I forget where.

Here's the result:

If I had time I'd probably do something with the background. Problem is, I have no idea what the colours are supposed to be. I think there is now too much yellow in the BG, although there was an awful lot to begin with.

wxwax · June 1, 2005

Bandit, excellent first post and welcome to the land of the posters.

That's an excellent tutorial.

Bandit959 · June 1, 2005

Hmmm... It looks different on a PC.
Hi Folks;
Thanks for the warm welcome. As I suspected, there are many ways to skin the cat in PS. everyone has some great suggestions.

: So Ann, as you learn more about the app, I suspect that you'll lean more towards the layering options and the adjusting the curves. But I think that you've seen from the other posters that "layers are your friend" no matter which way you go.

BTW, I checked the board this AM from my PC .. very interesting. The image that I posted last night looks very close to what you did on my monitor. BUT on my Mac, it's a much different story. Funny how that works.

mercphoto · June 1, 2005

david_h wrote:

Wow David. Probably the best one I've seen yet. I think the CYMK curves on Yellow and Magenta did the best improvement to skin tone. Can I ask what exactly you did to the curves in each case?

Also, the darken edges action, really cool. Where could I find that? I know somewhere you can find some really neat actions, such as vignetting, burned paper edges, film strip roll edges, etc.

Lastly, if one was really picky, any way to whiten the teeth? Is that hard?

ginger_55 · June 1, 2005

Thanks, you all, I just noticed this thread and printed out all the info, at least three posts,

.

I would like to know more about CMYK and skin (tones). Does any of you use that?

g

DavidTO · June 1, 2005

ginger_55 wrote:

Thanks, you all, I just noticed this thread and printed out all the info, at least three posts, .

I would like to know more about CMYK and skin (tones). Does any of you use that?

g

I do, but I rarely go into CMYK mode to do it. You can do it in RGB as well. The info you need is in the info palette, of all places. Just check the CMYK values on skin. The rough formula is that cyan should be half of the yellow and magenta should always be at least a few points less than the yellow.

Nikolai · June 1, 2005

It's the ICC

Bandit959 wrote:

BTW, I checked the board this AM from my PC .. very interesting. The image that I posted last night looks very close to what you did on my monitor. BUT on my Mac, it's a much different story. Funny how that works.

This has been discussed heavily. You probably have Adobe RGB (or some even more esoteric profile) embedded into your image, which is honored by Macs and generally ignored by PCs (they use sRGB). If you want them to look identical on both you might wanna try sRGB.

HTH and welcome!

DavidTO · June 1, 2005

Nikolai wrote:

This has been discussed heavily. You probably have Adobe RGB (or some even more esoteric profile) embedded into your image, which is honored by Macs and generally ignored by PCs (they use sRGB). If you want them to look identical on both you might wanna try sRGB.

HTH and welcome!

That is true, but the more likely culprit is the gamma. Mac gamma is a hand-me-down from the pre-press industry, and it's set at 1.8 by default. I highly recommend all Mac users go through the calibration tool in System Preferences, with advanced options turned on, calibrate their monitors and set the gamma to the PC standard, 2.2.

mercphoto · June 1, 2005

ginger_55 wrote:

I would like to know more about CMYK and skin (tones). Does any of you use that?

No, because I seldom do portraits. But you can find some very useful information about it right here:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone

DavidTO · June 1, 2005

mercphoto wrote:

No, because I seldom do portraits. But you can find some very useful information about it right here:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone

There you go. A great summary of what to look for in CMYK skin tones.

binghott · June 1, 2005

david_h wrote:

looks like you dodged the eyes and maybe even the whole face. that's what i would've done.

Ann McRae · June 1, 2005

Wow! The little thread that grew. Lots of great info and ideas here, aren't there!

I will post a different photo fo this young lady, to compare skin ones and eye color.

Thanks

ann

T4Tots · June 1, 2005

I like this thread!!

I had fun with this portrait. I will just list what I did and you are welcome to ask me for more info.

1. Rotate
2. Crop
3. Add Spotlight filter
4. Up Contrast
5. Apply xero filter: tweaker
6. adjust levels
7. add duplicate layer
8. kodak airbrush filter (lower opacity)
9. merge layers
10. add xero filter: soft vignette
11. add edge with retangular tool and feathering in mask with impressionism filter
12. add canvas size .2 black, then 1 white, then .2 grey, then 2 black.

david_h · June 1, 2005

ginger_55 wrote:

Thanks, you all, I just noticed this thread and printed out all the info, at least three posts, .

I would like to know more about CMYK and skin (tones). Does any of you use that?

g

Hey Ginger,

A great (albeit somewhat technical) book for learning about CMYK colour correction is Professional Photoshop by Dan Margulis.

As mentioned in one of the other responses, Cyan needs to be pretty low, Magenta about 3 times as much and Yellow a bit higher than Magenta for fair skinned people.

One of the great things about Photoshop is that there are just so many different ways to get good results (and of course different people have different views as to what a good result is

)

T4Tots wrote:

I like this thread!!

I had fun with this portrait. I will just list what I did and you are welcome to ask me for more info.

Very nice Tina. I like the look you acheived.

binghott wrote:

looks like you dodged the eyes and maybe even the whole face. that's what i would've done.

Hi Barry. Actually I didn't use the dodge tool, I just used curves on the M & Y channels. If I had taken more time, I think I would have lightened her left eye just a tad. It's slightly in shadow.

T4Tots · June 1, 2005

David...you know I think I like what everyone else did in cropping it more...so I went back and cropped it more.

david_h · June 1, 2005

mercphoto wrote:

Wow David. Probably the best one I've seen yet. I think the CYMK curves on Yellow and Magenta did the best improvement to skin tone. Can I ask what exactly you did to the curves in each case?

Also, the darken edges action, really cool. Where could I find that? I know somewhere you can find some really neat actions, such as vignetting, burned paper edges, film strip roll edges, etc.

Lastly, if one was really picky, any way to whiten the teeth? Is that hard?

Thanks Bill.
If I remember correctly, I kept the yellow curve straight, just lifted the left corner to increase the yellow %age.
For the magenta, I just found a point that corresponded to an average reading on her face then reduce the %age, keeping the dropper on her face so I could watch for the number I wanted.

I found the vignetting action at nobsphotosuccess I think. If you want to send me a PM with your email I'll be happy to send it to you.

Ann McRae · June 1, 2005

A link to other photos of this girl:
http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?p=115321#post115321

ann

Ann McRae · June 1, 2005

T4Tots wrote:

This is gorgeous, Tina. Absolutely wonderful. This one is what I hope to mimic.
ann

ginger_55 · June 1, 2005

T4Tots wrote:

I like this thread!!

I had fun with this portrait. I will just list what I did and you are welcome to ask me for more info.

1. Rotate
2. Crop
3. Add Spotlight filter
4. Up Contrast
5. Apply xero filter: tweaker
6. adjust levels
7. add duplicate layer
8. kodak airbrush filter (lower opacity)
9. merge layers
10. add xero filter: soft vignette
11. add edge with retangular tool and feathering in mask with impressionism filter
12. add canvas size .2 black, then 1 white, then .2 grey, then 2 black.

Is this with PS CS, or are you using some other program? I don't recognize things like Kodak airbrush filter, xero filter, etc.

ginger

david_h · June 1, 2005

Ann McRae wrote:

This is gorgeous, Tina. Absolutely wonderful. This one is what I hope to mimic.
ann

I agree with you Ann, Tina has gotten it just right. The tighter crop and slight soft effect make a big difference.

Grade 9? I hope my daughter doesn't think she's going out in shoes like that in a couple of years :yikes

Portrait editing - always second guessing myself

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