Hi all!

I was hoping some of you would be so kind as to suggest or point me to a few starter projects to get some practice in on retouching and repairing photos. I have tried a few of the challenges here with moderate success and am learning a lot already. I guess I would like 2-3 pictures that you feel are good examples of core challenges (lighting, damaged sections, color/contract etc).

I will keep doing challenges and projects posted here, but I just wonder if I should start one place and work my way up to others as opposed to just randomly picking stuff.

To put it simply...I need some direction! Such as "master this before you try that" kind of thing.

Thanks.

I would like to suggest an alternate approach and that is securing Katrin Eismann's book, PHOTOSHOP RESTORATION & RETOUCHING. There you would have controlled practice on both pictures and technique. You would be able to judge your own results against her completed example. She has both a 2nd and 3rd edition out. The third edition came out for CS2. I'll bet you could find some used copies at one of the online bookstores.

Try this link:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/002-3783075-0063244?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=eismann&x=13&y=20

Item 1 is the 3rd ed., item 5 is the 2nd ed. and item 8 is the 1st.

dc

stuggernaut, welcome to RetouchPRO.

probably the most basic tool of restoring is clone/heal. and there's TONS of that around here you can practice on :) i could probably write a small book just on that.

after that, there are a lot of things to learn, color balance, layers, channels, fade cleanups, stain removal, airbrushing, smudging, masks, gradients, coloring black and whites, layer groups, adjustment layers, etc, etc. you basically run into just about everything here.

the best advice i can think to give is take something easy, something that isnt marred with 16 different wrong things, but only one or two and those, not too badly. practice one tool at a time and in general, take what you know and know it better before moving on to a whole lot of different things.

and, feel free to take on anything in this forum, no matter how long it's been here or how deep it's buried in the pages of the forum. it's pretty much all fair game, providing that you dont post it elsewhere. images posted here are still copyrighted by the original owners. so, feel free to re-post your work in the thread it came from.

and the 2nd bit of advice i can think to give is, dont worry too much if we giggle and snicker at your work, or worse, completely ignore you. even michaelangelo had to start somewhere :)