School house pics rocked but didn't pop

[tigerphoto]

How can I make these pics pop

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/09197222.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/d8712e97.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/96badc05.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/c6640202.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/07a4fe40.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/5ab9f5d2.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...y/f7f7602f.jpg

[PatrickB]

Tiger,

let me first ask you for something: With all respect, but we/I/us wouldn't mind at all having a bit more to read than one single sentence. Maybe what you've done so far, what you have tried, what exactly you want, whatever. By "what can I do to make them pop" you hardly give any information on what you are expecting to hear.

Well, back to your image. It's a real pain to photograph people with such a dark skin, had enough experience... The best way is to use raw's AND photograph with two different exposures. For example you shoot the first one with a correct setting and the second and third one with the shutter-ring a bit more open (Don't know if this is the correct term for the iris-adjustment). It's really hard to get the proper skin-contrast and exposure of the environment right, especially as she's wearing white And use spot-measurement and focus it on the face, this gives some additional improvement.

For the retouch part, begin with a brightness/contrast-layer: Click the "create new fill-/adjustment-layer" button in the channels-palette, don't change any settings and click ok, then set the blending mode to screen, activate the layer-mask by clicking it, hit Ctrl+I, then paint with white into the mask over her face and skin to bring out the contrast.

Then the usual, adjust brightness and contrast, colors and so on.

That what you wanted?

[Photo678]

should of bracketed the shots in 1/2 stop increments...although you should still be able to pull some details out of her face, as it seems there is enough information.

anyway, to make it pop, try tweaking the contrast a big, give a cyan cast to it, and add some grain...looks to be a fashiony shot, so could use a cross process or bleach bypass type of look.

Also maybe try some faux split filter looks...by making two adjustment layers for contrast, one for highlights one for shadows...and then mask out what you dont need.

[Kraellin]

tiger,

invest in a light meter!

had a go at one of these.

selected the upper skin area, contrast/brighten to brighten.
selected background, gausian blurred
illumination on duped layer to bring out face more
fixed edges

craig

[bart_hickman]

I tried a bunch of ideas on one.

Started by duplicating the original layer, setting fill to 75%, inverting, overlay blend. This is a handy way to flatten the tones and bring out her face.

Cooling photo filter to neutralize it a bit.

All of the following can be considered as attempts at emphasizing the woman and demphasizing the background while still keeping it as an important part of the photo.

-Levels adjust to brighten it, but masked just around her.

-Duplicate, high-pass filter (radius ~30) then use a levels adjust on that to bring the darker parts of her high-passed face up to mid-luminance (128), then blend that with soft light (even more enhancement of her face). The math is complex to explain on this one, but basically it boosts local contrast keeping the dark part of her face constant (because it was already where I wanted it.)

-Simulated vignette to darken the background.

-Use the lens blur filter (use a couple of multiplied gradients as a map for the blurring)

I did all of these--you could try any combination and with differing degrees of intensity.

The shadow/highlight tool has some potential as well. Sometimes I use it, sometimes not. Didn't use it here, but you might give it a try.

Bart

[blue dog]

I liked Bart's technique to boost the contrast without moving the dark areas. So, the first step was to duplicate the layer, select only her skin areas, apply the HP filter with radius at 30, and apply the soft light blend mode.

At this point, I felt that her face needed more illuminance. I also saw a connection between the wall color and her skin tones. I created a fill layer using the brightest shade of the creamy yellow from the lockers. Added a see-nothing mask. Did an illuminance copy which I pasted into the mask. I tried several blend modes like soft light, hard light , and linear light, but eventually decided on illuminance for the blend mode. At 100%, I felt more was needed and duplicated the layer which put it now at 200%. You may adjust for taste.

All of this was performed on only her skin areas, so there's still more to do.

I like the result of both the added illuminance and the unifying aspect of repeating the wall color in the highlights of her skin.

I think the remainder of the photo needs an increase in illuminance and her robe needs to be raised up into the whites.

[PhotoVagrant]

An attempt to add a bit of "drama"

[tigerphoto]

I love what you all have done with your adjustments. I would try to do a cross between photovagrant, bart and blues suggestions. I love the background intensity on vagrant and I love how bart and blue have worked with the background to let the model pop out. I'm concerned with the discoloration of her skin in a couple of the variations though. I wont have access to PS for about a week, but when I do I will see what i can do. Thanks again.

[Godmother]

I went for a little more mood

Tell me what you think.

Another thing... Do you mind if I use this one for my portfolio?

[pellepiano]

Maybe this has some "pop" ?

[bart_hickman]

Nice job on the shadow--it's hard to make a good shadow on a subject with significant depth. Did you paint the shadow or do it in parts or what?

Bart

[pellepiano]

Part of shadow is the extracted girl, distorted and turned black and some parts that did not fit I painted in. Could be a lot better but works for a quickie.

[tigerphoto]

Originally Posted by PhotoVagrant

An attempt to add a bit of "drama"

I like what you did to the background. What actually did you do? Is there a way to seperate the model from the background changes?

[tigerphoto]

Originally Posted by pellepiano

Maybe this has some "pop" ?

lol I love it tell me more.

[pellepiano]

I separated ( Extracted ) the model from the background by painting a layer mask. Normally I would use the Extract Tool but I did not get the quick results I wanted.

Then I put the desert image behind the model and then merged them. To get them to go better together I did some adjustments on the combined layer and desaturated it.

When I shoot models I always use a bluescreen so I can extract somewhat easier. I find it very good to be able to change backgrounds afterwards, but this was a nice experience doing it with a "normal" image.

If you want to see some more extractions, all my images at http://www.modelmayhem.com/pics.php?id=92920 use backgrounds that were added later.