C&C on this portrait

[laurenvictoria]

thoughts?

 

[laurenvictoria]

still unsure on expression color etc

 

[Derrel]

thoughts?

First off, the green coloration looks a lot like green fake plants. That might be accurate coloring, I don't know, but that shade/luminance/tint of green foliage immediately registers to me as "plastic". Overall, the lighting is very soft, and diffused...it does not give the illusion of a lot of depth, and her eyes do not have a lot of light in them. I realize her hair might have more of that magenta hue from hair coloring than real, totally black-black hair, but I sifted the greens in selective color to a color that is less dominant but still green, made her hair a bit blacker, yet left some of the colored sections visible, and intensified the reds, so her lipstick looked brighter, and also minutely tweaked the curves to make her face brighter, and more of a focus of attention in all of that dark background. The image is low resolution, only 68k to work with, so it's not a great edit...but there's probably a LOT of malleability in the raw file.

I was obviously not there, but this is the way I envision the shot.

 

[YoungPhotoGirl]

thoughts?

For me personally,
It looks as though you have missed the focus slightly.
Her hair looks more in focus than her face,
But other than that I wouldn't fault it otherwise. Looks beautiful. Maybe just a light raise in the exposure

 

[YoungPhotoGirl]

Since we are editing lol
My thought on how I would edit....
Everyone has a different style , just throwing ideas out there....

 

[laurenvictoria]

this is so helpful thank you! the plants are weirdly green but i like what you did with them.

I love your edit Karissa

 

[YoungPhotoGirl]

this is so helpful thank you! the plants are weirdly green but i like what you did with them.

I love your edit Karissa

The green wouldn't occur like that in the raw file Its because I'm editing on a JPEG

 

[laurenvictoria]

oh sorry was referring to derrels comment on how the plants looks in real life!
I really like your edit!

 

[The_Traveler]

IMO, both of those re-edits are far from satisfactory.
This portrait has a problem that isn't really solvable, I think.

The light is overhead and has made blanched areas on her face and the beginning of raccoon eyes; additionally the wrinkles running from the ala of her nose to the corners of her mouth are emphasized by the overhead light.
this needs some better light (or a scrim to diffuse it) and some sort of fill on her eye sockets and to eradicate those wrinkles.

the greenery in the original seems oversaturated but a desaturated edit makes the blanched spots on her face even more obvious.
adding some red makes it better, I think, but not as alive as it should be.
in regards the pose and composition, she is beautiful but uninvolved in the picture.
She is dead center with lots of green on either side that seems really superfluous.

I think, if it were me, I would retake this in better light and try to coax her into some excitement about the shot.

 

[YoungPhotoGirl]

IMO, both of those re-edits are far from satisfactory.
This portrait has a problem that isn't really solvable, I think.
The light is overhead and has made blanched areas on her face and the beginning of raccoon eyes; additionally the wrinkles running from the ala of her nose to the corners of her mouth are emphasized by the overhead light.
this needs some better light (or a scrim to diffuse it) and some sort of fill on her eye sockets and to eradicate those wrinkles.
the greenery in the original seems oversaturated but a desaturated edit makes the blanched spots on her face even more obvious.
adding some red makes it better, I think, but not as alive as it should be.
in regards the pose and composition, she is beautiful but uninvolved in the picture.
She is dead center with lots of green on either side that seems really superfluous.
I think, if it were me, I would retake this in better light and try to coax her into some excitement about the shot.

I don't want to seem rude, but I disagree.
I think the women seems intrigued. I actually spent a lot of time looking at this photo wondering what she was thinking,
and if she wasn't showing emotion of some kind- I wouldn't have done that.
Some photos "give it all away" This one hold a lot of interest (for me anyway)
And wrinkles, meh.....everyone has some....adds character

 

[evegreyproductio]

What mood are you trying to accomplish? I feel the darker is appropriate for dark serious thrillers, dramas etc. The lighter photo is a clearer image. Perfect for commercials. Either are acceptable.

 

[binga63]

I had a play....you have a great model, I just feel that you mistimed the shot and caught her expression midway, as Traveller said she looks uninvolved. The brightness of the leaves are competing with the model for notice....adding flares and toning do her no justice....shoot her again and get some life in her eyes would be my suggestion

 

[Forkie]

I agree with The_Traveler that the lighting isn't perfect, but disagree that it's unsolvable. Sometimes we take shots in less than favourable light, either because it was impromptu, or we simply don't own the correct lighting modifiers or because we didn't know how to correct it.

As far as I'm concerned, this is precisely what Photoshop is for (within reason, of course!)!

The wrinkles and blanched highlights can be fixed as long as the fix isn't too extreme. Here I just dodged and burned the wrinkles away (mostly, you never want them to disappear altogether) and brought down the bright cheeks/head highlights using curves.

I also thought that the foliage behind her creates a lot of blackness so gave it a little bit of a reduced contrast treatment, as it's so trendy these days

And, just for the record, I love that her face is centred and surrounded by negative space. It works. I love it.

 

[FITBMX]

Your photo is a good start, and you are getting a lot of great info here!

 

[Clay Olmstead]

Leave those wrinkles in! Who says a woman can't have character? I'm intrigued by the expression in the original; there's mystery and thoughtfulness with a little wildness implied by the hair. To me, the background isn't holding up its end. It would be better with less information - as little as possible: a foggy day, and open road, and abandoned house; something to imply a story, leaving room for the viewer to fill in the details. You give them the chance to work with you and they'll love you for it.