PORTRAIT SHOOT 2

[FUJI]

Thursday saw me in Stratford-Upon-Avon with a photographer pal....the portraits were taken in and around a Street Market....

The heat got to us both in the end ...so we packed up quite early.

 

This Classical Guitarist was wowing the crowds...he was good.....

 

FUJI

[Guest]

This comes a close second to portrait no. 1 for me.  The first of the three images has a serene almost religious feel to it, spoiled slightly though by the fact that in throwing the BG out of focus you have strayed into the edges of the subject.  Don't like the mono conversion I'm afraid.

[FUJI]

Thank you John....your feedback is very valuable,  giving me great, pause for thought, re ...Street Photography ...Backgrounds.

I foresaw the comments due on both portraits.....the half face intruding on my lovely...hat lady......and....my processed blur behind the Street Musician.....he was sitting directly in front of a busy BG  so little chance of a camera blur.

Street Portraiture can’t be confused with formal, studio Portraiture where conditions can be strictly controlled.....

My aim is the study of the ...Human Face....for both photography and my paintings.

Had I posted the musician, as shot......the very intrusive background would have drawn attention.

Cant win’em all

FUJI  

[Guest]

Fuji, what software do you use.  There are plugins and Photoshop techniques that will allow you to make very accurate selections.  I can't speak for other software.  I have been a photoshop user, man and boy.

[FUJI]

11 minutes ago, John2 said:

Fuji, what software do you use.  There are plugins and Photoshop techniques that will allow you to make very accurate selections.  I can't speak for other software.  I have been a photoshop user, man and boy.

Hi, John,

i cut my photo editing teeth using Corel/Draw-Paint 4 during the late 1980s ...but but during the last 8 years have moved fully to Photoshop CS6  AND Nik Efex plug-ins ..

I had intensive one-to one tuition from experienced users on brushes/layers/sliders/all adjustments etc....but sadly lack many of the skills to alter backgrounds, especially fir my favourite Street Portraits.....I obviously want them to remain as faithful to the original scene as possible, and background elements have a habit of intruding or leading the eye.

Each and every time, I attempt to darken/lighten or blur a background,mI can never avoid affecting the fine strands of hair they get blurred or completely obliterated.

I keep wishing that I could make a sharp-edged copy, that includes all fine curls ett to paste on to a solid, opaque or blurred background...but I have never succceeded ....but just do the best I can.

FUJI

[Hatter]

I do like the mono conversion!
However, in the close up, I find the guitar strap raises a question about what we're seeing.  The wider view answers that question.

 

[Guest]

Fuji, I have used Topaz Re Mask for a no. of years for clean cut outs but try this:

In preparation make sure that the layers panel is visible in CS6 (select "Layers" in the Windows drop down menu).

1. Select the head etc.  Probably easier to select the BG and invert the selection.  Clean up the clean edges using say the quick mask tool (or whatever your chosen method is) but don't worry too much about the hair area.  Make the selection as close as you can whilst still getting all of the hair in.

2. Cut the selection which leaves you with the BG and a hole where the figure/ guitar etc. was.  Clone in the hole to make it smaller taking care to retain continuity of any obvious lines of tone appropriately.  Necessary because when you blur the BG, the hole will increase in size and you want it to be smaller than the image you are going to paste back.

3. Blur the BG using Lens Blur or Gaussian blur, whichever looks best. (or even motion blur if that is appropriate).

4. Paste the head/guitar selection back onto the image.  The selection is now a separate layer so flatten it (right click on the layer and select from the drop down menu or select a layer and find it in the Layers drop down menu).

5. You now have basically the same image you started with except the BG is blurred and the hair line looks a bit messy because the immediate edge isn't blurred but everything outside of it is.

6. Now for the interesting part.  Duplicate the layer by right clicking on the layer in the layers panel.  You won't see any difference because both layers are identical.

7.  Set the Blending Mode to "Darken" ( Drop down box at the top of the Layers Panel).

8. Select the clone tool with a small(ish) brush and as long as you are cloning from light to dark, only the light areas of the image will accept the cloned texture.

9. Make sure that Sample "All Layers" is selected in the top tool bar of the Clone tool, then select your source area in the blurred BG as close as you can to the messy edge you want to treat, and clone over the hairline.  Because the hair is black, only the lighter bits between the hairs are filled in with the cloned BG and not the back hair itself.  Doesn't work for blonde hair and in fact has a reducing effect the more the areas to be cloned tend towards mid tones so occasionally a bit more straight forward cloning is needed to finish off but the bulk of the problem will have been sorted.

Also a useful approach for dealing with a similar problem for tree branches and incidentally, 6.through to 9. above is a useful way of quickly and easily eliminating sharpening halos.

Hope this helps.