My Girl is Smiling Again!!

[lissykeeper]

A few months ago, I would have been tickled pink with the original sooc shot. The exposure was descent, white balance pretty good, and focus pretty much spot on (for me anyway). But since I have become a member of dps, I have learned so many useful tools that I could resist applying to this picture. This is not a dramatic before and after, but it does show what a few simple steps can do.

Before:=========================================== ===============================After:




My process:

1. Shot in Raw!!! Yeah, Me!!!
2. Opened in Lightroom, made a few very minor exposure adjustments, saved as full size jpeg.
3. Opened in photoshop for the real magic
   
4. Ran a color punch action I wrote based on Amy-Rose's secrets.
   • Basically it consist of the following:
   • A levels layer adjustment bringing both ends in until they reach the humps
   • A very minor curves layer adjustment at low opacity
   • A saturation layer adjustment, boosting saturation to about +7
5. Ran a Eye Punch action I wrote, also based on advice from amy-rose with a few tweaks from me
   • It's really easy to do by hand, I just use it so much I wrote the simple action.
   • Duplicate Original layer
   • Sharpen Layer, I use the highpass method, but I'm sure there are other methods, until the eyes shine
   • Press Alt and click on the layer mask to mask the entire layer
   • Paint over the colored portion of the eyes with white so that the sharpened layer shows through. Be careful not to get into the white, it may look blood shot if you do.
   • Right click on layer mask and choose add masking as selection
   • Make new Layer Via Copy
   • Change the Mode of this layer to screen and adjust opacity to taste. Mine was about 70%
6. Healed on little spot on her temple
   
7. Ran Amy-Rose's skin smoothing action and adjusted the opacity's of each layer of the action to about 25%. Not sure what the steps are, but you can find it on her secrets revealed blog.
   
8. Gave it a very slight vignette (I know, I can't spell)

And that's it!! It took me about 3 min from start to finish and I really like the new version. Please feel free to tell me what you think! I don't be afraid to tell me if you notice something I did wrong or that looks off!


I wished after the fact that I would have had her take the helmet off and brushed that fly away hair, but this was just a fun snap shot while she was riding her scooter. I just loved it when I uploaded because she is actually smiling in it!

[FromtheBackofaHorse]

You made a very pretty girl simply beautiful.

[abchip]

Congrats on taking the step over to RAW! It will open many possibilities for you.

Not only is she smiling again but the PP changed a good photo into a great one.

Can't wait to see what you do next!

[lissykeeper]

thanks for you comments! I think she's beautiful too, but I may be a little biased. Thank goodness she doesn't look like me!!! LOL! And raw is wonderful!! I can't believe I waited this long.

[sarch99]

She's adorable. Just out of curiosity, though, why did you save the picture as a .jpg before editiing in Photoshop? Why not just edit as a .psd or tiff?

[SusanAshlea]

It's amazing what a few simple steps can do, isn't it? My favorite part of the after photo is how the eyes really pop. It's really nice!

[lissykeeper]

Originally Posted by sarch99

She's adorable. Just out of curiosity, though, why did you save the picture as a .jpg before editiing in Photoshop? Why not just edit as a .psd or tiff?

Well, I just started using lightroom, so I may be doing something wrong. However, when I tried to just edit in photoshop from lightroom using a tiff file, I couldn't do anything with the file in photoshop at all. It opened, but my cursor was the NO sign and none of my tools were available for selection. It may be because of my antique version of photoshop.


SusanAshlea--Thanks for the compliment. My favorite part is the eyes as well!

[simplyjoed]

Nice pictures, much nicer when you did your steps. Made a difference in color and clarity.

[sarch99]

Originally Posted by lissykeeper

It opened, but my cursor was the NO sign and none of my tools were available for selection. It may be because of my antique version of photoshop.

Just a thought - are you exporting to Photoshop as 16 bit or 8 bit? I use Elements, not Photoshop, but I know layers won't work if I open in 16 bit. I set my export preferences in Lightroom to 8 bit. No matter how you did it, the after is really nice.