Which Path To follow - DPChallenge Forums

Pentax DA 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 AF

05/12/2004 12:31:27 AM · #1

Hi, I shot a great Portrait of my grand father, i did lot of retouching, i.e removing wrinkles, etc and than i made skin smooth by creating a layer and and doing selecting gaussian blur. Result is great.
Now i want to convert into BW, but after having done all this retouching i find skin to have become too soft, so was confused should i simply convert my retouched portrait or i should start from scratch i.e convert coloured portrait in to B/W and than do all the retouching

faidoi

Pentax K10D

05/12/2004 12:36:49 AM · #2

The coolest thing about taking pictures of older people are the wrinkles, gives a sense of hardship, etc.

Canon 12x IS USM (S3 IS built-in Lens) -- 36-432mm (35mm EQ)

05/12/2004 12:43:46 AM · #3

Ya it is but i read this great tutorial on retouching that that i had to do.
I did extensive digital skin graftting and now i look like his grand father and he looks like my grandson.

It was really great fun to finally start getting hang of PS, only negative point is that you are tempted to over do it

TooCool

Canon EOS-300D Rebel

Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II

05/12/2004 01:14:31 AM · #4

Originally posted by General:

Save it, do it the other way around, see which one ya like better! Best thing about digital, ya ain't confined to a one time processing!

GeneralE

Canon PowerShot S3 IS

05/12/2004 02:52:47 AM · #5

Probably the only significant gain in converting to grayscale first is speed (handling 1/3 the amount of data). Weighed against the risk of liking the color better and having to do it over a third time, I would just keep working in color.

At any time you can check you progress by adding a (temporary) adjustment layer with the Channel Mixer in monochrome, or just switch your monitor to 256 grays, and see how it looks in grayscale, while continuing to work in color.

KarenB

Canon EOS-70D

Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM

05/12/2004 07:54:34 AM · #6

can you post a before and after in this thread?
would like to see what you mean before I comment.

EddyG

Canon EOS-1D Mark II

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

05/12/2004 08:34:53 AM · #7

Originally posted by General:

Now i want to convert into BW, but after having done all this retouching i find skin to have become too soft

You could try putting the original version on a new layer, add a Channel Mixer adjustment layer above them both, and then vary the opacity of the "original layer" to add back some of the detail that you retouched out.

KarenB

Canon EOS-70D

Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM

05/12/2004 08:38:08 AM · #8

Originally posted by EddyG:

Originally posted by General:
Now i want to convert into BW, but after having done all this retouching i find skin to have become too soft

You could try putting the original version on a new layer, add a Channel Mixer adjustment layer above them both, and then vary the opacity of the "original layer" to add back some of the detail that you retouched out.

cool idea!

General, can you post "before", "during", and "after"? :P

05/12/2004 10:42:25 AM · #9

I will upload pictures asap, fotopic.net is not allowing uploading new picture.