Heather Maternity

[roostabunny]

Hey all, been off the forums for a bit and was starting to miss it. Google+ is a great place to talk about images, but I haven't yet found a group there that consistently does critique as well as it's done here.

So, vital stats:
50mm
1/80
f/2.8
400 ISO



Two questions:

1.) I loved the light, though after the fact I wish I'd had my assistant reflect some fill on the shadow side. The detail is there in the RAW file, but in order to get enough contrast for me I loose quite a bit of shadow detail. Does it work as-is? Any tips to improves that aspect without adding a bunch of noise?

2.) Not a lot of color - does she disappear too much? I darkened the background some to help with that. It did help her separate from the background a little better, but I'm not sure it was enough.

Thanks in advance for any feedback, and of course, I'm always open to critique outside the bounds of my questions - composition, posing, whatever!

[katia]

i hope you don't mind, but i had a very quick little play with your image and brightened up the right side a bit. this is by no means a good job of doing it, (i spent like a minute haha) just showing you that it can be done.

overall i like the image, but i find her expression is a little bit forced. and BELIEVE ME if i had any tips for you on correcting that, i would share :P i really struggle with relaxing models and getting them to act naturally, i guess it comes with practice.

she has such a cute little baby bump!

[roostabunny]

Originally Posted by katia

i hope you don't mind, but i had a very quick little play with your image and brightened up the right side a bit. this is by no means a good job of doing it, (i spent like a minute haha) just showing you that it can be done.

overall i like the image, but i find her expression is a little bit forced. and BELIEVE ME if i had any tips for you on correcting that, i would share :P i really struggle with relaxing models and getting them to act naturally, i guess it comes with practice.

she has such a cute little baby bump!

Oy, relaxed-ness is a struggle! Thank you for saying that. My wife/shoot director/assistant is my secret weapon, but Heather's a tough nut. A lovely tough nut, but self conscious in front of the camera. So it goes. Definitely something we're working on individually and as a team, because it's obviously a big factor.

I can see some difference between the edits (and I don't mind at all, BTW ) , but haven't had time yet to try to see them side by side. What was your method?

[katia]

opened in PS and used a Curves adjustment layer to brighten the whole image, then "inverted" the layer (look up tutorials for non-destructive burning and dodging for a better explanation) and painted the layer back up in a soft brush wherever it needed lightening.

like i said i just did it very sloppily and quickly, i'm sure you could get much better results if you spent more time on it.

[roostabunny]

Originally Posted by katia

opened in PS and used a Curves adjustment layer to brighten the whole image, then "inverted" the layer (look up tutorials for non-destructive burning and dodging for a better explanation) and painted the layer back up in a soft brush wherever it needed lightening.

like i said i just did it very sloppily and quickly, i'm sure you could get much better results if you spent more time on it.

Thanks, Katia, really appreciate your help! I think I can do that "invert layer" thing in the GIMP with what GIMP calls a Layer Mask.

[eblyth00]

if you have the raw file the easiest thing to do is use the raw file to create two conversions one with the correct overall exposure and the other with a brighter exposure for filling in the details. open both as different layers in a gimp file. Place the brighter exposure ontop of the corect exposure layer. Next Place a Layer Mask on your top layer (the bright one) and make sure it is filled with black, the image should appear just like you rendered your correct exposure. now with a white brush select a low opacity and brush in the brightness from your top layer where it needs it and it will keep your shadows where you want them for your contrast.

[katia]

i find it to be much easier to just use a curves adjustment layer as opposed to fiddling around with 2 different versions of the photo

[eblyth00]

Your right it is easier, but for best results using two copies (both made from the raw file) gives best results. When you convert a raw file to a jpeg you are losing tons of data (especially in the light and dark areas of the photo). Now generally this is not an issue if you are not making large adjustments but the image degradation is there.

[katia]

But why not just use an adjustment layer on the RAW file in photoshop? I never edit jpegs

[eblyth00]

when you open up a raw file it will open into adobe camera raw which is adobe's raw conversion software. What changes you make there will create your jpeg whitch opens in photoshop so by the time you are in photoshop it is actually a jpeg you are working with.