02.29.08
The hunger to improve
The Story
When it comes to photography, I prefer to play with the resulting image instead of getting a good picture right out of the camera. Part of the reason is because my camera is very grainy and the other part is because I am still not very good at controlling lighting. Lack of equipments also played into my problems with lighting. There were numerous times when I was tempted to go out and buy a new camera, but I held back because I understand that I haven’t explored the current camera’s full potential yet.
I’ve been acquiring Photoshop techniques here and there and using them on selected pictures, however I’ve never tried to apply all the techniques on the same picture before because I simply have too many pictures to touch up. Besides, I haven’t taken anything that’s worthy of such dedication. That is, until I took this shot. I’ve basically been ignoring the rest of the pictures from the photo shoot and concentrated on this one out of some weird determination. I wanted to create a metallic-reflective skin with a kind of monochrome off color like image. Something to convey roughness and beauty at the same time.
The roughness is achieved through different layers of color adjustments and focus is placed through an accidental spotlight effect from using flash. I would’ve wasted a few minutes to apply the effect in Photoshop if it didn’t occur naturally.
Original
Alex, who used to coordinate models back in Romania, has a knack for setting up the shot and composing the pose. I have to admit, that without her insight and her taste in clothing, this picture wouldn’t have come out as well as it should. I simply angled the camera and adjusted the flash…
Experimental
Still uncomfortable with color, I decided not to include the results from the final stages. I also struggled (and failed) with the technique needed to properly extract hair in order to compose the image into what I had imagined in my head. Makeups, hair extraction, fantasy like bright colors are all techniques that I am not familiar with until I made my attempt this time.
There comes a point when an artist need to stop working on an image. In the creator’s eye, it might not be perfect, but in reality, not many sees it that way. Which is why I decided not to present the image in its final form. In my opinion, the colors don’t match as well and the balance is broken because of my stubbornness. I wanted to present the hair, the lipstick, the eye. Yet I find that when those are enhanced, it takes the focus away from Alex herself which should be the most important part of this picture. I only wish that I can be good enough one day to present the final image that is well balanced. Either way, it is too much of a waste to throw it away so I decided to showcases it here:
Jeff said,
February 29, 2008 at 10:22 am
That first picture came out really well…I couldn’t believe that it was from the original. I’d say you should go buy a new camera. You’re probably being limited by it already, even if you haven’t explored it to it’s full potential.
Causalien said,
March 2, 2008 at 11:01 pm
Jeff: Coming from you I can safely take that as a fact. However, monetary constraints is holding me back. I also think that this is actually good, because I wouldn’t work as hard at finding ways to improve an image if I had a good camera to begin with.
Jeff said,
March 3, 2008 at 10:15 am
Good point. I learned my Photoshoppery from working with a bad camera.
A study in the imperfection effect said,
June 29, 2008 at 9:18 pm
[...] So far, I’ve only used photoshop to improve images. Meaning, smoothing out the skin, improving the colors and sharpening the lines if needed. Resulting only to special effects when a picture is irrecoverable. Which is why it was weird to see artists who focuses on the exact opposite. I am talking about people who deliberately highlight unevennes of the skin, add grain effects to the picture and turn everything into dual colored grayscale images. To my surprise, the end result is stunning when done right. When you strip the picture of all the distraction and present just the nitty gritty of imperfection, there’s a whole new level of beauty. This is my first attmpt from a 810×540 picture off flickr, it is far from the intended result, but is already a great improvement over my last attempt. [...]
UltraCrepidate » Photoshop food illustration 1 said,
June 6, 2009 at 8:27 pm
[...] my skill improve, the type of modification I do to pictures are more subtle instead outer-worldly. Unlike the retouched pictures of models in magasins, my style is moving towards enhancing the [...]