Shadow and skin tones help

[megkunert]

Hey guys,
I need some help. I've been getting into portrait photography. I am so glad I've been able to weasel my friends into taking photos of them, because otherwise I'd get no practice at all. Anyway, I took this photo last night. I am not sure where I went wrong. It was getting dark outside - the sun had set, but there was still enough light in the sky so it was still blue, but not pitch dark - does that make sense? I worded it kinda crazy. Anyway, even at 200 ISO, the pics were really light, but the shutter speed was slower (had it on aperture priority) so I wasn't sure what to do. (I know, I know, I REALLY need to learn manual mode) I am sure it was the weird lighting situation that threw me off. (btw, I shoot with a Nikon d5000 and was using an 85mm 1.4G lens)

I snapped this shot and it actually turned out really well, but the skin tones and shadows are really bugging me. Is there anything I can do in post processing to fix this? I shoot in RAW mode, so I have the original NEF if that helps.

What do you guys think?




Thanks in advance!
Meg

[edbayani]

try levels and use the middle eyedropper and click on the darkest part of the white stripe of her skirt to correct the slight reddish cast. then adjust the middle tones by moving the center slider a bit to the left.

[megkunert]

Thank you so much!

Here is the corrected image. Is to too much - does her skin look too yellow/green? What do you guys think?

edit: I also lightened and sharpened up her eyes a little bit.

[RLucas]

The second one looks much better, but it is still has an overall red color cast to my eye. Not bad, but I still noticed it.