Retouching critique, have i gone overboard?

[voidsource]

So i recently made a retouch image, out of a random online image, this time it was a fellow guy in some garden. Here is the link of the before and after:

Bald man retouched

a few people have told me that he's too shiny, but I am kinda going for a look as if he had lamps on the sides of him and maybe one in front to give him some kinda lights and darks into him. I understand that they aren't that many to begin with, but its something i did just as a learning process for me. So with a few feedback that i got from people, whom are just friends, I decided to make a new version with less glow/shine to it. I would like to get advice from fellow retouchers and kinda help me out with this one on do's and dont's and any tips for when retouching.


less shine version

thanks in advance.

[spinq]

Re: Retouching critique, have i gone overboard?

Depends on the efect you wanted to achive. I use dodge and burn to imitate the specific lighting i wanted to have but didnt, or to enchance the lighting i had. And of course to clean the skin.

My first impression of retouched version is that you tried to imitate the bare bulb directly on the camera, which is not the best way to light a person. Suggestion: add some light to the forehead and below the eyes, darken the chickbones and the neck and area below the nose.

I would darken the eyes a bit. They look unnatural. Another thing. The skin colour could use some work. You got some discoloration on the hair. Especialy on the right side. Try to reduce the saturation in this part.

I really like the way you cut him out. Must have been quite difficult on this background

[voidsource]

Re: Retouching critique, have i gone overboard?

thanks for replying sping. I was aiming for something of a look similar to what i have seen where they use lights and darks a to bring out a nice contrast to the person. the closest image i can find online to it would be something like this:
example

and yes after googling what bare bulb photography looks like, thats what i was aiming for. When u say add some light below the eyes, do u mean below the iris, or by the eyebags?

as for the masking out i made a duplicate of the bkg layer, invert it, then used B&W adj. layer to make it b&W so i can select the bkg colours and make them black. gives me a pretty clear images of the guy in white, the bkg in black, and then i just masked out around the hair. Been reading a lot about the different methods to mask someone out. the more harder to find ones, are such a great help.

anywho thanks for the reply. I will make some changes when i can and then ill repost to see what you think and others think.