Fix-It Friday #64 – Julie Rivera’s Contribution

Written by Julie Rivera of Julie Rivera Photography

Oh, thank you Michelle, for this beautiful image! The simple color palette of purple and green with this young lady’s flawless, fair skin makes for a timeless, treasured head shot. As this is Fix It Friday and we have to be nit-picky, I would say the focus hit right at the hairline instead of on the eyes. I also feel the image is cool, as I prefer warmer tones and I think I will play a bit with the crop after I finish editing the image. But here is where we start, with the SOOC image:

I opened it in Adobe Camera Raw and made the following adjustments:

Temperature +4, Exposure +0.25, Blacks 10, Brightness +4

Under Noise Reduction, Luminance to 54

Under Lens Correction, Vignetting to -37

Now I have this image that I start with in Photoshop CS3:

As always, I apply Totally Rad Action‘s Pro Retouch, using a 51% brush on the skin layer and a 40% brush on the eye layer. Flatten. Then use the Dodge Tool on the teeth and whites of the eyes with 28% opacity.

The focus landed on the hairline, not the eyes, so I want to soften the hair and sharpen the eyes. Go to Layer>Duplicate Layer>from Background, then go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur at 7.2 pixels. Use the Eraser Tool at 100% and erase the blurriness from her face, avoiding the hairline, as we want this to be blurry, making the eyes appear sharper. Reduce the Background Layer’s opacity to 50%. Flatten.

To sharpen the eyes, make another Duplicate Layer from Background, go to Filter>Sharpen>Unsharp Mask with settings of Amount 60, Radius 3.5. Flatten.

Now to pop the colors and bring vibrancy to this image: apply TRA‘s Oh, Snap!, reducing the Contrast layer to 50% and the overall opacity to 77%. Add TRA’s Green with Envy, brushing on the grass and dress with a 41% opacity brush. Add a curves layer and make it an S-curve, deepening the blacks and brightening the whites. Flatten.

I wanted to brighten the image even further, so I added TRA’s Claire-fy, eliminating the Tone Curve and reducing the Contrast Layer to 70% and the overall opacity to 47%. Flatten.

I felt the image would benefit from a bit of a rotation in the cropping, so I applied the Crop Tool, then rotated the crop box counterclockwise until I was pleased with the result.

I also thought this image was a great choice for a B&W conversion. I made a duplicate of my edited image above, then went to Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Black and White. When the dialogue box opened, I moved the Red to 60% and Yellow to 64%, which brightened her face. I then added TRA’s Boring Old B&W and flattened.