Anyone Tried Portrait Professional 8?

[SteveB2005]

Hey retouchers. I just got my Oct 2008 issue of Macworld and there was a full page ad featuring the new Portrait Professional 8 enhancement software. I downloaded a demo for my Macbook and gave it a go. I must say it is quite impressive. I haven't had time yet to explore all it offers, but it had many features and variations of techniques for retouching a portrait image. It is also a stand alone app, not a Photoshop plug-in.

I can see how this software could save a lot of time, especially if you had to do a lot of batch procession. The app seems easy to understand and there is a pdf manual that can be downloaded.

As far as using it for high end fashion retouching that's going to press, it probably is not going to help much, but for the average digital photographer that wants to "hotrod" a retouching project, then it might be a good addition to PS. Getting pro results by D&B for high end skin work, I doubt it would help, but it might, I don't know yet.

In a week or so, I will report back some results after I have more time to play around with it on some of my higher rez images.

If you have tried out the app, what is your opinion?

Thanks steve

[enzo]

Hi! I use it a lot for my work and found it very easy to work with and you also get professional results. Great software tool! Hope it comes in handy for you and saves a lot of time and effort.

[HuBBa]

Define "professional results" first then.

Does it look like any one of the 2387918346892364239659256 blurred skin texture/degrunge techniques out there? definately yes. It saves a few steps with evening the skintone aswell thats about the major benefit.

Does it look like a carefully and painstakingly D&B and reshaped fashion shot in Vogue? Definately not.

If your clients only pay for the basic quick & dirty glamour retouch with supersmooth untextured skin making them look like plastic dolls, then Portrait Professional will save you a lot of time yes.

That however is not what i call professional results. Any retoucher who have googled for more than 30 seconds will know techniques that will give you the same result with a basic action.

[Koosla]

I've tried several versions of it since it first came out, and while the underlying idea (to have the different facial features segmented, so as to manipulate them afterwards with relatively simple parameters instead of manual brushing and distorting) is indeed very cool, I've never been quite convinced by the results. They always looked weird enough, as if the product of a careless manual retouching, that I deemed preferable to resort back to manual (and obviously more careful) retouching.

I guess the main problem is that they still have to work a lot in the algorithms for detection and segmenting of individual facial features, as well as the routines for distorting them with minimal quality loss.

I can see its usefulness for (relatively) quick jobs, and for photographers with only basic skills at photoshopping; but not much more than that.

[thepcmouse]

I have ver. 6 (shrug) I guess I could update it. I agree it isn't going to be enough to do professional glamor pictures for a magazine. But it can cut down on some steps getting there. It's great for fixing your friends and family photos and sometimes a professional picture that's not required for upscale ads.
Fun program though. I should use it more.