These are some really nice photos out of the cam. As with anything, it really falls down to personal preference on what to do with photos, or what you like. With portraits, there *are* a few basic tips that you really want to focus on though.
#1. lighting and Contrast. A good contrast really helps a portrait with depth, making areas stand out, giving it a more 3 dimensional feel. A lot of people have different methods of achieving contrast, but what I am finding to be a pretty good tool, offering a nice amount of control, is using a selective color adjustment layer and working on the blacks and neutrals in the various color channels for a stronger feel. I do it as one of the last processing steps before sharpening, to help get a little pop to the photo. It doesn't always work exactly as I'd like, but it usually tends to help a great deal. Along with contrast is your lighting.. and doing some clever levels work can really help your highlights from becoming blown out, and bring out areas of the portrait you'd like to stand out more as well.
#2. Color - You kind of have to know where you're going with a photo, but once you've made up your mind, stick with it. In my personal view, the first photo would really work well as a B&W (as justin has done), or as a desaturated work. Pedro has a really nice tutorial on a method that works really well for that kind of thing. The second photo would really look good in a semi-high contrast brightly colored look, imo, and the third portrait, as pitasman has shown, can be stunning with realtively little work.. mostly levels and contrasts to give it that rich, deep look. It's all about experimenting and discovering which photos may look the best with which methods of processing. This takes experimentation and time. Don't be afraid to try anything.
#3. Sharpness. Key in portrait photography, your subject's eyes and facial features should be sharp and clean, even with a really shallow DOF. I tend to use a mix of Smart Sharpen and USM to achieve the sharpness I want on a duplicate layer with a mask, and then mask out the sharpness where I want the photo to be softer.. using a mix of opacities. Again, it all depends on the look you want, and where you feel the photo should be.
Anyway, just some thoughts from my own experience.. I'm certainly no expert by any means, but I hope some of this can be helpful. When in doubt, practice, practice, practice.
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