This photo of model/actress Shelley Boozer was taken about six months ago at the Popular Photography Digital Days model shoot in Houston.Short memory. That's what happens alot to me when it comes to postprocessing my photos. I move on to the next project or get caught up with a new technique and leave decent images sitting on a hard drive. Nothing's more satisfying to me as a photographer/retoucher than when you find that long forgotten image buried in a folder of photos taken months ago and bring it to the surface and get a printable image from it.
After a nice retouch of the eyes and skin, what really made this image pop was a Nik Silver Efex layer put into luminosity blending mode at about 60%. The Silver Efex layer? Antique Plate I. Go figure. This doesn't exactly have the appearance of "antique." But it never ceases to amaze me how creatively you can use black and white and sepiatone layers with various blending modes to impart selective glow and shadow and really give impact to an image.
This image really pops. Composition, color, detail and sharpness are good. Did you dodge and selectively boost the green eye color? Like the highlights in her hair too.
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I did a little work on the eyes, mostly making her left eye a little brighter coming out of the shadows to better match the leading eye. The antique sepia from Silver Efex did a great job highlighting the hair, also adding the vignetting at the bottom right below the shoulders.
ReplyDeleteI agree the B&W layers often add a lot of punch to color photos. I am like you I do not know exactly why, but that's one of those mysteries I can live with! Never tried luminosity mode with one but it is now on my radar.
ReplyDeleteGood pose and lighting, and of course your post-processing is outstanding. Another good photo from Mr. Steve.
I forgot to say that I checked her out on the web. She should, as well as you, be very happy with this photo. Your shot is one of the better ones I have seen of her on Model Mayhem.
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