small boy

[aladyforty]

Any Ideas for improvement welcome. I have been working on this photo on and off for 2 weeks.

[RodneyBlair]

Hello Julie,

You may get better responses on the editing forum. I'll throw a few things at you though.

You need more contrast and the image needs to be slightly darker. You can use levels, but I prefer to adjust Highlights Midtones Shadows.

Use your clone tool with with blend mode set to darken and opacity 100 to clone out what appears to be a second catchlight created by fill flash in each eye. While you have your blend mode set to darken, clone out the larger lint specs on the arm nearest the lens. When blend mode is set to darken, the clone tool only modifies pixels that are lighter than the cloned pixels. Lighten blend mode affects pixels that are darker than the cloned pixels.

Burn the sleeve nearest the lens to get it darker. Try to get the darkness to match the sleeve of the right arm (furthest the lens). Don't darken it so much that detail is lost.

When done with all other edits, run the USM filter.

Here is a quick edit for demonstration.

Rodney

[aladyforty]

Thanks Rodney, it's amazing what a little more editing can do. Ive done a little more, not quite as good as your work but getting there. Ive posted the original to show what can be done with a basic shot.



Heres the original

[RodneyBlair]

You are getting there with the edited version. The colors are nice in the original. You may want to fill it all with the yellow object for a nice color version too.

Just remember to use either lighten or darken blend mode when cloning out flaws because doing so will destroy less of the original pixel information and less likely to be detectable. Most people aren't aware of this...Even the pros. Also I'd like to remind you to never use Sharpen or Sharpen more filters because they are terribly destructive. Always sharpen using the Unsharp Mask filter. Exercise moderation when selectively sharpenin.

Rodney

[aladyforty]

Thanks Rodney, I never knew about the blending with the clone but have always used USM rather than sharpen. I once used the little sharpen tool and it wrecked a photo that I had forgot to save the original from, it was a hard lesson.