Maisie

[rutt]

This is my niece, Maisie. She's turning into one of my favorite subjects, though she is very hard to hunt down.

Taken at my sister's birthday party. The final frontier, event photography.

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20333432-L.jpg

[Khaos]

Beautiful girl and shot of her, but I wish the other head wasn't in the shot. Ain't that the thing though? Candids are hard some times.

[rutt]

Beautiful girl and shot of her, but I wish the other head wasn't in the shot. Ain't that the thing though? Candids are hard some times.

It's her mother. I debated cropping, etc. But decided to leave well enough alone.

[Andy]

rutt - she is gorgeous and it's a lovely candid. i think you need to get some color into this girl though! i'm not going to advise how, though i can say that the pic seems a bit (bit!) washed color-wise. would love to see come redder lips too :D

[bfjr]

It's a good shot. Eyes and complexion really nice :thumb
The overall look makes me a little tense, but then again I've come back a couple times to look, so thats real good too :thumb
IMO maybe a real tight crop might work :dunno, might make it even more tense :scratch:uhoh

[rutt]

OK, you guys talked me into playing with it some more. This picture has an interesting feature, no real highlight. So perhaps I overexposed the raw conversion in an effort to spread the right end of the histogram.

Here is a darker conversion:

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372080-M.jpg

Took to LAB and steepend the L curve through the highlights and high midtones to bring out skin detail (maybe wouldn't do this with an adult woman) and again in the low midtones and shadows to bring out detail in her eye.

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372092-M.jpg

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372214-S.jpg

Added saturation by steepening the A+B curves symmetrically:

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372121-M.jpg

Finally, cropped and did a little cloning to isolate her from her mother (more easily done in PS than real life.)

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372979-L.jpg

Each step got sharpening, but that hair takes a real light touch, perhaps I overdid. The originals are availalbe, take a look if you like.

Comments?

[bfjr]

Top notch Job :thumb :thumb :thumb
IMO very compelling portrait :clap

[Andy]

coloring looks to me much better, john!

[lynnma]

Thats beautiful Rutt.. I really love it without the second figure in there.. even if she was the mom... beautiful texture and color and no I don't think you oversharpened anywhere.. congrats.. it's lovely :clap :clap :clap

[GREAPER]

Great shot Rutt, perfectly improved.

[USAIR]

Great photos
Beautiful:thumb

Thanks
Fred

[ginger_55]

I love it, though I guess I also like anemic photos of kids. A touch of pink in the lips, etc. From high key to low key, smile.

I certainly do love the finished product, here..............except the upper left corner bothers me. Does it bother you? It looks me me like you were trying to keep the hair.......the easy way.

g

[pathfinder]

Very nice, John. I agree that photographically speaking her mother had to go. I thinkthe increased color saturation was helpful also. Very nice.

[david_h]

Very nice work. I appreciate that you are sharing your LAB colour techniques with us.
You've opened my imagination to how I can improve some of my own work. Being pretty new to digital, I learn something new about using PS everyday.

[coldclimb]

Oh man Rutt, that last one is awesome! Taking out the other face made it a LOT better. Makes me ALMOST wish I had a little kid or two around to take pics of. :D Too bad though, my sister and neice live thousands of miles away. :dunno

[Phil U.]

Finally, cropped and did a little cloning to isolate her from her mother (more easily done in PS than real life.)

http://rutt.smugmug.com/photos/20372979-L.jpg

Each step got sharpening, but that hair takes a real light touch, perhaps I overdid. The originals are availalbe, take a look if you like.

Comments?

There ya go Rutt - you took a shot with potential and brought it to reality. :clap

(what's with the blue line at the top of the image though? :dunno )

[rutt]

Thank you everyone. I appreciate the feedback, especially the early feedback from Andy and Khaos which led me to improve the color and crop and clone away the other face.

[Angelo]

what a beautiful little girl!

[mereimage]

Perhaps just a slight Gaussian blur to cheeks and forehead feathered of via a layer mask to give her an even creamier glow to her skin. Not a critisism since its already better than I can do. I enjoy your work and insights and have fun following yours and pathfinders discussions////Mereimage

[rutt]

Perhaps just a slight Gaussian blur to cheeks and forehead feathered of via a layer mask to give her an even creamier glow to her skin. Not a critisism since its already better than I can do. I enjoy your work and insights and have fun following yours and pathfinders discussions////Mereimage

Thanks. Criticism, feedback, suggestions are always welcome. Gaussian blur isn't really in my bag of tricks, but I've been thinking I should explore it more.

[rutt]

(what's with the blue line at the top of the image though? :dunno )

A cropping blunder. I cought it before I read your comment. Why does PS make this so easy to do?