Can't Get The Look Right

[Kyudos]

I started with this:

start.jpg

and tried a bit of restoration, thus:

end.jpg

I'm quite happy with the results, except for one thing - it looks like an old photo!
(I mean apart from the content). Not sure how else to describe it - almost like it has a sort of general cast to it?

Has anyone got any suggestions? Should it be cooler? Warmer? Colour balanced?

Thanks!

[flowbox]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

I'm not a pro, but maybe this way?

http://i.imgur.com/iKAR7EU.jpg

[Tony W]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

The general cast seems to be too red/magenta. As a start (and working on your edit) you could use a curves layer and drag the red channel down as seen in the attachment. Refine as required

[Kyudos]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Thanks for this guys.

@Flowbox - can you tell me some of the things you've done with yours? You seem to have managed to retain much more detail than my heavy handed processing?

[flowbox]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

First of all, I have increased the size of the photo

I worked with clone, spot healing brush , healing brush, I have isolated the background and applied a little bit of gaussian blur, various step in camera raw with photoshop CC ... including little bit of sharpening and noise reduction

[Kyudos]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

I tried again and I'm happier with this! Thanks for the tips!

CarolineStuartSean2.jpg

[makesense]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Here's my take on it.

[Mike Needham]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

It's always a tricky area, but I would go with the original tone of the photograph. It is an old photo, it was not taken with a modern digital and would probably benefit from looking its age. The clothing says late 70's early 80's (no offence intended if the image is later!) I imagine the colouring of the image should also match the style.

[klev]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Your red channel is a bit blown, which is typical for the way mini-lab photos from this era would have aged. It's not something that can be done in one adjustment, but I would probably start this way, then make secondary corrections on the highlight areas where there are problems, and pull more red out of the hair. It still looks faded, so I would address that. The brighter clothing should have a bit more detail. Keep in mind for the really nasty compensation for bad channels, channel mixer is your friend for the first round of correction. That's all I really wanted to show here. It can cause some problems. I can see problems in the highlights around foreheads, and it didn't do enough in the hair. It's a good way to start though. I hope that helps.

[Gary]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Subjective colour correction.

[kateveber]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Subjective colour correction.

I think the background color of this image is worth matching with the persons and looks quite good.

[Gary]

Re: Can't Get The Look Right

Thank yu.

Cheers.