Fixing details and how far to go

[darield]

There is still quite a bit of blochiness in the jacket and I'm not sure the best technique to smooth it out a bit without loosing any more detail. I also wanted to smooth the background a bit but when I added a layer, with a mask and did a gaussian blur for just the background, I didn't like the look. Is there a better way to smooth out the background a bit? Sometimes I have trouble deciding how far to go before I am finished.

[dataflow]

just desaturated it.(make B&W)
then if you want the color back just use color balance to get it back to same color

[capice]

agree with dataflow....I also would use noiseninja to get some of the grain out and smoothing it without blurring and to keep the details

[darield]

Thank you, I did both.

[photo-restorer]

Yeh i agree. desaturate the photo to b&w and then use the hue/saturation adjustment ticking colorize and add the sepia tone back in

[Splitter226]

You may wish to paint in a new background using the Pattern Stamp tool and using the Kraft Paper or Kraft Waffle Paper pattern. I might use a soft brush, 80-100 px, and experiment with an initial opacity of 30%. This might be particularly useful if you already have a mask or an alpha channel for the area to be restored.

Best regards.

[byRo]

Originally Posted by darield

Sometimes I have trouble deciding how far to go before I am finished.

Seems that nobody replied to this part!

My view:
It depends on the customer - there is a possible spread from "historically accurate" to "Artist's impression".

If you do a lot of restoration work you will get to know what people around you will want. Around here folks tend much more to the "Artist's impression" side of it - so that's what I do.

(As you didn't actually say that there is a customer, and you are doing this for yourself then, probably, it will never be finished )

Rô

[sergio2263]

Originally Posted by darield

There is still quite a bit of blochiness in the jacket and I'm not sure the best technique to smooth it out a bit without loosing any more detail. I also wanted to smooth the background a bit but when I added a layer, with a mask and did a gaussian blur for just the background, I didn't like the look. Is there a better way to smooth out the background a bit? Sometimes I have trouble deciding how far to go before I am finished.

I would use channels and see which channel get rid of the blochiness. for the background use the healing tools check pattern and use the kraft paper which is already in photoshop then just brush all over the background that should give you a very nice finish.

hope this helps

[skydog]

Ro...where have you been hiding?