Jewellery retouching methods

[ray12]

Janice,

Sorry to hear you're having a hard time. But, please understand that most retouchers also feel that jewelry is very tough to do - you picked a very demanding area to start with.

I worked on your original image for a short time - just to generally make some corrections. Im going to spend most of my time going over the thought process and principles I used in getting there - since you indicated your need is urgent. Here are the steps I took:

Image was generally dark - so I used the curves adjustment (Shortcut ctl -m) to brighten up the mid levels of the image. Click and push left on the center of the curve.

There was not a good white or black reference point in the image - so I used the levels adjustment to bring up the whites - and bring up the blacks (ctl -L).

The overall contrast of the image was low - so I did a contrast adjustment to make the image pop a little more. (Adjustments>Image>contrast)

The color of the gold seemed to be pale and thin and not strong and vibrant. I increased the overall saturation of the image using the saturation adjustment. (ctl-u)

There were some small surface blemishes on the metal so I set up a separate layer and used the spot healing brush (set to sample all layers) to remove the small imperfections - then merged that layer down to the original layer below when I was happy with the result. (merge down).

The metal looked blotchy in several areas - so i copied the image to a new layer (ctl-j) and did a surface blur (Filter>Blur>Surface Blur - new in CS2) on the metal. I used a black mask and painted on it with a white soft brush to place the surface corrections on only certain areas of the image to smooth out the color.

The diamonds looked blurry - copied image onto another layer and did a smart sharpen to the whole image and made it a bit stronger than needed - I then used the black mask and white pen masking technique to limit the strong correction to only the diamond area on the image. Used the opacity slider to adjust the final intensity of the sharpness.

Im trying out a new plugin called Vertus Fluid Mask to make masks and cutouts from images. So I did a fast cutout so I could isolate the rings to place them over a background. Added a royal purple background with a diffused white oval placed on it to give it some depth and interest.

Wanted some sparkle in the diamonds - so I created a new layer and added some white sparkles from a brush I found in the Adobe Resource Center free download page.

This is just a start - Hope this helps out some - good luck!

Ray

[Janice Ong]

Thanks Ray,

I've tried the steps you suggested but I still can't get my jewelleries smooth at the surface.

I've tried using surface blur to blur out and mask it. However, there's still patches around the ring. That's beacuase there's a harsh black shadow which seems hard to remove.

[creeduk]

Hue sat, levels and some color balance, all with a noise reduction. sharpen on the details and and some manual blurring. Finally masked and added to darker background.

[ray12]

Creeduk,

Nice result. Love the color contrasts. Image really pops.

Ray

[MBChamberlain]

Jewlery retouching is more about the way the jewlery is shot than the way it is retouched. Retouching well shot jewlery is very easy, whereas a shot with textured reflections are near impossible.

I was a photographer before I was a retoucher, so I have a great appreciation for the "in camera" philosophy. Pure and simple: they were taking beautiful pictures of jewlery YEARS before they ever thought of retouching, I'm afraid that we too often use photoshop as a crutch rather than a tool. We try to do things in photoshop that are easier, faster, and ultimately better if done in camera. That being said, Janice, you can't really get the perfectly smooth textures you are looking for with this shot. The reflection of the florecent lights, textured table, and room objects prevent it. On the other hand, if you didn't have those reflections, you can easily smooth the surface and get that magazine look. Remember that for large product displays (like those 5 foot posters in jewlery stores) the piece being photographed is probably a couple of feet across.

I don't have the equipment to do product photography so I can't post an example, but here is a link for some basic techniques and equipment requirements.

Hope this helps,

Michael

[dkcoats]

I shot my share of jewelry over the years when I was in the photography biz and I can second the motion of previous posters who've said in essence that if it ain't on the chrome, you ain't gonna get it. Jewelry photography falls under the heading of "kids, don't try this at home." If the photographer doesn't have the know-how or the equipment to do it right, no amount of retouching is going to fix it. </.02>

dc

[creeduk]

Originally Posted by ray12

Creeduk,

Nice result. Love the color contrasts. Image really pops.

Ray

Thanks Ray for the compliment, I always like the way that style of effect makes the shot look.

Like MC said it is in the shooting, I read a lot on jewelry shots (never done and doubt I will) but it seems a hard subject especially diamonds, I have heard from those in the know that what you need is multiple pinpoint sources of light, (not too strong though, softer is better)

I also came across this article.

http://www.photoflexlightingschool.c...ing/index.html