How to acheive this look

[emarts]

Put aside the controversy about this artist and let's discuss how she acheives this look in her photography: http://www.paulkopeikingallery.com/a...erg/index0.htm

It has been suggested that she works in the Lab color space. Any ideas?

[Cassidy]

quick look, to my eyes, looks like each have colour cast and the highlights are exaggerated

[Angel_Ice]

Originally Posted by Cassidy

quick look, to my eyes, looks like each have colour cast and the highlights are exaggerated

Hi, sorry, what do u mean with "color cast"?

[Cassidy]

each photo looks somewhat desaturated skinwise and looks to have a deep blue cast which would accentuate the reds too. Easiest translation in photoshop is probably mask skin, desaturate a little and then use a dark blue photo filter. To accent the highlights, then over paint with white before guassian blurring and possibly set to soft light mode. Unfortunately my children are too old for a belting and do not often display this type of distress

[Angel_Ice]

Thanks so much for your explanation!

[emarts]

Do you think it's mostly done in Photoshop? Or is most of the work done in the camera and lighting? It looks like there are at least two sources of light coming from both the right and left of the subject at equal strength. A modeling light behind and another fill light in front. The skin does look desaturated except for the faces.

I like the look alot. It almost feels illustrated.

Did you see the prices for those prints?

[recrisp]

It looks like to me that not only was good photography was used, as in the backlight, and backdrop, but also Lucis Art was also used for the skintone/illustrated look.

In case 'some' weren't aware of the filter...
http://www.lucisart.com

Randy

[Pam]

According to Jill Greenberg herself, in a podcast, the images were front lit, then she added "sheen and drama" in post-production. By that, I'm thinking she basically airbrushed in the highlights along with some contrast adjustments. I don't think it's a special program or any huge secret technique. I think the "secret" is lots of manual labor, tweaking and just knowing when to stop

--
Pam
http://www.pbase.com/pam_r
'art is working on something 'til you like it...then leaving it that way'

[NancyJ]

The technique is quite simple if you have a good starting quality image.
Once you've sharpened and acheived the tonality you want then its just a case of exaggerating the highlights - particularly on the drool, snot and tears. My favored method is multiply and screen layers of the original but its basically just dodge and burn so whichever method you prefer will get you to the same/similar end.
You can achieve similar with a highpass overlay, setting a large radius will go beyond sharpening and into contrast adjustment nicely but you have less control over what you enhance.
This is just a quicky I threw together from a stock xchange image - obviously the quality is poor so you wouldnt mistake it for the real thing but it kinda demonstrates the technique.

First I adjusted the levels to get a good black point
Then I sharpened with a highpass layer
Then I adjusted the tonality by using selective colour to increase the cyan in the reds and enhance the 'blueness' of the blues and cyans
Then just dodge and burn

[1STLITE]

Nany J that is really awesome! I do believe you've got it right there!

[goose443]

It seems like there's quite a bit going on in terms of painting with light. If you take your time (something I didn't really have the luxury to do with the example below) it's incredible the dramatic effects you can achieve. the trick is to maintain your light sources and really use the brushes to their full potential. Below is a very quick example using Nancy's photograph. It's just separate layers curved darker or lighter, masked and painted back in. There is a final sharpening (which kills the details due to the compression of the JPG) and an overall desaturation.

[Arandel]

Amy Dresser retouched(/es?) Jill Greenberg's pics, so check out http://www.amydresser.com/pages/sipper.html for a before and after comparison. In an interview with her, she revealed her techniques as really bright frontal lighting in combination with highlight enhancing postprocessing (which is very visible in the example pic).

[Angel_Ice]

Do u think is possible to obtain a retouch like that starting from a pixellated starting photo?

[Arandel]

Of course it's possible; I mean, it all boils down to your intents with the photo.

[megl]

Originally Posted by Arandel

Amy Dresser retouched(/es?) Jill Greenberg's pics, so check out http://www.amydresser.com/pages/sipper.html for a before and after comparison.

That one show that Amy is one of the best!!! Wow!

/megl