Need some Portrait C&C - 1st attempt

[Twelvevoltguy]

Just wanted some general thoughts around what i could do to improve upon what i have here. No Photoshop has been applied thus far. Keep in mind I have PS Elements 5.0 ( no CS yet)

This was Taken with my Canon XTi and the 50mm 1.8 prime. I really would like to learn as much as possible from anyone willing to lend advise on how to post proccess a portrait. I am just begining to get into this, so any advise is welcomed.

Thanks!

[gmarblestone]

to me, a total novice, it seems the cropping is strange.. too much above her head perhaps?

G

[my3peas]

I think this is a great start!! She looks well exposed. maybe add a bit more warmth and contrast.

Things to watchout for:

generally, I try to keep the eyes in the top 3rd of a portrait. You have hers in the center, which leaves space above her head. Filling the frame and putting the eyes in the top part gives interest and focus on the subject.

your background is a bit busy, watchout for things that may be growing out of heads of the subject :)

nitpicking, I might have done something else with her hands. and I'd put the hair from her shoulder camera left behind her. Also, maybe not have her standing so straight forward, but angle her just a bit.

hope that helps and wasn't too harsh!

[Jake]

Hey Austin,
Nice portrait! I think you did good leaving the open space above the head. How many threads do we see saying "how can I make an 8x10 without cropping?". This photo here crops to 8x10 very well.

Here is a 8x10 crop with some sharpening, contrast, warming( a little too much warming actually) a little bit of skin smoothing and a vignette added.

[fstops]

the tighter crop looks much better. i did a quick clean-up to remove some of the distractions on the background.

[busytexan]

You cleaned up the background beautifully. I'm working on getting better. How did you do that....what tools? I could definitely use some tips.

[luis_relampago]

here is my take.

[Twelvevoltguy]

Thanks so much for all of the feedback, I love the crop, and had not even thought about the background being so distracting.

Are the edits performed here things that i can do with my everyday PSE 5.0 or would i need to upgrade to CS?

[fstops]

i used cloning tool for the clean-up. not familiar with elements. but i am assuming its has cloning tool.

[fstops]

luis- i love your color change.

[texxter]

Austin, this is a nice portrait! You got some pretty good advice on composition and post. I'd like to add a couple of points. It seems that you have an interesting background that does not quite make it as part of the "story" because it's blurred... but not blurred enough to avoid being distracting. One suggestion would be decide up front whether the portrait has a background that says something about the subject, and is part of the image, or the background is just part of the story and simply makes the subject stand out. Being in between these two positions creates the possibility for distractions.

Another idea is to consider whether this is a picture of her face, or a picture or her face and figure. The way you've shot it, it's mostly a headshot, but there is enough of her dress, figure and skin to make the viewer want a bit more from the image. For example, you show just one of her finger, not the entire hand or arm... but it you crop it too much it'd look strange. Deciding clearly what your goal with the portrait is, ahead of pressing the shutter will help. This is the time to decide on whether you want to show her frontally, or sideways, at eye leve, above or below, standing there or perhaps with some prop, expressing a certain emotion, etc.

I don't want to overwhelm you with too many considerations, but most of what makes a portrait great has to do with how well the image conveys a specific message, story or emotion - having that clearly come thru is something worth working towards!

good job!

[Duffy Pratt]

Here's my try. I don't know if what I did can be done in Elements or not. My guess is that it probably can't. I applied the Green Channel in luminosity mode at about 80%. Then switched to LAB and applied the A and B channels to themselves in overlay mode at about 28%. Then i did a high resolution, low amount sharpen on the L channel, followed by a smart sharpen of about 95 amount, .8 radius.

Duffy

[tjones0214]

Duffy, great technique. It really brought her hair to life. I've started to venture out into the LAB frontier a little bit lately. Really great for doing some detail overall sharpening on just the lightness channel and color correction for those very trickly color/luminosity situations. It may be this monitor at work, but are you seeing some banding occur on right arm and on the highlights of her chest. If so, it may be due to application of the green channel on a low-res image. If not, please just ignore me :-)

[ThePhilosopher]

My go, it may be a bit too processed for your liking.

[adirty1]

Yes some cropping would help the image as shown. I really don't think that the back ground is that distracting. Burning the background down will help a lot. I am totally drawn to the finger. More of the arms and hands might have been nice. Some thing like a 3/4 shot. I do like the railing on the right side. Helps to hold the eye in the image and the window on the left helps to trap the eye even more. The eye keeps making a journey from her arm up to the face back down the arm and then back up to the face. only thing that really takes away is that part of a hand.

good start.