Have been trying to touch up this photo of my friends daughter. The right side of the image has me stuck... Wish l knew how to paint hair on. .. Hope someone might offer some suggestions. So far l have simply used the transform tool in photoshop cs and flipped horizontal the right side of the face onto the left and used the clone tool with the colour balance to take out some of the shiny bubbles... Finished with polaroid dust and scratch removal plugin. Attachment shows the original. Not sure how to put two images together so l will include the reworked image next.

This is a my reworked version.

Well this is certainly a challenge, but not beyond impossible (did i say that out loud)

Will spend some time with it tommorow, but i think something can be done.

Hi Tell. I think you can see where I'm going with the hair. You know your subject better than I so I'm not going to try and do too much. A couple of observations. Her left ear seems higher than her right. This may be so but for esthetics you may want to adjust. Her left eye seems a "smidgeon" (techo language) too large. Again, you know your subject. Hope there's some ideas here for you.

Cheers
Dave

My first on a ripped photo and hair...

Well i got to tell ya its took me 2 hours to do this, and i still need to sleep, no worries job interview isn't in till 2pm i got plenty of time.

I did the median noise on most of this, and copied the side of her head to then flip it, i added her a different hairstyle just a simple bob behind the ears most girls has had this kind of style.

Goodnight everyone

~Legacy~

Thank you Tell...

Duplicate layer
Polaroid dust and scratches to reduce the light spotting overall.
Duplicate this layer
Gaussian blur - quite a lot
hide all layer mask and paint back face except for really bad area.
reduce opacity to 80%
merge visible to new layer
smudge tool to finalise repair on good areas of face.
copy good eye and surrounding are to new layer and flip horizontal.
reposition and blend in using a layer mask
merge visible to new layer.
Paint colours from visible hair over damage.
smudge hair with hair brush mostly set to darken.
Changed background by duplicating layer, radial blur and distort - glass, hide all layer mask and paint back in the background.
Add noise

Christine

Boy, a really strong UK connection except for this hockey puck. Legacy. Good stuff although you may want to think about it from the stand point of "A" symetrical, whatever that means.
Christine, very nice! Can you do something about the ear? Really appreciate the time to note your steps!!
Keep in mind, comments from someone who didn't try to complete the image.

Cheers
Dave

No time to do more now - I think to do a really good job you would need the hi-res image.

Christine

To think l uploaded this image a few hours ago... Now l have so much to aspire to. Thank you Dave, Legacy, and Christine. I wish l wasnt so envious. These brilliant examples of what can be done has made me painfully aware of my inadequacy with photoshops brushes. ..Christine, how long did it take you to do this wonderful touch up and might you have a suggestion on where l could start to learn to use the brushes better. Thank you all again.. Tell.

Tell,

That took me about 1.5 hours, most of my learning of photoshop restoration has come from Katrin Eisman's book and DVDs and the forums here. The only thing I would say is use hi res images where possible (300ppi) and practice, practice, practice.

I often go back to things I did a year or so ago and do them again applying the new techniques I have learnt since.

Christine

Dave not sure what you mean there hun...? But i don't think mine looks anything like the picture, i gave her a make over new hairstyle and all lol!

Thank you Tell for the nice email, i have only had photoshop for about 6 months, i had the program on the pc but only used it to do silly make-overs nothing at all like the retouch they do here on this site, mine was just made up, i only learnt last night that photoshop have action files, just as they do on psp.v8 & v.9.

Tell...I am in the dark with this too, i am just pressing the buttons and hoping things work out, i guess being female might have an advantage where make up and hair styles come into it.

Legacy

I just have to add Christine i am in awe that is superb!

Thats a good tip Christine. As l continue to learn, i shall take out an old project and have another go at it... Im not an Artist but maybe l could learn to pretend l am.... Legacy, l dont know if being female would lend you those artistic skills or not. But you have them and i want them too. lve noticed people covert most what they do not have...Yet people who can pick up a brush and automatically paint, always under estimate their talent. Thank you both for generously sharing your skill and time... Tell.

I took a whack on a small chunk.
Tore it apart into Hue, Sat, and Lum.
Then got busy fixing a little at a time on the different parts.

old.jpg (http://cablespeed.com/~jlhalmich/ozone/ii_old.jpg)
new.jpg (http://cablespeed.com/~jlhalmich/ozone/ii_new.jpg)

I don't mind hair and I don't mind skin.
But I don't like blending the two together.
Ugh.

edit:
Tell, would you mind if I shared the two graphics that I built with others?

Hi everybody,

Dave, great start!!! You have an incredible eye for symmetry .... !!!!

Legacy, very good! A bit too blurred in my opinion... and the 'copy, paste, flip' technique can be very tricky!!! One of the most common effect is that the person in the picture seems to squint....

Christine, great .... but 'squinting' a bit ....

It took me more than 3 hours to fix this picture....

I run the polaroid Dust&Scratches Filter to eliminate some of the white dots.
I used the copy and paste technique to reconstruct the missing parts.
I used the Heal Brush first set to Replace then to Normal to further correct and blend in the pasted parts.
Filter>Noise>Dust&Scratches to eliminate the stronger noise.
Neat Image to smoothen out the rest of the noise.
Curves to Balance Tone and Contrast.
Empty Layers set to Lighten, Darken, Multiply and Overlay to selectively fade, darken, enhance different parts of the picture.
USM to enhance contrast.

Flora, just when I thought I was Potty trained, you come up with something like this! Oh well, back to the diapers. Just an awesome job!

Dave

Flora, you rock!!!

Flora, you continue to amaze.
:bow:

Dave, Janet, vinniesworld,

thank you so much for your great comments..... :blush: :blush: :blush:

I was trying to keep the restoration close to the original. Like others I used a Polaroid Dust & Scratches Filter, and then followed it with a Filter/Noise Dust & Scratches. Then came extensive cloning repair of the good areas of the face that would be copied to the bad areas (right eye, ear, forehead, hair) . Once these areas were cleaned up they were copied to new layers, transformed into shape, and blended in by creating and then painting into a layer mask.

For the background I created a new layer and ran another Polaroid Dust & Scratches Filter, and then used a Guassian blur to blend the background while masking out the Girl. I followed that up with painting on the background for those areas still not blended in.

Lightened the girl's dress by selecting it onto a separate layer and setting the blending mode to screen. Lastly ran an Unsharp Mask with "Hide All" layer mask and selectively painted in sharpness on her face.

Alan

What an interesting motion of metamorphosis. All these wonderful interpretations are better than text book learning for me... Christine pushed me in the deep end with her interpretation. Splash. I just had to try to emulate her. Of course l havent. But l have pulled out some new skills trying. The final result is not the original girl at all. I know my rendition is a poor profile, but hey its got me excited. .. Flora .. All that manipulation and still the fabric of the photo remains true. Of course your name has the ability to tune anyone in, so l felt my mouth watering as l clicked on your thumbnail. Its really a special gift you have.... Oh flora before l go. I see some hair tutorials at the bottom of this thread. Could you recommend me any others. I have just purchased a wacom tablet and am really keen to improve my hair brushing... Thank you all again... Tell.

Great Job!!! :bigthmb: ... and thank you for your feedback!!! :pleased:

As for hair Tutorials I found this one (http://div.dyndns.org/EK/tutorial/) ... but there are, probably, billions more....

Russel Brown has a movie tutorial on hair - about 2/3rds down the page.

Lots of others here as well.

http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html

Christine

Wow, Christine,

thank you so much for a great link!!!! :pleased: :pleased:

Thank you Christine for the Russell Brown link. It looks very thorough. I will practice the tips given... Flora, not sure how you get around to helping so many retouch pro enthusiast's. Found your hair link and will try that too... Sorry l didnt get back to thank you both sooner.. Didnt think of looking here again...I really have snubbed the brush palette. Just using the same brush for everything.. Wish someone would do an indept tutorial on making use of the photoshop brush palette. .. Tell.

Hi Tell,

Thanks for your feedback! :pleased:

As for the 'Brushes' Tutorial .... next on the 'agenda' ..... :wink:

I look forward to that Flora... There might also be a tip or two on utilizing a tablet pen... Maybe a tip on designing a brush for specific tasks, such as using with the clone brush or using to paint hair.... Tell

I added a third version where I smoothed out the skin more, gave a more natural color to her face, and brightened her dress and background.

Alan

wow, ajcutlers work looks very impressive. best job in my opinion. it doesnt look so blurry than the other pictures. :)

wow, ajcutlers work looks very impressive. best job in my opinion. it doesnt look so blurry than the other pictures. :)

Thank you very much Limaze.

Alan