Portrait question

Alessandra · Jun 5, 2006

Hey!I'm new here and i'm really happy to have found this comunity.My greatest passion (if i may say so), is photography, esspecialy portrait photography. I'm willing to learn as much as i can from you and possibly become professional.For starters i'm going to post one of my latest portraits.I'm hoping to recive as many critiques as possible, so please, no matter if it's in favor or not, post your opinions and stress out the faults.

Thanks in advance!

Alessa

bowronfam3 · Jun 5, 2006

Hello and welcome to The Photo Forum! I have to say that I really do like the composition in this as well as the color. One thing I might suggest is that the post processing done on the skin to smooth it out does look a little overdone in areas such as the forehead. Also, there are a few stray hairs like the one on the left side of the top lip that is a little distracting, you could easily clone that out though in Photoshop. Overall....great portrait!

Oldfireguy · Jun 5, 2006

It's a very nice shot.

If I was going to be really picky, I picked up on the stray hairs also.

icdapoakr · Jun 5, 2006

great composition

the only thing that bothers me is the over post processing of the skin and that stray hair above the lip. so basically ditto to bowronfam3

jemmy · Jun 5, 2006

Hi and welcome... i agree with the hair/skin comments but must say i love it in all other aspects... lovely compostion, the colours work beautifully, good lighting and 'i LOVE the make-up too '(says the make-up artist!) xxxx Great 1st post.. you should be very proud!

summers_enemy · Jun 5, 2006

Very nice composition, but personally, I think her skin is too pink. Most people that pink would be in vast amounts of sun induced pain. :mrgreen: I would also like to see her right eye lighter.

markc · Jun 6, 2006

I agree with many of the previous points. As far as the color goes, I think something like -20 red and +10 green not only helps the skin, but the shawl too. I'd also crop off some of the right side so that blown out area isn't as distracting.

It's a nice shot of a beautiful model. You're lucky to be able to work with her. With a few edits, I think you would have a vert striking image. Let me know if you would like to see a couple edits as ideas.

Alessandra · Jun 6, 2006

Thanks a lot for the replies, now that you mentioned the strands of hair i can see the overall effect (a bothering one) on the picture.I'll take them out and change the skin color tone.Fortunately, i'm quite good with PS (i'm an Art Director) so i'm going to make a few changes and post the picture again.I also do agree on the post processing of the skin, I'll try to re-edit the original picture and come with a better result, a less blured one.

And markc, it would be nice if you could give me some more ideas of editingm thanks in advance!

Alessa

markc · Jun 6, 2006

Cool. Here is one idea with the crop I mentioned. I did the color correction above, but it looked like the saturation might have been boosted when you adjusted the contrast, so I desaturated the skin by 10 (and shifted the hue right by 3 while I was in there) by using a masked layer. I copied and reversed the layer and then adjusted the shawls hue and saturation a bit also, moving them to the right. I also used a masked layer to boost the curve slightly on her right eye (image left). You have to be careful doing this, as having the eyes too white looks unnatural. The skin still looks funny to me, but I think you can take care of that by starting from the original.