Colorization critique, please

[keepemcomin]

What do you think of this so far? I've done everything but the background. Please give me all the advice you can...I need to be shoved in the right direction with this one. The original is here.

[yuppicide]

Really nice, the only thing I think that really stands out in my mind that needs work is the eyes. They look fake.

[soleah]

I agree with yuppiecide. The eyes are flat. The whites, maybe was a bit too white and there's no catchlight to the iris. I think you've already added red on the corners, it would be a good idea to make it redder and widen it since the lady was facing sideways.

[venivedi]

Nice work!
As for the flat look eye, I think you can reconstruct her eye by the original(layer, blending mode, and etc.)
But she is still likely to look like having a black eye.(of course, it's from light circumstances when picture taking)
By the way, I had a go at it.(I'm not familiar with coloring old photo...and it took about 3 hours for me. Originally I took advantage of your retouched pic and the original)

[Flora]

Hi,

keepemcomin,

I think you are doing a very nice and clean job with your colorizing!

In my opinion, the skin is a bit too 'one colour' and 'pink' ..... I wrote this in another Thread:

Correcting, applying or changing skin colour is the most delicate task in colour correction and, when nothing else works, here are Katrin Eismann guidelines:
Mode CMYK

* in light skinned babies, yellow and magenta are equal,

* In adults, yellow is up to 35% greater than magenta,

* Cyan makes people look tanner and darker,

* Only people with very dark skin should have noticeable amount of black ink in their skin tones.

As for the flatness of the eyes, I think the problem is the absolute lack of colour around the iris ... Here is what Vikki suggested in different occasions:

Originally Posted by Vikki

Don't leave any areas gray, even if you know they probably were. That goes for black and white as well.

and again

Originally Posted by Vikki

Don't leave anything gray. Even gray has color in it (often from reflected surroundings). If the job looks tedious, apply a sepia tone before you start coloring.

Hope this helps...