B&W baby portraits

[sweetdeal22]

I couldnt remember if id put these on here before, but i'd love some more comments if i did (though im pretty sure i didnt)

Ian is the cuttest baby boy i've ever babysat, comments?

[Lava Lamp]

I couldnt remember if id put these on here before, but i'd love some more comments if i did (though im pretty sure i didnt)

Ian is the cuttest baby boy i've ever babysat, comments?

Cute. Especially #3. The first two could use more light in the eyes -- perhaps with fill flash. Youc an see in the second one how the camera exposed too much for the strong backlight and not enough for the child's face and eyes in particular.

[gahspidy]

I like the first picture best because of the pose and the boy looking up. The exposure on his face is better than the second shot, but I agree with LL that it still is a bit underexposed. The third shot looks ok, but I think i would have liked it better had he been looking up into the camera. A cute kid , for sure.
btw, has his parents seen your signature pic?! ;)

[noahyay]

sharpen your digitals

[sweetdeal22]

btw, has his parents seen your signature pic?! ;)

maybe that's why i dont babysit for them anymore


to be honest with you guys... i messed with the curves on those pictures (personally... i like more black and white tones [rather than greys] in my pictures). But here are the orginals

[gahspidy]

Looking at the originals, I would say you have done as good as could be with them. They were underexposed, but your curves adj. and what looks to be diffused lighting effect added has done a pretty fine job and bringing them up. Also your crops are fine.
Too bad about not sitting for the kid any more that you have a strong feeling for, it's like that with babysitting gigs. I dig the signature pic as it relates to my sentiment about the holidays. . . .well, maybe not that extreme . . . .

[sweetdeal22]

thanks Gary,
yeah, I agree... they are a bit underexposed ( :P no matter what i do to fix them), but i guess that's what you get for being in the shade on a nice sunny day. As for the adjustments part, i didnt deffuse the lighting in any way outside of adjusting the curves, but i did use the median setting found under noise (in PS CS) to soften the picture a tad.

noahyay- i dont really understand what you mean by sharpening my digitals. I had alot of noise in my pictures (especially when i changed the curves) so i did soften it a little.

Lava- maybe i should start using flash... but i do hate it alot.

[dbutler]

You can definitely fix 'em. He is precious. I did this in less than 5 minutes so it looks like crap, but I did do it in CS. Needs more work, but you can surely do it. Worth it too cause he's a real cutie!

[sweetdeal22]

what did you use? tool wise

[dbutler]

I did a couple of layers. The first layer was a dupe and screen mode. Then I did a contrast and brightening. I flattened it and felt that it could use a little more contrast so tweaked it again. I think that's all I did (I did it so fast I can't remember for sure)

[dbutler]

Oh, and I must have done some USM in there because I can't eve NOT do USM. So, I must have done it. I usually keep that at about 2 or 3 with 128-144%

[sweetdeal22]

what's USM?

[dbutler]

Unsharp Mask

[photodolphin]

I like the third one because the eyelashes are quite crisp.

tom