What Would You Do (#67)

[k9mom]

Nathan, I vote for the "fun" version. Hilarious and yet, artistic. Made me laugh

[baldmountain]

Exact steps are hard because I tend to "twiddle the knobs" in Aperture until I like it. I started by raising the exposure and black point. I added a little saturation and vibrancy. But just a little. I changed the color temp and tint and I'm a little worried I may have added a bit of a green cast. I used the repair tool to remove some of the red V in the base of the bottom teeth. I also used it to remove the highlights on the teeth since they are overwhelming. I cropped the image just a little to remove the logo and distracting hand in the lower right corner.

If I owned Photoshop I might have tried the editing tips from the blog to make the eyes look a little whiter.

[cin]

I tend to think that if color doesn't bring anything to a photo then it's not needed, so I went black and white.

- Level mixer with the orange filter preset to make it black and white
- Level adjustment to correct exposure, brightness and contrast
- Contrast/Brightness adjustment to tweak the brightness some more
- Slight white wash vignette to tone down the background contrast and bring the attention to the face

[falafelicious]

What I would do...

[zespri]

Hi Sela

During the last 'what would you do' challenge I found a tutorial which addresses exactly what you had problems with, isolating the wispy bits of hair. It's a really easy tutorial to do, so wanted to share it with you as the results are very pleasing

http://av.adobe.com/russellbrown/Stroked_Extract_SM.mov

Originally Posted by Sela

This baby is so cute I wanted to see him next to something else almost as cute...kittens! I stuck in a gradient background that looks kind of cheesy I know. And I couldn't get the hair 'isolated' just right unless I spent a loooong time on it, but there's my take on it.

[Teewinot]

Sela,

Cute + more cute = REALLY CUTE! Very creative...I love your idea here.

[SaraJane]

I thought it was so cute and he looked like a little doll!! So I thought I'd make him look even more like a doll.
Using PSP X2- adjusted sharpness, used skin smoothing, whitened eyes. In another layer put on some colour for rosy cheeks and blended. Then erased the background and put a black background. Did some burning on the shirt. And also converted to black and white.

[Sela]

Thanks so much for the tip on isolating hair, I will check that out!

Very nice adjustments from everyone, it is really interesting to see what others think of doing with a photo.

[FrankenPengie]

From DPS Assignmets et al....

Tried to note steps as I went along. I know I could do better but:

Dup layer
Smart sharpen: Amount 75, Radius 2.0
Dup layer
Smart blur: Radius 9, Amount 12
Layer opacity: 50?
Some cosmetics over the upper lip with a lightening brush using the lightest cheek color.
Levels adjustment
Color Balance: Midtones -20 Cyan/Red; -50 Magenta/Green
Merge down:
Dup layer, Set to Overlay
High pass filter at @50
Then gaussian blur at @ 30
Layer Opacity %15
Flatten image
Color burn shirt lightly with black brush
Brightness +35, Contrast -45

[Katydidit]

My first time here and saw this cute kid. Hope this uploads.
Here are my steps...
Adjustment Levels
Color balance
Always Flatten as I go to next step
Add Nik brillance 55%/warmth filter 55%
Marquee & Level down bottom teeth
For Eyes add layer, opacity 60%, add color
Add white dot highlight on new layer
Add soft white to area on right side of eye
Soften neckline with healing brsuh
Guassian Blur 20%, layer opacity 30%, then erase back sharpness in detail areas (eyes,nose)
Soften glaring white spots in mouth using healing brush
Dodge whites of eyes slightly to brighten
Brighten over eyes, nose and mouth area with fill filter
Go to Adjustment Selective color, Neutral, add +7 to get better contrast
Duplicate layer, use Lucis art filter,Sculpture 11, 2 Mix 6 soft overlay mode, flatten
Duplicate layer, transform layer inward, add Stroke & drop shadow
Go back to Bkgd layer and unlock it, blur it with radial blur
Use levels adj and lighten bkgd with center slider to left
Flatten
Duplicate layer add Lucis At filter again same settings as prior with
20% opacity on layer mode
flatten