street portraits Street Portrait

Many thanks in advance for viewing and rating + comments/suggestions

if any, Loic

The fantastic beard needs contrast around. The jacked is strong, however too havey just at the bottom, without a balanced grey. So for balance and all attention for the fantastic face.. the next suggestion.. (Fine shot loic!)

first of all and most importantly: it's a phantastic portrait. Still, it indeed lacks contrast. Since it seems to be en vogue to upload I'll give it a try too.

Hi Olaf and Ton, MANY THANKS for your very USEFUL input.

Ton, you are not only an excellent photographer, you are also a PS master... which I am not as you know from my bio (and also true I have never been enclined to do until recently at least). But now, with the "re-work" you've prepared and uploaded here, you have opened my eyes. The "digital darkroom" work is inescapable, and I think it is now time for me to enter a new phase... What do you advise : PS for dummies ? This is probably where I stand at the moment, as I only used B&W conversion, brightness, contrast... On this specific example, if you could drive me through the functionalities you have used, it could be a good example to start with, by trying to reproduce what you have produced. Thanks for the enlightment of today !

thanks for the compliment but I'm hardly a PS master. What I did here was quite straightforward. Burning in of the background. Select his cap and the light spots in his beard and making this a bit darker. I then increased the overall contrast and after that I brought back (dodged) the eyes. Took less than 2 minutes.

 

If you're looking for books I always advice people to get the books from Scott Kelby (he has a website) they are fun to read and he'll show you in easy to follow 2-3 page tutorials how to do things and do them good. If after that you want to get deeper into it I can advice you some great books on most important topics.

 

 

I'm glad, for I didn't want to upset you Loic..! Haha.. myself not knowing anything about Tons' cooking-recipes as well! :)