Hi,

I just found this site today and really like what's going on here. Especially the friendly atmosphere in the forums.

Some quick information about me... I started studying graphics design a few months ago and although PS isn't explicitly covered I am so fascinated by it that I spent more time doing PS stuff than studying ;).

Anyway here are two images for you to look at and maybe give me some hints what can be improved.

The first one is a try at basic retouching. It wasn't my intention here to get a porcelain like skin or make it a fashion shot. It's more about improving her skin.
Link: http://www.kar-ma.de/orig_retouch.jpg

The second image is a wallpaper where I tried to make things not _that_ nice ;).
Link: http://www.kar-ma.de/decay1.jpg

Welcome aeterius! What a great first post! Death is wicked. I love it! Your skin tone correction looks good, seems to have some nice texture. Perhaps a tad too yellow but maybe that's my personal preference. Hope you keep posting. You definetly have good stuff to contribute!!

Cheers
Dave

Hi, I'm new too, first post;)

Lovley photo, I agree she's a bit yellow. However, I thought perhaps Dave's version went a bit too red. Sorry Dave :wavey:

I took the libety to remove a bit of distracting hair, burned in the lips a bit, and brought out more detail in her hair.

Hope you like it.

Cinthia

Love your second link.

Correct me if I am wrong, but this looks like a little girl, and so, if I am right, it is probably more appropriate to give her less rich looking skin and not reshape the eyebrows.

I only adjusted the levels, matched the skin on the neck and chest to be more in tone with the face and removed a couple of blemishes and only reduced the under eye not removed.

Hi Aeterius

Taking a closer look at your picture, you've done an excellent job in providing texture in the skin, something I forgot about. How did you achieve it, Noise?

Cinthia, Welcome aboard! You never have to say your sorry in this forum. We can't learn if we can't critique and express our opinions. To your post, what I wanted to achieve was a porcelain look similar to the before shot. Personally, I think I succeeded but I also agree that it's personal taste. The real question should be is it plausible? I always get thrown for a loop when someone says too much red only in that I deal in CMYK values for skin. Many, like Flora, are very good at eyeballing good color in RGB..I don't happen to be one. In any case, when sampling the forehead and cheek on yours, you actually show more magenta (red?) than mine. I usually hold true to Eismann's values of slightly more yellow than magenta plus a bit of cyan in the skin for caucasians.
A couple of things I noticed in yours. The whites of her eyes has a too high proportion of blue. Red should dominate because of the blood vessels which by the way should be reduced a bit. Also, I think the catchlights are too small in the eyes. Your picture looks great! Hope to see many, many more posts from you!

Cheers

Dave

Cassidy, simple and nice. Good job.

Dave

duv,

i've seen this discussion on skin tones/colors in several places on RP now. i almost always avoid it ;) however, i would like to make a few comments now. see, i dont have a problem with your rendition here or aeterius's or cinthia's. i know you like eismann's 'standards' for this and that's fine, but i find the concept of a standard a bit difficult in this regard. on any given day in any given setting and any given skin, lighting is going to be different. shadows different, sun tan or not, different. even exercise and blood flow can change a tone in skin. and add in the whole optical illusion thing of nearby colors and you've got a dog's breakfast of possibilities.

i'm not saying there isnt a standard. and i fully agree with setting something to work from, even if it's a bit arbitrary, but with all the possible variables that can exist in a picture and lighting and so on, i just have no disagreement with any of the afore mentioned renditions. and mind you, that's all i'm saying here. i think they all work. true, it's a black background, so the nearby colors isnt a big issue, but was the picture taken in soft light, harsh, filtered, ... actually, i guess i'm talking about the final product here and not the original, so it's more of a question of how do you want it to look, not how was it originally taken. so, again, what 'look' do we want? and again, i'd say you all did a completely acceptable rendition.

so i guess what i'm saying is that rather than being a single one fixed standard, there is more likely a range of standards and that each of you is within that range. that one is a tiny bit more red and another a tiny bit more yellow seems moot to me. they all look good to me given a set of possible acceptable conditional variables.

at the same time, i wouldnt want to talk you out of or try to discourage you from using what you use. it does seem to work for you. you do nice work. but i just wonder if there isnt a bit of lattitude as far as acceptable goes here. i've seen the same with baby pictures especially. if you've ever gone into a maternity ward and looked at all the variations in the babies's tones and colorations and so on, i think that discussion would fade somewhat. i'm also reminded of an interior designer/architect i knew of once. he could paint a wall a particular color and as the day progressed and lighting changed you'd swear it was never the color he had originally painted. the guy was a master.

anyways, nice work all :)

Craig

Hi Craig. Good post! I absolutely agree with you on a acceptable range of color. The key word is acceptable. I've seen posts here and you have too of some pretty horrendous skin color renditions. I remember in the past some of my own posts where I didn't check values, just eyeballed. Thought I had something that looked pretty good until someone pointed out that it was probably impossible for a caucasian person to have double amount of Cyan to Magenta and Yellow. When I looked at my post again, he was right. My rendition was quite ghastly when I looked again. It shouldn't be a choice between eyeballing and going by the numbers. You should use both. Does it look good (the way you want it) and does it make sense (any number "way" out of whack).
BTW, you shouldn't avoid these discussions, it's perhaps one of the most important aspects of this forum.

Cheers

Dave

duv,

thanks :)

ok, no disagreements here then.

i only avoid them at a certain point. when it gets down to niggling about a value of 245/175/63 as opposed to 245/175/62, i make my escape ;)

Craig