Gini's Magic - Photo Enhancement, Graphic Arts Tutorials

Portrait Enhancement - Major Shadow Removal and Skin Smoothing

2008-07-22T21:37:00.000-07:00

This photo was taken by a friend of the bride, not a professional photographer. Overall, It is a beautiful picture. The problem: It was obviously shot in the early to mid afternoon, when the sun was high and shining directly down on the bride; causing dramatic shadows and hiding her beautiful blue eyes.

The details of what I corrected included lots of detail work around the eyes, lightening shadows on the neck and chest, adding shiny highlights to each jewel on the tiara and each pearl, and a bunch of dodging and burning on the lace of the dress.

Because there were both extreme shadows and extreme highlights on her face and chest, I had quite a time coming up with the nice, smooth, light skin you see in the finished image.

Here are the basic steps I took using Adobe Photoshop Elements after I had done major work on regaining the details around her eyes:

1. I selected all of the skin on her face and neck and right clicked on it, choosing "Layer via copy".

2. I selected the eraser tool with a soft brush and a pressure of 10% and, making sure that I was working on the copied layer, I ran the eraser over major facial features: eyes, outline of the nose and nostrils, mouth, jawline, and any major lines and dimples.

3. I went to the "Filters" menu, clicked on noise, and chose "Median" I increase the median until the skin looked overly smooth, to where the face looked more like a blurry painting than a photo.

4. I turned the Opacity of the Copied layer down to 50%, which created a much nicer, smoother skin and less extreme shadows to work with. Even so, it wasn't exactly right.

5. I chose a few places that still had shadows and highlights which needed to be smoothed. I selected and use the Gaussian Blur filter to smooth each one individually.

6. I now had a smooth skin to work with, but it still had tons of shadows to get rid of. So I went into "Enhance", "Adjust Lighting", and then chose "Shadows/Highlights" I ran the "Lighten Shadows" bar as far as possible, to 100. I did this several times over until I was satisfied with the result.

7. After this it was mostly small detail work. I repeated a similar process on the lips and chest. I whitened her teeth, and did a bit more detail work on her eyes, dress, pearls, and tiara.

Safely Upgrading RAM for Graphic Artists and Other Computer Lovers

2008-07-13T18:20:00.000-07:00

Adding extra memory to your computer will keep it running smoothly and quickly. For graphics artists like me having plenty of RAM is one of the most important things to think about when buying or upgrading a computer. Adding RAM to an existing computer is easy, fast, and cost effective.

Memory Deal has taken the process a step further toward safety with their unique online service guaranteeing that the memory you purchase from them will match with the original memory installed on your computer exactly; eliminating many of the potential difficulties that so often come with memory upgrades. I have upgraded my RAM in the past without any trouble, but others haven’t been so lucky. Many people have run into problems with memory upgrades because of the many options they have to choose from in RAM modules. Problems can stem from the wrong sizes, low quality, or the wrong type of RAM altogether.

Scott Bauer, the owner of Memory Deal says that this service insures quality because the "levels of RAM modules remain the same as computer makers Apple, Dell, HP, IBM and Sun installed at the factory when the computer systems were first built."

Memory Deal is now offering numerous items including PC3200 DDR400 SDRAM Upgrade, a 2gb Memory Upgrade and other Apple Memory & MAC RAM.
The service offered by Memory Deal seems to be a very good idea to me, and I’m sure that my fellow computer-lovers out there will feel much more comfortable knowing that everything in there computer will be the same quality originally intended by their computer manufacturer.

How to Create a Beautiful Selective Black and White Photo in Photoshop

2008-06-26T14:11:00.000-07:00

Here is and example of a soft, glowing Selective Black & White.

I will start off with this where I left off on the restoration of this same original photo (see previous posts).

This customer wanted a Selective Black & White version of this photo. She asked me to leave the flowers red and the eyes blue. So, after the restoration, I carefully selected the tulips, inverted the selection, and feathered it so that it would look like it glowed. I then inverted the selection to select the all of the photo except the flowers copied it.

After all of this I used several different softening filters to create several different “glowing” versions of this photograph, presented them to my customer, and she chose this one.

To turn this into a Black & White, I used a completely different program. You can make perfectly acceptable Black & Whites using Adobe Photoshop Elements Adobe Photoshop Elements and absolutely incredible ones using Adobe Photoshop CS3, but I prefer using another program altogether, called The Gimp. It has a great Channel Mixer, which allows you to choose the color “channels” you want to use to create your Black & White. There really is no “correct” combination of colors, it depends on the colors and lighting of your original photo, how many main colors there are, and how dramatic you want the final product to look.

To see this photo “Magically” become Black & White see www.GinisMagic.com http://www.ginismagic.com/.

How to Turn A Baby Into a Flower - Example 2

2008-06-12T21:30:00.000-07:00

This is me again! Some people are embarrassed by their baby pictures, but I’m not. I was adorable and I know it! =)

In this case, I used my own face and put it on a picture of a daisy that I had taken earlier. It is quite an involved process, and I don’t want to reveal all my secrets, especially since I don’t know of anyone else who does portraits like these, so I won’t be explaining this one in detail. Sorry.

After adding my face to the flower, I changed the hue of the “Face” layer to more of a yellow/orange color in order to help it blend into the flower. Then I used one of my Special Effects to make it appear as if the facial features were actually coming out of the flower itself. This one was done partially in Microsoft Digital Image Pro and partially in Adobe Photoshop Elements Adobe Photoshop Elements.

There are more examples of these portraits on my website, www.GinisMagic.com http://www.ginismagic.com/.

Damaged Photo Restoration - Recreating missing Pieces of a Photo

2008-05-27T06:11:00.000-07:00

Much of the time, repairing a photo is more difficult than it looks. This was not one of the those cases.

Though it may look difficult because such large pieces are missing, the majority of what was missing was background, so repairing them mostly involved some creative cloning and blending.

The most difficult part to fix was the piece missing from the lower left corner, because part of the child’s leg is missing. This took some time to rebuild, but it’s pretty believable, isn’t it? I used the part of her leg that was still showing in order to create a realistic vision of what the rest of her leg would look like. Also, if you look closely at the original picture you will see the dimple of her knee if half there, half missing. In the finished photo, you can see the entire dimple, which I recreated.

After fixing the missing pieces, I finished with the detail work that involved getting rid of spots on her face, and some tears and cracks that were too thin for you to be able to see in the above examples and some other small but important details.

Once all detail work was done, I wanted to give the photo a softer look, so I used my "Pure Softness" Special Effect. You can see more examples of this effect on the Special Effects page of www.ginismagic.com.

A Really Cool Special Effect

2008-05-14T05:11:00.000-07:00

Here is an example of another one of my favorite Special Effects; Brownie Diffuse. This effect is best used on a photo like the one below, with two main colors or tones.

This effect is a mixture of two different filters, some dodging, some burning, and some good, old fashioned, tinkering with color and saturation. It was done completely in Microsoft Digital Image Pro 10, but it can just as easily be done in Adobe Photoshop Elements Adobe Photoshop Elements

Turning Friends Into Fairies - Example 1

2008-05-05T15:39:00.000-07:00

This is another photo I took myself, of one of my best friends in my front yard. I can take pretty much any photo of a person and turn them into a fairy, but some positions are better than others. For me to turn you (or anyone else) into a fairy, just send me a picture of the person in whatever clothes you want, and make sure that there is nothing in front of the person that you don’t want in the final portrait.

Since this was a new photograph it didn’t require any restoration or repair. I was fortunate enough to be able to shoot this in ideal lighting, just before sunset on a slightly overcast day, so there were extreme shadows or overexposed areas.

Tip: When shooting portraits outside, my favorite environment to shoot in is sunny or slightly overcast weather, but out of direct sunlight, like the above portrait.

Now, to turn this young woman into a fairy, the first and most important thing she needed was a pair of wings. There are many different kind of wings and props I can use. To see some of the different props I can use in my Fantasy Portraits, please go to www.GinisMagic.com To add the wings, I had to VERY carefully select The part of the body that they would be touching; in this case the arm and back. Using Adobe Photoshop Elements, I then duplicated it on to another layer and added the wings on yet another layer. After moving the wings behind the duplicated arm and back, I adjusted the hue until I was satisfied. I chose a yellow orange because it contrasted with the purple of her blouse and complemented the flowers in photo. Then I used a diffusion glow filter on all the layers.

After that, I used different sizes of a brush with a very beautiful floral design to create the frame. I felt that a simple, square shaped frame wouldn’t complement the portrait well so I used the brushes to roughly imitate the shape of the portrait subject.

Fixing an Old, Damaged Photo

2008-04-20T16:17:00.000-07:00

For this otherwise beautiful photograph, the worst of the damage was in what is almost always the most difficult place to repair; the face.

Eyes are especially tricky when there are scratches or tears to fix. Luckily, with this photo, the majority of the damage was limited to only one side of the woman’s face. I used this to my advantage, especially when fixing the eye.

As with most photos that require restoration and repair, for this picture the ability to work with layers was absolutely essential. Again, and I can’t stress this enough, I highly recommend Adobe Photoshop Elements or Photoshop CS3.

To restore this photograph, the first step I took was to repair the largest of the scratches, which with this piece was the most difficult part, as the scratch covered most of one eye. Lucky me, huh? In case you didn't know, the eye is most likely the most difficult part of a photograph to repair. That is, unless you have something clear to use as a reference point. Again, lucky me. Only this time it's not sarcastic.

I used the primarily undamaged eye as a model while working on the other. After that, I took care of the rest of the tears, dust particles, and age spots. Once this was finished I worked on the contrast and saturation (though this may look like a Black & White, the final photo is actually in color, as many of the greatest "Black and Whites" are). After that the only thing left was to get rid of some of the noise and burn in a few shadows.

Some of the damaged parts of this photograph are not visible here, but can be seen the larger example of this image in the Restoration and General Enhancements section of http://www.ginismagic.com/

Abstract Mermaid Tutorial - Turning a Pencil Drawing Into an Abstract Graphic Image

2008-04-02T22:01:00.000-07:00

To create this image you'll need:

two pencils; one sharp and one fairly dull, a piece of paper (a sketchbook would be perfect),
a scanner, and a digital editing program (the one used here was Adobe Photoshop Elements)

When I started drawing this, just like a lot of my drawings, I had no idea what I wanted it to look like when I was finished. But that's what is so great about art; you can watch yourself create something from nothing. It's a wonderful feeling.

Here's how to create and image like this one: It will be done half by sketching it by hand, and half in Adobe Photoshop Elements.

First, you need to draw a very rough sketch of the body of the mermaid. It does NOT have to be perfect, or even detailed; just the rough shapes that make up her body. Here you can make a choice whether to draw the hair now or to do it in your editing program. I used a calligraphy brush in Photoshop to draw the draw hair. After making the light pencil marks where you want them, go over them a second time with a darker pencil and erase the stray light pencil marks.

Next, you'll need to scan the sketch into your computer at at least 300 dpi (the more dpi the better) and open the file in Adobe Photoshop Elements. Use "Levels" to darken the shadows (dark pencils stokes) and lighten the highlights (background and stray light pencil strokes). Now, no matter how much you tinker with "Levels", unless you had an incredibly clean-cut sketch to begin with, you will probably STILL have stray lines. There's nothing for this but going over every extra line with you eraser tool.

After that, go to "Filters" and choose "Cutout" and use whatever settings you like most. I suggest 5 levels or less. After that, you just need to fill in any blank spots there may be and you're done!

My Suggestion: Get a piece of paper and a couple of pencils, one sharp and one dull, and just start drawing. If you mess up, don't start erasing, just use the mistake to create something new. you never know what you'll come up with.

Enhancing Portraits and Lighting Correction

2008-03-22T23:47:00.000-07:00

This is a self-portrait I shot against a blank wall in my house. When I took this photo, I accidentally shot it with the wrong setting on my digital camera. As you can see, the lighting left A LOT to be desired, but fortunately I was able to fix that afterward. Once again, this work was done completely in Adobe Photoshop Elements.

For a better, larger view of this portrait, please visit my website, www.Ginismagic.com.

To get the finished portrait, my first step was to adjust the contrast, shadows, and highlights. Then I placed a lavender gradient behind the subject to give the effect of a studio-portrait and complement the blue blouse and green eyes. Next, I smoothed a few areas of skin that had some blemishes on them, though these are nearly impossible to see on these photos because there were very light. I also used a mild softening filter to give the skin and hair a smooth, healthy glow. Next came hair highlights, eyeliner, teeth whitening and faux eyelashes.

If you look closely, you’ll notice that the catch lights in the eyes are different than in the original. This is easier to see in the larger version on my website. The catch lights are different because in the original photo they were different sizes in each eye and they were awkwardly positioned, so I removed them and put in nicer, more attractive catch lights to bring attention to the eyes.

Once all of that was done, I experimented with different lights and sparkles and chose wound up choosing these.

What do you think?

How to Turn an Ordinary Photo Into a Dreamy, Dramatic Image

2008-03-11T15:50:00.000-07:00

This is a portrait I shot of my cat. And below is an example of how I can take a simple, ordinary, albeit very cute subject and turn it into an engaging and interesting image.

I used two of my Special Effects on this image, both of which are made up of several different filters and some other digital tinkering.

First, to get the intense color, I used an effect that I call "Wonderful Drama". It involves a hue change, different for any individual picture; a diffusion glow filter, and some very specific settings on an Unsharpening Mask.

The second special effect is a bit more tricky. I call it "Pure Softness". The effect simulates a soft-focus filter and with it, I can make any image as soft and dreamy as I want. It's definitely one of my favorite effects and I use it quite often, especially on portraits. This effect requires the use of a program that will allow you to work with layers, a flexible gaussian blur, and VERY flexible lighting effects.

I always do this effect in Adobe Photoshop Elements. It's a great program. It's kind of the little sister to Photoshop Creative Suite 3. If you want a program that will do the basics that CS3 does but costs less and takes less room on you computer, Elements is for you. Howevever, if you're looking for a program for serious, detailed, digital editing with full functionality, Photoshop CS3 is really the only way to go.

Hello World!

2008-03-10T02:03:00.000-07:00

Gini Here!

I can’t wait to start posting here and showing you guys all that I can do. I use digital editing computer programs to enhance and repair photographs. I can restore old and damaged photos, use special effects to enhance already beautiful images, and I can turn ordinary people into extraordinary beings.

I love what I do and as I do it I learn more and more. As I learn more, I seem to wind up falling increasingly in love with what I’m doing. I’m telling you, it’s quite the visious cycle.

Here I’ll be posting numberous examples of my work; including family photos, my own photography (another of my hobbies, but as a true amateur), and the work I do for other people.

I hope you enjoy what I show you and that you learn a little something at the same time!

~Gini of www.GinisMagic.com~