Postprocessing help

[rbrugman]

I think that I finally may be one with my D80. After taking hundreds of terrible pictures, I had one portrait turn out good. I was just looking for any suggestions for taking this picture from good to great. I have the raw file, but I actually like the JPEG that came out of the camera better. Any input is appriciated!

Thanks fellow dgriners!

Robert

[ChrisKraftPhoto]

??? I'd hesitate to do anything with the colors as the red against the white ice is kinda striking:

http://borracho-advr.smugmug.com/photos/243345618-L.jpg

[RogersDA]

I think that I finally may be one with my D80. After taking hundreds of terrible pictures, I had one portrait turn out good. I was just looking for any suggestions for taking this picture from good to great. I have the raw file, but I actually like the JPEG that came out of the camera better. Any input is appriciated!

Thanks fellow dgriners!

Robert
Reduce the grey of the ice. Lighten the eyes. Remove some of the red tone on the face.
http://darphotos.smugmug.com/photos/243350311-L.jpg

[MarkR]

I have the raw file, but I actually like the JPEG that came out of the camera better. Any input is appriciated!

Thanks fellow dgriners!

Robert

Just to be clear, are you saying that the default rendering of the raw file was less pleasing than the jpeg, or that you were not able to to tweak your raw to get the same pleasing image as your jpeg?

Also, what raw converter are you using?

EDIT: It is a heck of a nice picture! :thumb

[pyrtek]

http://bertold.zenfolio.com/img/v3/p429720703.jpg

[leaforte]

Can't help with PP, but I like it!

[rbrugman]

Just to be clear, are you saying that the default rendering of the raw file was less pleasing than the jpeg, or that you were not able to to tweak your raw to get the same pleasing image as your jpeg?

Also, what raw converter are you using?

EDIT: It is a heck of a nice picture! :thumb

I'm using photoshop CS2 with the lastest ACR that's available for CS2. When I open the RAW I just don't get the color that I have with the JPEG. I think the problem is that I don't know how to use photoshop to do things such as reduce the gray of the ice, lighten the eyes, etc as recommended. My photoshop book should be here this week though and then maybe I can figure it out.

I really do like the red against the ice. The saturdation of the red came out great. Having absolutely no eye for art (I'm a Finance major for a reason :wink), I don't just know what makes for good portrait composition, color or style.

[MarkR]

I'm using photoshop CS2 with the lastest ACR that's available for CS2. When I open the RAW I just don't get the color that I have with the JPEG. I think the problem is that I don't know how to use photoshop to do things such as reduce the gray of the ice, lighten the eyes, etc as recommended. My photoshop book should be here this week though and then maybe I can figure it out.

I really do like the red against the ice. The saturdation of the red came out great. Having absolutely no eye for art (I'm a Finance major for a reason :wink), I don't just know what makes for good portrait composition, color or style.

I think that your camera adds a fairly strong contrast curve when it renders its jpegs. ACR 3.x is probably showing you a linear curve --no contrast applied. You might try going to the "Curves" tab in ACR and trying some of the drop-down curve menus to see if that gets the image closer to (or even better than) the jpeg.