Pick 1 (out of 3)

[DanOstergren26 2]

Final product!

View attachment 131840

I'm thinking of having some sepia or split tone variants. Thoughts?

This is the one I would have picked as well. My only feedback is that I think you went way overboard with the skin retouching.

 

[Braineack]

you went overboard on the face smoothing.

the random blur patch on her dress is also...well smooth?

 

[OGsPhotography]

2 because her dress is slightly less wrinkly.... Expression is maybe better. Basically these are the same photo, problem its the eternal problem of rejection process.

Just click X to reject and ctrl Delete to Delete rejected.

 

[DGMPhotography]

you went overboard on the face smoothing.

the random blur patch on her dress is also...well smooth?

I seem to be getting that a lot. I know there's a very fine line, and I'm still working on that, but I prefer having the more polished look. And yeah, unfortunately, we didn't iron the dress, so it is what it is.

 

[DGMPhotography]

Okay, so here is a closeup comparison of my retouching work. I feel like I preserved the texture, but I keep getting comments that I go overboard. Can anyone elaborate?

 

[DanOstergren26 2]

Okay, so here is a closeup comparison of my retouching work. I feel like I preserved the texture, but I keep getting comments that I go overboard. Can anyone elaborate?

View attachment 131882

The texture is great, but to me the skin tones look too perfect, kind of making her look like a wax doll. If you did your retouching in layers, I would try reducing the opacity on that layer by about 25%. The photo can still have a great polished look without a lot of skin retouching. What's most important to making a portrait look polished in my opinion is lighting, choice of color, styling, and emotion. The lighting is already on point, and this in itself reduces a lot of retouching for you already. It took a long time for me to start letting go of having absolutely perfect skin in my portraits, but slowly I started reducing more and more, eventually realizing the importance of the lighting and the importance of having a relatable subject for the viewer. If the skin looks fake, the viewer will see and focus on that. If it's believable, I think the viewer will be able to much better appreciate the photograph and be able to have some sort of connection with the subject. I think removing blemishes is still very important though.

 

[Granddad]

If I've over processed an image I sometimes do a quick fix by cutting out the original face and pasting it on top of the retouched version then fading it to where some texture is restored. If I like the cleaned up eyes and lips (for example) I can erase those out of the new layer. It's not conventional but I learned PS by trial and error after starting in 2000 with Paint Shop Pro (PSP was good back then) and it works for me.

P.S. I just noticed that her make-up ends in a noticeable line a couple of millimeters above her jaw line. That's something to watch out for: it should be brush blended to merge into her skin with no line at the time of application. You could fix it in post but much less work to do it on her face. (This is the kind of little thing I usually miss at shoots and which creates more work than I need.)

 

[Braineack]

And yeah, unfortunately, we didn't iron the dress, so it is what it is.

my issue is more with this random burred patched:

 

[DGMPhotography]

And yeah, unfortunately, we didn't iron the dress, so it is what it is.

my issue is more with this random burred patched:

View attachment 131887

Yeah, that was me fixing the wrinkly bits. ugh.