Photo critique and touch-up requested

Hi all,
I have a picture I took of my daughter at the beach with my D300 and 17-85mm and would like to convert it to a 16x20 canvas. I played around in Photoshop for a bit to try and lighten her face/eyes, but not sure it's as good as it could be.

Does anyone have any suggestions for improving the brightness and eye visibility?

 

You got an NEF file?

Joe

 

You appear to have pushed the file a bit too much, and have messed up the skyline/mountains edge. I worked from the large .JPEG file, and did a few things, whitening the teeth, increasing lip saturation, correcting a couple of skin blemishes she had, lightening the eyes and eye sockets, and touching up a few stray hairs and also correcting the sky/mountain juncture, doing an edge burn, and changing the color to two versions I like. I will PM you the URL where the 20-MB print-sharpened files are located.

Here are web-reductions made from the PRINT files...which have a LOT of "tooth" applied, so these even at web-size look a bit scritchy. My favorite would be the "ice" look print file.

 

I agree with you Derrel. I learn something from your suggestion. Thanks.

 

Here is a little processing I did. I used color effex to add in a gold reflector light which helped warm up the face. I created two layer mask, one with curves high and one with curves low. then I did some layer mask blending on her skin. added a bit of color to the sky and a layer mask sharpening.

 

Joe, I've uploaded it to dropbox:

Dropbox - _DSC3164.NEF

Thanks so much!

 

Derrel, thanks so much for your suggestions. I like the lightening of the eye sockets, but the lips, and perhaps even the teeth improvements, make her look a little too "made up".

I've uploaded the NEF file here. Perhaps that would help?

Dropbox - _DSC3164.NEF

Thanks,
Dave

 

Whew! Tough one and I may have pushed too hard -- backlight without fill. Don't do that!

I used C1 to get a base conversion and then further touch-up in PS.

Joe

 

Yeah, I think that pushes it too far. Thanks so much. I agree about the fill-flash. I tried, and the picture was completely blown out. It was a very bright day, and I would have lost any DoF by increasing the aperture any further.

I was thinking a reflector would have been best, and need to buy one of those.

I also have an SB700, but apparently don't know how to use it very well, because I couldn't figure out how to get it right in this case. Are there settings I should know about to do a better job next time, or is a flash really just too much?

 

So you could do this shot again, sometime? Excellent!

Meanwhile, you can learn the settings on your flash. If iTTL didn't do it, then set the flash for manual and adjust the power down just to the point that it lightens the shade areas (eye sockets, under the chin, etc.) and meter for the sunlit skin or clothing of your model.

 

You're sending this to canvas. It needs punch.

 

Can you explain what is C1? What were the further touch-ups in PS?

I'm really interested in knowing how you brightened the background to be more blue? Looking at the difference between your sky and the original sky is pretty dramatic.

Thanks again,
Dave