Still pretty new to the digital darkroom, and trying to find my way around Pshop. This forum has been a great resource and thanks for all the tips!

Here's a retouch of my wife. I think I'm getting there, but would love some input on what else I can improve. My goal with this image was to use the relationship of light to dark and some selective sharpening to try to have the viewer's eyes go from her eyes, then lips/face, followed by torso, hair and background.

Some concerns I have with the image are: Did I go overboard with the smoothing, or does it seem ok? I'm a little troubled by her right (viewer's left) cheek/lower jawline, but I couldn't seem to get it better (however a similar softness/ DOF issue does appear in the same area of the original).

Likewise, are the highlights on the left side (viewer's right) too much? Or is that more of an aesthetic/creative concern?

Finally, a program related question. The file size went from a few megs, to a final size of ~470 megs! Is this unusual or commonplace? The image did end up with a lot (I think around 20 or so) layers, with a lot of masking, but I didn't imagine it would explode to almost a half of a gig! Any tips on keeping file size down, or should I start looking at investing in my own server farm?

Any input on the above, or any other issues you can point out to a relative noob are greatly appreciated!

Mucker

Welcome to the forum!

I would have cut a bit on the smoothing part.
Regarding the size of the file: if you started with a full resolution image and added multiple layers while working on it, it could grow by orders of magnitude.

This is my try:

color correction followed by levels and curves.
Finally used the Portraiture filter using conservative settings.

[EDIT]
Forgot to mention that I used some USM for the eyes.

Still pretty new to the digital darkroom, and trying to find my way around Pshop. This forum has been a great resource and thanks for all the tips!

.....

Any input on the above, or any other issues you can point out to a relative noob are greatly appreciated!

this is a great photo of a beautiful woman. and this is my retouch interpretation to it. i think your main concern was the skin. i went a bit beyond that. did some color and light correction, skin smoothing, vps (virtual plastic surgery:)) and some teeth/eyes bleaching. hope you like it. thanks for sharing.

You're on the right track but she's a bride, keep it as close to natural in complement.

I might have smoothed this a little too much, and no doubt it will look better on my computer that as a post here :sad:

Hi Mucker,

When you have completed a few layers and are satisfied with the result take a 'snapshot' of your work to date and merge the layers. If you do something on subsequent layers that you don't like, you can always go back to the last snapshot and start again.

I think you have made your image a little too dark, and got a little carried away with the smoothing :-)

Mucker
First thing I did was change the crop to try to get the eye to follow the way you suggested. Then I adjusted for white balance.
I burned the background.
Did a gausian blur on a color layer (had some hot spots from being jpeg'ed and shrunk).
I sharpened the eyes and added catch-lights, I also took some color out of the whites.
Evened out the skin tones.
Changed the curves.
Used the healing brush on the 3 tiny little blemishes.

I am curious how close I came to the skin tone. Did I go too pink?

Oh, and by the way, yes you went too far. You made your picture look like an oil painting, very nice if thats what you were going for. I have the same problem. I always find I've done too much when I go back and look after a time. I suggest going into each of your layers and lowering the opacity to 50%. Go back and look at it later and see what you think.

keep it natural, don't go down the "blur the skin path" or "fashion retouch path" maybe if the bride wants it retouched it's ok, but if not...don't :D

I just added more magenta/red, some dodging....

Really nice image to work with. The DOF was great on the original shot. Changing the background makes her look like she is standing against a wall. You loose a lot of image depth changing the background.

I agree with the other comments that the skin is pushed too far. I like the more natural look.

The angle of the light has created a strange catch-light in her eyes. I burned a little of the highlights out but could use more work. Also, there is no white showing in the right side of her right eye. I used the dodge tool to lighten.

The lower left of her lip is a little washed out and her teeth have a very slight yellow cast.

I tied to add a little more pop to the image with curves and local contrast enhancement.

Hey mucker, I gave this a shot. I didn't do any blurring or sharpinging. I did play with the colors, I was trying to warm it up and take out some of the green tint I saw.
Modified her eyes with new catch lights and finally some dodge and burn.
Hope this helps.

I tried to keep looking reasonably natural. I used a very small amount of soft focus on the skin, highlighted the eyes (removed the excessive glare in the right eye), lightened the teeth, burned the edges of the mouth, applied an orange photo filter to warm but also reduce the brightness of the cheek a little. Did a final levels and curves adjustment and then did a selective sharpen of the eyes. Might have cropped it too

very nice Alison!!!

Here is a sketch version.
Cassidy I like yours.
With the small version file a little blurring is good, but on a full version it probably is not necessary.

I'm in agreement with most everyone else re going easier on the blurring and softening but I have another weird point to make. The way the picture is cropped, with no hint of a dress, makes it look like she's nude to me. Maybe you can crop the bottom portion?

:-\

wow, hope you got an answer from all this. seems like a subjective discussion. I won't bother with my sample, you already got quite a bit to choose from. the after image does seem a little dark, but heck, some photographers have a style for being dark, kind of a rembrandt. beautiful woman and you did a beautiful job. I like to keep things realistic, and would suggest not to smooth so much, but I think the final product is all up to you. just my two cents worth.

Thanks for all the replies!
I was using some of the techniques/principles I picked up from Versace's Welcome to Oz, so it wasn't quite a straight forward bridal retouch. Probably should have mentioned that. Was shooting for a little more of a cinematic/fine art type of retouch, if that clarifies a bit of what look I was trying to reproduce. (As an aside, quick review - I thought the book was a great resource, lots of good info if you're into the fine art type of look for your photos, however the info comes at the cost of having to read one of the most typo and errata filled books in recent memory)

Some quick replies to above: Photo is full frame, so no cropping decisions made. Looking at the photo now (away for a day or so, instead of staring at it for a while during the retouch) does seem a little too smooth. Will definitely try to keep a little more background detail also next time.

Thanks again - keep the comments coming if there's any more - I still have a ton to learn!

A bit inbetween here.. smooth, but not too fake. More vibrant colors for a little more pop, but not over the top.

Adjusted contrast and balance in lightroom (it's just faster..), reduced some of the noise with Neat Image, then went to work adjusting color balance and vibrance.

Past that, smoothed out the skin ever so lightly with over-painting.. then added a 50% gray layer on overlay and used black/white to bring out highlights and shadows a bit without destroying skin tone (which dodge/burn techniques tend to do).

After much fighting with getting it display in my browser properly.. I've given up, hopefully you see what I do when it's in photoshop.. for whatever reason it doesn't display correctly when I upload it somewhere. There should be more color in the cheeks and face, but oh well.. still looks ok.

Kyle

http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w90/k2kyo/wifeport-12.jpg

Hello Mucker,

Beautiful young lady you have there. I like where you were heading on the shot but I also think you took it a bit too far..

I'm new here on the RetouchPRO site but decided to throw my version into the ring... It is kind of challenging working on low res images and trying to make them look really good, but I am anyhow attaching my version on your lovely wife.

The whole world is a critic. Everyday I see what I think is terrible stuff and turn around and find work that is amazing and wish I could do the same. But like in photography where there are certain techniques and styles, and supposed right ways and wrong ways... ultimately it all comes down to what you like, what you are satisfied with,... and how your subject (or client) feel about the final result. If they are happy and you are happy... you have won the war -- no matter what anyone else has to say. ;)

I think every person created a much improved photograph of a beautiful bride. If I knew how to do any of these versions I would be very proud. Can any one tell me (I'm new and not good at these things) how to start a new thread? I would like to show you a photo and get ideas how to begin.
Thank you.

Mucker
First thing I did was change the crop to try to get the eye to follow the way you suggested. Then I adjusted for white balance.
I burned the background.
Did a gausian blur on a color layer (had some hot spots from being jpeg'ed and shrunk).
I sharpened the eyes and added catch-lights, I also took some color out of the whites.
Evened out the skin tones.
Changed the curves.
Used the healing brush on the 3 tiny little blemishes.

I am curious how close I came to the skin tone. Did I go too pink?

Oh, and by the way, yes you went too far. You made your picture look like an oil painting, very nice if thats what you were going for. I have the same problem. I always find I've done too much when I go back and look after a time. I suggest going into each of your layers and lowering the opacity to 50%. Go back and look at it later and see what you think.

I thought it needed to be rotated too!!! :o}

Hi John in Las Vegas,

mutch better rotation and nicely done skin, I like it

This is what I would have done. If you want the PSD-file to easily go through what I've done I can send it to you. I have cropped/rotated the picture a little.
There is NO skin softening at all. She doesn't need it! Perfect skin and very nice texture in the skin. You always want a little texture to make it look realistic. :)
What I concentrated on is the eyes and keeping the right part of her face from being blown out when applying contrast and stuff. I also darkened the background and added highlights here and there. As I said, I'll keep the PSD if you're interested.