Darned shadows! Please help....

[pepperspray]

Hi, there.

I have a picture of a cute couple, taken when they were high school sweethearts, and now after all these years they have reunited and would like a cleaned up copy of the photo.

Unfortunately, the pic was taken with unsightly shadows, and despite my best efforts, I'm just not winning. Everything I have tried just comes out looking pretty awful.

I've searched here for advice on removing shadows, and over the last few days I've worked with all the tips and tricks I could find here. (Flora's results in a wedding photo thread were simply stunning, but I just can't seem to replicate what she'd done with this image! The frustration is driving me to drink, I swear!)


Anyway, I would greatly appreciate any advice you may have for me with regard to this photograph. Or is it too hopeless, and I should just go buy a bottle of gin?


Thank you!

[Daviskw]

Hello Pepperspray

I just duplicated the background then used Shadow/highlights to reduce some of the shadows.

Then a hue/saturation adjustment layer to play with the color. Then I used a noise filter and to end sharpened the faces a little.

Butch

[pepperspray]

Hi, Butch.

Thank you for your reply. I'll play around with your suggestions to see what I can do.

In your example, there's still quite a lot of shadow (perhaps there is no getting rid of it, alas) but the faces are much improved over what I've been trying to do.

Thank you.

[Swampy]

I played with this a little.

Three HSL adjustment layers to reduce the shadows all set toLuminacity blend mode.. Masked so the adjustment only affected the face areas. Then a color fill layer (using the same masking area as the HSLs) with a slight gausian blur.

Not much time to devote to this, but maybe this will help. I didn't work on any other areas other than the faces and I wasn't shooting for any sharpening etc. Just tried to remove the shadows.

[pepperspray]

Hi, Swampy.

Thanks for your help.


One thing I don't really understand is the colour fill. What does a colour fill do?

I'll work your suggestions into my files, too.


Later on, I'll upload what I've done using everyone's suggestions, and then perhaps you can guide me on what I've done right and what I've done wrong, if you have time.


Thanks, again!

[Daviskw]

Hi there

I gave it another go but with just more of the same.

[pavel123]

Shadow/Highlight (doesn't do much in this case), color corrections. Painted some face areas, used an overlay grey layer to lighten a few spots (this actually must be done on a high res pic). Darkened background.

Pavel

[Swampy]

Originally Posted by pepperspray

One thing I don't really understand is the colour fill. What does a colour fill do?

A color fill lay is just a layer filled with a solid color (usually set to Overlay blend mode) that tends to "cast" a tint or shade to the underlying layer. You can use it with a mask (so that only certain areas are affected) or not.

In this case I used a skin tone color and the mask is applying it just the face areas. The HSL adjustment layers removed much of the color in those areas so the color fill "filled" them back in.

[LonK]

I briefly just painted light on a grey overlay layer on their faces, but with a bit more effort, I'm sure a more satisfactory result could be obtained.

[Flora]

Does the young man in the picture have a moustache or is it only shadow???

[pepperspray]

Hi, Flora

Sorry for the delayed reply; it's been a busy weekend!

The young man does not have a moustache - it's very dark shadow.

[pepperspray]

Thanks for the great replies, everyone!

One thing I did try with part of the young lady's face was to carefully select an area of shadow, feather the selection by 5 pixels, copy to a new layer, and set the blending mode to screen. I then added a clipped colour balance adjustment layer, followed by a hue/sat one. I merged the adjustment layers with the shadow layer and then blended it with her face using the healing brush.

That worked well on some areas and terribly on others.

Finding what works where sure does take a hella long time!

[pepperspray]

Okay, I've combined some of your suggestions and played with some ideas of my own, to try to get the best blend of techniques in an effort to make this image as perfect as I can get it.

At the moment, I'm not too worried about the white pants, as I'll try Flora's shadows-on-wedding-dresses tips, but I'll do that later. First up is the skin shadows.

I've selected the shadows from the red channel, and made a mask from that - tidied up to focus on the shadows I want fixed - and then played around with an exposure adjustment of the shadows, including tweaking the gamma a bit. Then used the eraser set at a low opacity to blend any ugly hard edges.

Used a color fill to try to bring back lost skin colour, and then played with various layer and fill opacities to try to get the best blend without bringing back too much of the shadow I'm trying to get rid of.

But I just can't quite make it work as it all looks so unnatural.


Anyone got any advice based on the attached file? I'm going to work on this pic until it's perfect for printing, if it kills me!

[Ziaphra]

Personally I don't think the answer lies in removing them totally...but rather to blend them lighter so they don't detract from their features. Lightening, colour correcting the shadows, a bit of cloning and smudging to blend them in more naturally.

http://img226.imageshack.us/my.php?image=image16jb7.jpg

[Flora]

Hi,

... this is surely a tricky one....

The shadow on the young man's upper lip is so strong that I had mistakenly taken it for moustache ....

I've been working on and off on this picture but was never satisfied with the result... removing the shadow without having the contour of his upper lip disappear (changing his identity) is very difficult... I think Ziaphra is right

Originally Posted by Ziaphra

I don't think the answer lies in removing them totally...but rather to blend them lighter

Anyway even if not satisfied at all, here is what I got ... If I have the time, I'll give it another go following Ziaphra's tip...