Click-a-Pic Challenge #11 "Before & After: Extreme Makeover Photo Edition"

[shutterspeed]

No one, not even the professionals get it right ALL the time. Sometimes photoshoots go well, where all the images are relatively perfect and need little PP afterwards. Sometimes photoshoots don't go so well and some “tweaking” is needed to boost the image from “ok” to “wow”. During the portraits challenge I posted an example of a side-by-side of a “before & after” of a photo that came straight off my camera and one that had been photoshopped.

This week's challenge is to take a photo (either old or new) straight from your camera and then post process it to improve upon it. This may include fixing the exposure, or sharpening a somewhat blurry image. It might include enhancing the colors or airbrushing out blemishes/imperfections.

When you prepare your photo for posting, create a side by side and label each one “before” and “after”.

This challenge is meant to not only understand how to get better images straight from the camera, but if for some reason you happen to get a less than stellar image, you can do some fixing in photoshop. All is not lost.

Tips & Helpful Hints:
this article (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2325757,00.asp) has 4 relatively easy things you can do to improve your photos.

this website (http://www.digicamuser.com/basic_photo_editing.html) has a few tips like the ones i used.

there are countless blogs, websites, etc that are dedicated to giving tips or tutorials for photoshop/image editing. find something that works for you. everyone does it a little bit differently. the main thing is to expierment to see what works for you. :D

If you have any questions please feel free to post them or email me. I'm here to help.

You have from*Friday Sept 4th*to*Thursday Sept 10th*to shoot your photos for this theme. Please submit only photos taken during that time frame. Below are some examples to get the creative juices flowing. Good luck and I look forward to seeing everyones photos!

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2498/3887225044_d5b54cd554.jpg
a subtle change was needed. the original image was a little "muddy" as i like to call it. so i boosted the saturation, did some sharpening to add back detail & used an "ethereal" action to add to the "mist" effect.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2503/3818282424_88180f00c7.jpg
again, somewhat subtle changes. the biggest being that i used a curves adjustment layer to fix the "grayish" exposure. did some sharpening & brightening of the eyes & viola! image fixed!

REMEMBER:
- You may post up to 2 photos per challenge.
- Post-processing and use of actions ARE ALLOWED.
- Photos must be taken by you during the challenge week.
- Photos must be posted in the *new* PHOTOGRAPHY gallery & in this thread.
- PLEASE SIZE PICS to no larger than 600px WIDE and/or TALL.*
- Please number or title your photographs for recognition.

[Scrappie Irene]

Oh, this one is great too. So just for sure, we can choose an older photo for it?

[shutterspeed]

yes Irene, I thought that, for some, they might want to go back and take an older photo & fix it up. I know that I'll go back sometimes and re-tweak photos since my photoshop skills have improved dramatically over the last 3 yrs.

However, if you want to take a new round of photos, please do so. :)

Plus I'm hoping that for all those who've been super busy (like myself), getting to use older photos for this challenge might boost participation! :)

[birgit]

oh cool - i have millions of messed up pictures i can try to fix with your tipps :happydance:

[KirstieGai]

such a change in the photo of the sisters, from lovely to wow!

[KirstieGai]

here's mine
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/madoriginal.jpg?442

[RhiG122]

lovely edits sarah! is that lake palestine? i love the colors in that one! the one of the sisters is just awesome!!!!

kirstie, nice edit! lovely little color pop on it!

i stupidly decided i would put my camera in b&w mode....yeah, i will never do that again. i know my bg is less than even decent but eh no studio to work in just the bedrooms. thankgod for acr! i was able to fix the white balance and exposure. i also fixed the background and popped the eyes, and fixed a few blemishes....she reminds me of one of those 40's starlets! so heres mine with lots of pp!

Starlet
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/pc-cap11-starler.jpg

[shasta.hun]

Ok I think I got this down. I'm a newbie when it comes to editing pictures.

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/imageedit1.jpg
(http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6877)

[MissMint]

Great job ladies! I love seeing the before & after!

[graphicsgirl]

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6880

I'm not sure if it's going to show up here, all I see is a red x right now. My first time posting/sharing picture here. :)

trying something else...

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/pp_sample.jpg

[glumirk]

Quick question: Does the photo have to be one that I have taken, or is the requirement just that it came straight from the camera? My MIL took our wedding photos, so we have them straight from the camera and I want to try post-processing them.

[shutterspeed]

Megan I don't see why you couldn't use the wedding photos. The emphasis of this challenge is more about the post processing anyway. :D

[Scrappie Irene]

Here's mine:
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/thumbs/CaPBeforeAfter.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6883)

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j208/Silent29/Scraplayouts/CaPBeforeAfter.jpg

[RhiG122]

Sunbeams & Sweet Pea
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/pc-cap11-sunbeamsandsweetpea.jpg


Irene - he is such a cutie!!!!! that pic is absolutely adorable!

[nina81]

This one was fun!!! I took this picture exactly 2 years ago at the wedding of a good friend of mine! She asked me if I could be her wedding photogrpher, because they wanted to have someone who knew them....I was afraid but said yes! We took some really nice pictures and I was happy all went well! But this one was definetly an outtake!!! This background was just terrible....so I didn´t even considered to put it in their photobook ( which was my present for them)
Today-2 years later- my abilities in photoshop are a bit better and I really like what came out here!!
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6888
http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/8117/beforeaftery.jpg (http://img5.imageshack.us/i/beforeaftery.jpg/)

[birgit]

hmmm.... i never like my pictures after PP - i just don't see if it's still natural, too much or not enough.

the picture was taken with my mobile... i tried to reduce noise but then i thought the change was making the eyes too dark again and all the snow came out grey so i didn't do it in the end.

PP really is not my favourite thing to do! maybe i should take a class, the problem is that i just try to do something - without having a clue of what i am doing really :-)

anyway, here is my little snowman before and after:

http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/5466/snowmanxa.jpg (http://img196.imageshack.us/i/snowmanxa.jpg/)

[MissMint]

Y'know what I just thought of that BEST pp EVER!!!
Anyone remember when Irene fixed that picture for Megan (glumirk?)

Gosh I have to find that thread...that was genius!

[MissMint]

Here it IS!!!!

Poor Megan had this awesome pic that got messed up when it was transferred from her camera. We all thought it was lost till Irene came to the rescue and fixed it...miraculously!

BEFORE (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/showpost.php?p=10593&postcount=1) & AFTER (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/showpost.php?p=10781&postcount=24)

[glumirk]

Here it IS!!!!

Poor Megan had this awesome pic that got messed up when it was transferred from her camera. We all thought it was lost till Irene came to the rescue and fixed it...miraculously!

BEFORE (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/showpost.php?p=10593&postcount=1) & AFTER (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/showpost.php?p=10781&postcount=24)


I vote Irene wins! :cheer: She is absolutely amazing!

[shutterspeed]

wow Irene! amazing save on that photo. you did an excellent job restoring the pic! :D

[Scrappie Irene]

OMG, I totally forgot about that before/after project!

Unfortunately my computer crashed, so let's see if it's still in Photobucket...... tick tack tick tack, hmmmm, only the corrected photo.

I have to copy the original from the forum and will make a before/after image.

[Scrappie Irene]

Ok, here it is:

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j208/Silent29/Scraplayouts/C-a-Pbeforeafter.jpg

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/thumbs/C-a-Pbeforeafter.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6910)

I cloned away the line and the electrical cables in the background.
I copied the good eye, turned it horizontally and pasted it in the corrupted eye with a little bit of erasing, fixing and copying.

[birgit]

ok. you win!

:noidea:

:teehee:

[originalcher1]

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/before_and_after_small.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6916)

For some reason I have had no luck with photos lately, my camera is taking incredibly dark photos. I have tried everything I know how to make them lighter and to no avail. From what I an gather this is an inherent problem with the Canon camera. I usually shoot in AV mode, with my ISO adjusted to 100-1600 depending on the light; I use the white balance settings also dependent on the light and lastly I now take everything 2 f-stops lighter and I get okay results. Is it just me though or is there something I am doing wrong- gack!:noidea:

[shutterspeed]

Cher I too have trouble with my photos coming out too dark. So especially for photoshoots I shoot in manual and set it so that it over exposes slightly. (at least an Fstop sometimes 2, just like you).

I think your "after" photo is perfectly corrected!! :) And great shot btw!!

[hsteward90]

Here is Mine :)


http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/heeaaather.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6919)


****fixed :D

[MissMint]

**Heather when you post your HTML code delete the /thumbs part**

Here are my entires for this week!

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/missmint_cappp.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6921)


Think I could have gone with a silhouette effect on this one - how do you post process that look???

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/missmint_cappp2.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6922)

[shutterspeed]

i think techniques can vary depending on the type of photo you're wanting to silhouette...

however for this particular photo (the beach one), i would use the magic wand tool or the lasso tool and select the jumpers (carefully selecting them as you don't want too much surrounding scene to become dark). then i'd probably use the burn tool (100%) and burn over the people jumping. i would use curves to adjust the exposure for the water/sky, so it was lighter. (do all of this in different layers so you can change it as needed and then merge them to get the finished photo when done.)

this is what i got doing the above very quickly. i wasn't being careful with the lasso tool so some of the background got selected but you get the idea....
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2439/3906122145_e615e8ace1_o.jpg

or if you like that they're faces/bodies are lighten but you wanna darken the background (because it became overexposed when trying to lighten the people) you can do the exact opposite of the above and darken the reverse like this:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2443/3906919910_dac1128cc8_o.jpg
again this was done very quickly & i wasn't taking my time to be more precise with the selecting. :D

you could also achieve this using layer masks, but my knowledge of those is sketchy at best. so i'm not sure i could be very helpful there. anyone else good with layer masks? :) my problem is i never know if i should change the layer blending option & what to change it to when it comes to this kind of stuff. i'm sure my techniques are very back woods! :D

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2666/3906150669_ebb74221f0_m.jpg http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3485/3906149687_d86119e59b_m.jpg

ehhh it's not the greatest work i've ever done, but maybe you get the idea! :teehee:

[tulip918]

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/grandpa_edit_Small_.jpg (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/../gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6928)

http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6928 (http://www.peppermintcreative.com/forum/../gallery/showphoto.php?photo=6928)http://picasaweb.google.com/fivetulips/ScrapbookPages#5379838123358830786

I figured out how to link it..... it's huge! I'm learning, It will take some time.

http://picasaweb.google.com/fivetulips/Fivetulips5Tulps?authkey=Gv1sRgCN6LpYjgh6KNDw#5379 837651386545426

I really like the idea of learning to improve my photos. Here's a photo of my grandfather and my kids. This photo was taken last week. It's so precious to me because he turns 95 on the 20th of Sept. He has been a huge part of my life. I am not sure that I did not make the photo a little too red..... but I thought the original was a little washed out. I cropped the photo and used the levels slider to darken it up.

Thanks Rosalie
I can't seem to get the photo attached to this message. I am not sure what I am doing wrong. Here's the link in my picasa web album.

Enjoying Grandpa (http://picasaweb.google.com/fivetulips/ScrapbookPages#5379838123358830786)
http://picasaweb.google.com/fivetulips/Fivetulips5Tulps?authkey=Gv1sRgCN6LpYjgh6KNDw#

[MissMint]

Oh Sarah I like the one where the faces are lightened and you darkened the background a bit - that looks more balanced. Thanks for the suggestion!

*Rosalie - your code looks right, not sure why it won't show up! Post in our gallery and link from there.* ..what a great picture!

[shutterspeed]

haha, yeah i think i missed a step with the photo where i was trying to silhouette them. it looks...odd to me. *sigh* i shall try and research further to see if there's a better, more natural way to do it. what's funny is that whenever i'm shooting into the sun i almost always inevitably end up silhouetting the foreground whether i mean to or not! :teehee:

i'm so much better at lightening photos than darkening them! :D

and Rosalie what a precious photo to have of your children with your grandfather!! (if you think your after photo is too red, i suggest doing a color balance on it to lessen the redness!) :)

[RhiG122]

what great pics this week!

sarah, i am glad i am not you! its going to be hard picking!!

as for layer masks...i will post a tut on them a little later. i spent days trying to figure those suckers out and finally i know what i am doing with them. i use them to fix blowouts, lighten here or darken there. very helpful!

thanks for the silhouette tips too!

[cindys732003]

wow, awesome befores and afters everyone,.....great photos this week!
Here's what I came up with, this was taken at the zoo a couple of weeks ago:
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/CAP11challengeweb.jpg

[shutterspeed]

i'm lovin' all the entries and participation this past week. i've got my work cut out for me trying to pick a "winner". excellent job everyone!! :smug:

[shutterspeed]

*phew* well after considering all the entries i think i've got it narrowed down. but you ladies made it hard!!

i'd like to wish a BIG CONGRATS to:

ScrappieIrene "Megan's photo fix"
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/C-a-Pbeforeafter.jpg
i've gotta give props to such fantastic work. i'm not sure i could've done so well to save this photo! BRAVO! :clap:

Honorable Mentions:

OriginalCher1 "Ferris Wheel"
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/before_and_after_small.jpg
you took a dark underexposed photo and made it perfect. :)


Graphicsgirl "Boy in a helmet"
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/pp_sample.jpg
the after photo is such a transformation.


hsteward90 "Monument"
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/heeaaather.jpg
the blue of the sky in the after is spectacular!


Mint Chick Mention:

Cindy's "Girl in a Hat"
http://www.peppermintcreative.com/gallery/data/506/CAP11challengeweb.jpg
the eyes really pop & match the dress she's wearing. beautiful!! :)

and a BIG WELCOME to all the new players this week. glad to see some new "faces" participating!! :) thanks ladies for another great challenge!! check out CAP #12! :)

[MissMint]

Way to go everyone! Congrats Irene!

[RhiG122]

congrats irene!

such wonderful transformations!!

[Scrappie Irene]

Thank you so much!!!!
And I still can't imagine why I forgot about this fix.

[glumirk]

Hooray! Congrats Irene! :cheer: I'm sad I didn't make it to participate. All of the grandparents are here this weekend and this is the first time I've touched the computer in a long time. Great work everybody!

[hsteward90]

congrats!! yours was great!! :happydance:

[birgit]

i was just working on my last page of kimi's book - i really didn't like that guy walking through the picture - although i know in the layout he'd be so tiny and nobody will notice the difference... anyway, i played a little bit with the picture and wanted to show you the result! i know it's not perfect - i'm just too lazy to really do it properly :smug:

[/URL][URL="http://img200.imageshack.us/i/beforeafterj.jpg/"]http://img200.imageshack.us/img200/4963/beforeafterj.jpg (http://www.mypicx.com/09172009/hupa/)