PortraitProfessional software

[Doug Nelson]

I'm not 100% certain this is a good thing:
http://www.portraitprofessional.com/content/gallery.php

[Ant]

meh. there are others too. great for the wedding photog or something, but it all comes down to blurred over imperfections and small jpg captures that didn't have much detail to begin with. Plus, tiny jpg samples.

anything that says Professional, Collectors Edition, Expert, etc. has to be looked at as not.

[BillFrey]

Respectfully, Ant.

Your replies are often negative, but seldom give us advice on how to improve. Sharing your knowledge would benefit all of the members, especially those who are struggling to learn and 'do it the right way'.

I for one would love to learn how the professionals do retouching.

Bill

[Doug Nelson]

I was more concerned about how it reorganized the faces around. Not sure that's something you'd want automated (if at all).

[videosean]

It's not completely automated... I tried the trial. Doesn't work so well if it's not a straight-on portrait and it's far from a one-click fix

[Ant]

Originally Posted by BillFrey

Respectfully, Ant.

Your replies are often negative, but seldom give us advice on how to improve. Sharing your knowledge would benefit all of the members, especially those who are struggling to learn and 'do it the right way'.

I for one would love to learn how the professionals do retouching.

Bill

respectfully, how is this apt to the posting? I said only that the software didn't do anything for me, nor will it in the future. Might be nice for someone, but not the big picture. there is no 'right way' in PhotoShop when it comes to a lot of things - most especially retouching. However, in terms of retouching, there is always the end result looking "right".

EDIT: perhaps you should read more of my postings. I do give advice. If it isn't sugar coated, well, it's not. There is an enormous amount of that here and that is a major contributor to the lack of 'ways to improve'. Practice makes perfect, so does being objective of your own work. There are plenty of examples available to compare to.

[BillFrey]

oh well, I tried to be nice.

I really didn't expect you to change that easily. Keep on making fun of those of us who aren't pros and get your giggles.

[Ant]

Originally Posted by BillFrey

oh well, I tried to be nice.

I really didn't expect you to change that easily. Keep on making fun of those of us who aren't pros and get your giggles.

sigh. you still didn't answer my question as to how your post was apt to what I posted or even the thread title or its contents. I'll take that and what you have just said as you being stumped for an answer and then trying to attack me. I don't make fun of people. If you have an issue with me, take it to pm.

[mistermonday]

Doug, I agree with you. It may be OK to blur the blemishes and smooth the skin, etc. However I feel it crosses the line when it warps the cranial bone structure and face. It may look more aesthetically appealing but it is not representative of the real person.
Regards, Murray

[lilsip]

There is something really weird about the way the faces change shape after the filter is applied. They look kinda doll-like and unnatural. The eyes get spaced apart and the whole face is sort of ballooned out slightly.

In fact, I liked most of the portraits better "before." But then, I prefer more natural-looking retouches. In particular, the first one I saw was a woman with, in my opinion, some nice character-y wrinkles in her face that should have stayed. In Katrin E's book, she mentions that you shouldn't take away tooo many wrinkles or it looks unnatural.

Why get your picture improved if it doesn't even look like you afterward?

[Akarat]

it's the best semi-auto retouching software that i've tried
but it's not enough for commercial use

Akarat

[Cassidy]

well Akarat, it takes you part way there

[Greytata]

I am a newbie at these foruns, but here's what I think about the software: I also agree that no one in the world do need their face changed in terms of morphological appearance, but when using the software, what I do is after the initial automated action, put all the "face" values to "0", just to get the original face. Afterwards, I can play around with the other settings, keeping in mind to preserve as much as possible the real appearance of the person in question and emphazise skin tones, etc. And we can obtain good results very fast. I am a no dedicated portrait photographer but I find the software useful, just when I need it to do things in a quick way. Cheers

[Cis]

First of all ... PortraitProf is an awsome program that take hours of work out of my hands in Photoshop.
The program isn't about changing faces ... its an airbrush program.
If you have funny faces like some ppl mention .. means you didn't do your job well, and besides if that happens, anything can be corrected afterwards.
My guess is .. only ppl who use photoshop to airbrush can rate this program.
Next time if you rate a program ... use it for a few days instead of a few mins, then atleast you know what you are talking about.

[Markzebra]

There's not a lot thats really going to help anyone in that software. More likely to distract them from improving their observation and skill level. Why is that people assume that Photoshop doesn't already have the toolkit? it quite obviously does. There's no 'one click fix' for anything, unless you are happy for it to look rubbish. And the more rubbish is out there, the nearer the backlash.

[vlasta]

I guess there might be a group of people, who will find it useful. Personally, I am for less extreme and more manual retouching.

In any case, it is an interesting piece of technology and it may evolve to be even better. Right now, my feeling (and I am probably not alone) is "it could be cool for someone else" (without being able to define that someone). The goal of the authors should be to change this to "it is useful for me" or for someone concrete I know.

[Zeusman]

It's really not a bad program. If you have a large number of head shots to get through it can, as someone mentioned, take hours off your workload.

The program does give you plenty of options with regards to eyes, nose, blemishes, etc. So yes, you can make people look alien but you can also do small corrections that enhance and don't look overly worked on.

So many of the programs are aimed at watering down the intimidation factor of Photoshop. In some case, such as Nik's plug-ins they work well.

Is it the "pure" Photoshop retouching - NO. Can you do it in Photoshop - ABSOLUTELY Do you need a 400 page book...Sometimes.

[gerund]

My experience with Portrait Pro software is I am impressed.
I have worked with portraits in PSE, PSPro and Painter , but no
other software I have used has yielded so much so quickly.
You can do in 5 minutes what it takes a half hour to do in these
other programs. And you have 10 levels of skin texture improvements to work with so you can leave the natural skin elements, ie pores, etc of the portraits as untouched as you like.
It does have its limitations but they are becoming fewer and fewer.
PP 8.0 allows additional work with the eyes that is very time consuming
in other programs.
My advice is don't judge this program until you have spent some time with it.
I will use this program any day in preference to others out there.

Gerry