Be Mine, Or Die (A Valentine's Day Works)

[Trenton Romulox]

That's sick dude.

One thing I see is that you have the teeth going from yellow to white on flash side, but the lips remain constant red. Doesn't look right to me.

Yeah, that's the way it was before I did the lipstick and yellow teeth in PhotoShop though, 'cause I did that with an overlay paint, so the overall tones were the same before and after. I thought it was a bit off too, Kundalini, but it turns out that's just how the original shot looked, brightness wise. And I'm not sure I really dislike it a whole lot, the lips and teeth, because the shot has enough creepiness going for it, I think, that people won't notice the inconsistencies. But, I do agree with you, and I'm gonna look into this shot more in PhotoShop and see what I can work out. This is why I post here, to get good feedback like all of you, not just Kundalini, have given me. Much thanks guys.

Anyone else wanna chime in? The more opinions and viewpoints and tips, the better. :]

 

[noescape]

That is sick... I LOVE it.

 

[neptune000]

Hey Trenton!

as you have given the OK to edit your pics, I gave it a try and changed the rose a little, hope you like it. Any comments, suggestions very welcome

Old:

New:

Here's what I did, a screen dump from my cs3 - single layer, not much fuss

changed changed the hue of the rose a wee bit to match with the lips... and played around with the brightness/contrast and the shadow/highlights,
hope this is what others meant..

C&C pls
Disclaimer: No intention of hijacking this thread :mrgreen:

 

[plentygood]

The rose looks a little too fake in your adjustment to me Neptune.

But seriously Trenton, this is a terrific shot. If I had to nitpick about something, I'd pick the teeth going from yellow to white (what Kundalini said) first.

 

[Jermz_01]

Trenton... great shot / PP... cool idea... my only complaint (and I hate to make one cause this thing is pretty cool!)... It appears you "yellowed" the teeth... but darn it all, they are too straight!! but what a cool concept and great job!

 

[Trenton Romulox]

Thanks everyone for the kind words and thank you for giving me some steps in PhotoShop, as many of you did, much appreciated.

I'm going to continue to do some work on this shot and I'm gonna taken into consideration what all of you said, and I'll be back when I work out an improvement (hopefully an improvement). Thanks again everyone.

 

[Trenton Romulox]

Here's an edit I just did. Better, worse? A mix of both? And what about it is better, or worse?

Be Mine, Or Die (Ver. 1.0.1):

 

[Antithesis]

I think the first edit is better.

If you want to lighten just the rose, there are a few options. One: use the dodge tool, but you might end up with gray shadows. Two: Make a Levels adjustment layer (when your background is selected, click the little half circle thingy on the tool pallet at the bottom of your layers
pallet). Adjust for the shadows until the rose starts to stick out more, or just the shadows in the rose (your whole image will blow out, don't worry). Then select the adjustment layer and fill the whole thing with black. Then you can use the paint brush, with white paint, and paint in the rose. Basically just an easy way to mask.

Oh, and the image is going to give me nightmares, thanks.

 

[lifeafter2am]

The first thing that catches my eye are the blown out eyes. Other than that I like the re-edit!

 

[Antithesis]

Lightened the rose and put a contrast mask on it to make it even more cartoonish. I also burned the left side of your hideous lipsticky lips so they look more natural. Did I mention I'm going to have nightmares?

 

[plentygood]

Is there any way to remove the white rims from the rose's edges? Everytime I examine it, it feels like it was like copied and pasted in.

 

[*~*AshleyRenae*~*]

Nice shot, but scary

 

[Brad Hardy]

I dig the idea.
The processing is a little iffy here. Did you shoot it in RAW?
A few tips:
Brightness/Contrast is your biggest enemy ever. Avoid it like the plague.
I used (actually over used) this function for years. The problem with Brightness/Contrast is that it destroys everything. It sucks any level of tonal range, color, and whatever else out of an image. If your looking for a safe alternative, look no further then curves and levels. These two functions will do everything you want them to do and won't kill your photo.

Lighting:
The problems your having are due to lighting. It seems as though you've lit this from the side, hence the flower gets no light, thus it comes out dark. This type of selective lighting can be tough to achieve. I'd use a small softbox on very low power. Don't have a softbox? Your not out of luck just yet. Have a laptop? If so, go into PS and open a full screen white background. It'll give you soft, white light. It's not as easy as it sounds, but tinker around with it.
PM me anytime.

-Brad

 

[Trenton Romulox]

I don't have a softbox. It's strange though, I used two SB-800s and lit from below, I couldn't get the knife and the rose exposed at the same time for whatever reason. I had like 60 different shots with at least 10 different lighting setups, and this was the best one HAHA. I had to be careful though, 'cause I shot this in my room and my room is trashed and my walls are covered and I didn't want their to be a bunch of distracting elements, so it really kind of sucked to light HAHA.

 

[cpelsy2k1]

creepy, but great concept. I have the same problem with brightness/contrast that Brad Hardy is talking about, one of these days I'll learn proper photoshop