First Of The Series

smoke665

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After a long, long time an elderly couple we're friends with talked me into shooting their wedding Saturday. May be a bittersweet memory, as the man in question has a lot of medical problems, including Pancreatic Cancer. Learned yesterday that he spent his honeymoon in ER, and back in the hospital again. Most of the shots turned out well, with minimal editing, but I'm getting down to the heavy editing, and because of the circumstances I really want to get these right. This was one of the first in a series of more intimate portraits, and before I spend a lot of time editing them, I'd like a little feedback on the processing???

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Top-notch sir, top-notch! My only thought here is, "Can you get some separation between his jacket and the background?" Otherwise, I wouldn't mess with a thing.
 
Top-notch sir, top-notch! My only thought here is, "Can you get some separation between his jacket and the background?" Otherwise, I wouldn't mess with a thing.

Thank you, I was hoping you'd comment. These were shot on location, so the background had to go. I initially used a color slightly darker then her dress over all but that didn't quite look right, so I applied a radial gradient (you can still see the original background color around her head), which brought that bottom corner closer to black. On the original it's close, but there's still a tad separation between the background and the jacket. I'm thinking the print will be okay, but I may revisit that area again. On the others the light in that area was a little better.

Lots of retouching on the gentleman. The effects of chemo, radiation, and other medical issues made for multiple challenges trying to get the skin tones to match closer to the lady. Really struggled on how far to go on him, correcting everything wasn't looking right either.
 
This photo is amazing - technically well executed, I don't really mind the lack of separation with his jacket assuming this will end up in a frame, and really elicited an emotional response, even before I read the back story. I think this is one of your best shots I've seen, and imagine they will be beyond thrilled with it.
 
Great job with the lighting and pose -- real nice portrait. The skin tone challenge as you say is where I see room for further improvement. I'd smooth out the blotchiness more and bring their skin colors closer together. They may recognize that you did it, but I'm going to guess that they won't object. Is this too far?

Joe

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This photo is amazing - technically well executed, I don't really mind the lack of separation with his jacket assuming this will end up in a frame, and really elicited an emotional response, even before I read the back story. I think this is one of your best shots I've seen, and imagine they will be beyond thrilled with it.

Wow!!!! Thanks Adam, I'm honored. After editing and culling, I'm guessing I'll end up with around 75 finished images between portraits, wedding ceremony, and reception. A little more than I intended, but once I got started I couln't stop. LOL
 
The skin tone challenge as you say is where I see room for further improvement. I'd smooth out the blotchiness more and bring their skin colors closer

Thanks Joe. Yeah this was a tough edit, and I agree I'm not sold on the skin tone. How did you achieve your edit? One thing I noticed is that your edit took the color out of his lips (that could be put back with a mask). One of the challenges I faced is his face was either red or had the chemo yellow look (especially around the eyes). I have some targeted hue adjustment layers, that I might need to adjust slightly.
 
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The skin tone challenge as you say is where I see room for further improvement. I'd smooth out the blotchiness more and bring their skin colors closer

Thanks Joe. Yeah this was a tough edit, and I agree I'm not sold on the skin tone. How did you achieve your edit? One thing I noticed is that your edit took the color out of his lips (that could be put back with a mask). One of the challenges I faced is his face was either red or had the chemo yellow look (especially around the eyes). Take one out it accentuated the other.

Yes, the lips could be masked back easily. I used a C1 feature that's too easy. That was a single click coupled with an intensity slider. C1 has a function they call Skin Tone (but can be applied to any color range). You click to select the anchor point and then adjust the intensity of the correction as it pulls neighboring colors in toward the anchor.

Joe
 
I'm probably not the one to give advise on editing portraits since I am primarily a nature photographer. First and foremost, I believe the image is superb. :icon_salut: I can't tell if you are trying to maintain a certain aspect ratio but the only suggestion you may want to experiment with is eliminateing (cropping) some of the extra space above the lady's head. I don't know - after looking at the image again before hitting the "post reply" button, the couple's faces "together" are centered.
 
Well done Smoke! Your skills are showing here.
 
@zulu42 Thank you, you're to kind!

@Flying Panda all the portrait images were shot and cropped to 5:4 with the intent of printing 8x10's at the finish, per couple's request.
 
I'm no pro and I've seen my share of portraits so I have a little knowledge of what makes for a good portrait. I know this much, there shouldn't be any hard shadows so maybe there's a little bit hard light from the right creating shadow from her hand on his shirt and some shadow from his head on her but that's all that jumps out at me. It isn't extreme either so no big hit. Looks pretty good overall I think! With everything everyone mentioned you skills may improve greatly.
 
Yeah...i like the original edit's skin tone on the couple, but am in agreement about cropping off a slight bit of top space, and perhaps a slight bit off the sides. Maybe dodge the front of his jacket a slight bit, to show some texture, and to give a slight bit of BKGD sep.
 
Thanks for all the feedback. Went in and did a little more on skin tone, and some dodging as suggested. All in all I'm satisfied enough that it will become the template for the others.

Learned a lot on this one. One thing I forgot was makeup (not something I normally carry LOL) but it's something I won't forget next time, as it would have saved me a lot of work in post.
 
Smoke665,
Very nicely captured, raw emotion is emoted in this image. Great work Mate.

Mike ☘️
 

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