My best result ever - please give me your inputs!

[iceblue1980]

Hello fellow retouchers!

I've been away for a while but now back to retouching again. I am not a professional, I just do it for artistic reasons. I work in PhotoShop Pro CS3 and started out around 5 years ago.

I aim for glamour and artistic retouching with just a touch of reality.

Please give me your thoughts about this photo. It took me roughly 12 hours to retouch it.. I usually spend 4-8 hours per photo but this one took longer since i'm a bit rusty

Original: http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/2590/julina1sn5.jpg
Edited: http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/5...llsizefpp0.jpg

[yelhsaneerg]

simply put: i like it

[pixelzombie]

the eye lashes seem a lot sharper than the rest of the image...

[LQQKER]

Retouching and art are are "always" subjective so keep in mind that I do like what you've done with this lovely lady and can certainly appreciate the time you put into it. Just a few areas that I might have done differently.

The fly-away hair crossing her hair direction would look better eliminated, unless you kept the wind blown look on the edges as well.

The nose edge is almost non-existant on her left side.

The highlight by her strap and forehead are slightly intense to my taste.

The upper forehead hairline area above the right eye has hairs coming from nowhere.

Placing a very light feathered shadow under the lip and above can give a fuller look.

You have a few hairs by her chin that appear to be starting "on" the chin.

Clone marks where her neck meets her shoulder.

Although you did a fine job with the eyelashes, they are sharper than the rest of the image.

Now . . . if you weren't asking for a critique and this was simply posted I would have had nothing to say except . . . nice job!

[iceblue1980]

Originally Posted by LQQKER

Retouching and art are are "always" subjective so keep in mind that I do like what you've done with this lovely lady and can certainly appreciate the time you put into it. Just a few areas that I might have done differently.

The fly-away hair crossing her hair direction would look better eliminated, unless you kept the wind blown look on the edges as well.

The nose edge is almost non-existant on her left side.

The highlight by her strap and forehead are slightly intense to my taste.

The upper forehead hairline area above the right eye has hairs coming from nowhere.

Placing a very light feathered shadow under the lip and above can give a fuller look.

You have a few hairs by her chin that appear to be starting "on" the chin.

Clone marks where her neck meets her shoulder.

Although you did a fine job with the eyelashes, they are sharper than the rest of the image.

Now . . . if you weren't asking for a critique and this was simply posted I would have had nothing to say except . . . nice job!

Ah splended! Thank you! I totally missed the shoulder. That edge was coming from hair extentions layer.
I also lowered the opacity by 25% of all the lashes-layers. Fixed the hair on the forhead and added shadow to lips (gr8 advice thx!) but unfortunatelly didn't quite get what was wrong with the hair by the chins since those areas are untouched pretty much, compare to original.

I've done some lip reconstruction and my problem is that I often try to go plastic surgery instead of working with lights/shadows etc.

I have updated the original post with my edited version.

[LQQKER]

Normally I would not do this, but seeing you didn't notice. Here is a blowup of the chin where the hair starts.

[duwayne]

Welcome back -

I'm not much of an artist but I like the overall results you have achieved. My only comment is that the image looks "heavy." With all of that lovely flyaway hair, I would expect a lighter feeling to the image. Looking at the original, it looks almost like the photo was taken as a close-up with a wide angle lens. I played with this and reduce the width of the image (from her hose to the left edge) and increased the height of this section. Just a thought.

[Tom K]

Not wanting to be picky, my only negative thought is too much
shine on her forehead.
I do like the picture and it's clear how much work you put into it..
Tom

[janie]

I like it.

My only comment - there was mention of shine on her forehead, but when looking at it closer, the same shine is on her shoulder - so if you follow a line from her forehead down the shine is the same, so I look at it as glow or highlight from the lighting. I would reduce it a bit, but not by much.

[iceblue1980]

LQQKER, thanks alot. I somehow thought you were talking about the cheeks, where you actually told me about the chin! I've cleared it up now. Also lowered the lights on her forehead and shoulder.

And while we are here I just have to tell you that i tried to remove her dress (black thingy) and was working on that and that only around 5-8 hours but did not achieve any acceptable results.

Tried with clone stamp, healing, patterns, well even vanishing point... still it was looking weird. I think it has something to do with lights/shadows and my skills are appearantly just not good enough.

If anyone can "remove" the dress, I'd love to know how?

Thanks for the critiques guys!

[unimatrix001]

just a quick 5 minute job removed the dress strap with the patch tool...

[duwayne]

unimatrix001 - Nice job. I keep forgetting about the Patch Tool but I think this is the way to go. I used two selections (left half and right half) and Transform Selection to move the left half dowm and the right half up. Copy and paste and curves to blend.

I screwed up and worked on the original instead of the final but you get the idea.

[byRo]

Originally Posted by iceblue1980

.....I aim for glamour and artistic retouching with just a touch of reality...

Then I think you missed the best piece of advice in the thread......

Originally Posted by duwayne

... I played with this and reduce the width of the image (from her hose to the left edge) and increased the height of this section. ....

Risking a very Ant-like comment.. I like the original better.

Sorry.

Rô
(Ant wouldn't say "Sorry", though)

[iceblue1980]

Unimatrix, you must have some serious skills! I tried Patch Tool several times but the black color goes away really slowly.. I think I'll go for the Duwaynes advice though.

Thanks again guys.

[unimatrix001]

i have never been able to use the healing brush or clone tool... could never get them to blend in properly. i pretty much use the patch tool for everything. but i guess its to each his/her own. i feel really comfortable using the patch tool. so i havent practiced with the clone or healing brush that much.

[AltIvan]

The lips; before was a cute expression; after she haves a less feminine mouth.

The hair behind talk about movement, in front those dont.

[Ant]

Risking a very Ant-like comment.. I like the original better.
Sorry.
Rô
(Ant wouldn't say "Sorry", though)

LMAO. The original is LOADS better.

[Gary Richardson]

Pretty much everything I hate all in one picture. You've successfully removed any character the model had, that's quite some achievement.

Sorry, but I much prefer the untouched original.

[iceblue1980]

LOL ByRo! What have you done with my pic? Hahaha, don't scare me like that!

Anyway, I appreciate the critique I've received here concidering the technical details.

Some of you guys like the original more, which is understandable since it's really a matter of taste and some people like it more natural

Thanks again!

[WayDen]

Out of curiosity, what did you use to create more hair for her? Was it cloning, or a specific type of brush that you used?

I'm working on a photo right now, but having a little bit of trouble getting the right look for loose strands of hair, so any help would be appreciated!

[Panpan]

I found the original a little dark.

[iceblue1980]

Originally Posted by WayDen

Out of curiosity, what did you use to create more hair for her? Was it cloning, or a specific type of brush that you used?

I'm working on a photo right now, but having a little bit of trouble getting the right look for loose strands of hair, so any help would be appreciated!

Actually I used a technique I've learned quite a long time ago thanks to one of the (great) tutorials available on the internet!

I'm really bad at explaining such things but I'll make a try:

I copied fractions of her hairdo, making 3 new layers. I used "Twirl", "Free Transform", "Curves" and "Hue/Sat" on each layer. The point of making 3 layers was to make the extentions look natural and also to prevent the digital scars. Those layers covered different parts of her hair off course.

Finally I pasted them and played around till I got the desired result. I think I spend couple of hours making the hair. I suggest you check out this link, which should be a good start:

http://www.peachpit.com/articles/art...01733&seqNum=4

[WayDen]

Thanks for the link!