1st real attempt at a restore... sorta

[Guac953]

Hello all! I'm new to the forums and I'm glad I found this place.

About a month ago my wife found a painting of her grandparents and asked me to take a snapshot of it and fix up in photoshop. The only digital camera I have is actually my DvCam which is what I used to take a couple of snapshots of the painting. I know DvCams are really bad for using as a digital camera, but I am working with what I already have. The snapshot is actually footage I took with my DvCam since I believe the actual pixel count is higher then the digital camera function in it.

I have been tinkering around with photoshop for about a year now and I don't have any formal art classes or graphic art skills under my belt either. All I have is what I have learned on the internet.

I'm going to upload two pictures the first will be the original and the second will be the restore picture. Thanks all in advance for helping me to better my skills

http://www.netpci.com/~castro953/01g...s-original.jpg

http://www.netpci.com/~castro953/02g...nts-finish.jpg

Jess

[Ed_L]

Hi Jess,

Welcome aboard. I think the background looks great! Good job on that. My biggest concern would be too much contrast. The blown out highlights is the thing that would concern me most. You've lost a little in the shadows, but that's not an important part of the image. If you've been playing with Photoshop for a year, you've done a nice job in a short time. Stick around. This is *the* place to learn.

Ed

[Guac953]

Ed,

Thanks for your insight! I know one of my biggest problems in using Photoshop is learning to do a little bit at a time. For some reason I want auto-fixing done with the push of one button... like in some other user friendly Picture programs out there. I know that using PS is something that takes time and is done slowly which is why pros can fix an image up to mint condition without anyone noticing what was done... the beauty of FX I certainly should have taken more time with the picture; I think I spent about 2hours on it total.

Currently I have downloaded a challenge picture to try and fix up... but I think its way out of my level. Is there a beginner level area to start?

Thanks again,

Jess

[Ed_L]

Jess,

The challenges are great for learning. I should do more of them myself since there's more about Photoshop that I don't know than I do. If you look at some of the challenges that have been turned in, you'll see how people came up with their magic. It's a super learning experience. Don't ever be afraid of submitting something because you don't feel it's good enough. We learn from critiques. If you don't understand something, ask questions. There's a lot of people willing to help on this site.

Ed

[Doug Nelson]

Ed's comments are spot on. You did an excellent job, and my only criticism would be letting the highlights and shadows get blown out. This is kind of a shame, because the highlights in the original are quite nice. But for a first attempt, well done!

As for which Challenge to start with, pick any one that engages you. No one will make you feel bad if you pick one that's outside your skill range at this point. If we only chose projects we already knew how to do, we'd never learn anything.

Stretch, experiment, ask questions, but most of all have fun!

[Guac953]

Wow guys thanks!

I really appreciate your comments and enthusiasm! The restoration challenge I took was Restoration Challenge #56
35th Anniversary... so far I have worked out the background since I thought that was the easiest to fix... hehe that took me at least a couple of hours

Thanks again,

Jess