From behind the veil

When i saw the thumbnail, i thought of the Afghan Girl picture of some fame, but when i opened it the thing that jumped to the front of my mind was the processing. It may be a matter of taste but working from her eye out it just seems a little overdone and plastic. This reminds me of slide film shot in high key and xprod. 

Seven all the way!

PDE

I like that photo. Can you explain me postprocesing?

I appreciate the image but it is a little over processed for my liking.

quite like the idea of the composition but the hugely unreal eyes detract... adopt a more nuanced approach would be my suggestion

Quite haunting and so very well made!

Startling rendition of a low key image with that one eye standing out as the only bright tones. Gives one a bit of a chill up the spine.

Jerry

...this is a unique work! it's more digital painting than a photo

and somehow you guess a possible  photo-portrait

future development and direction; it's done well and it's Not overdone!

I would crop a bit from the right and the butom

matsko

Please note the following:

• This image has been selected for discussion. It is not necessarily the "best" picture the Elves have seen this week, nor is it a contest.
• Discussion of photo.net policy, including the choice of Photograph of the Week should not take place here, but in the Help & Questions Forum.
• The About Photograph of the Week page tells you more about this feature of photo.net.
• Before writing a contribution to this thread, please consider our reason for having this forum: to help people learn about photography. Visitors have browsed the gallery, found a few striking images and want to know things like why is it a good picture, why does it work? Or, indeed, why doesn't it work, or how could it be improved? Try to answer such questions with your contribution.

I'm not sure what it is, but this picture looks really artificial to me. The skin's texture and consistency of color just seems too perfect, as if it's been airbrushed (or the Photoshop equivalent), and something seems odd about the fabric as well. The image just seems over-processed.

That aside, the single eye gives the figure a strangely cyclopean quality that seems to be at odds with the photographer's apparent intention of making the viewer feel sympathetic. Without that, it would just be a cloyingly sentimental image that allows Westerners to feel superior to foreign cultures where women are required to cover themselves, but with it, the picture is just kind of weird.

I do like the colors, though.

A very well constructed piece of art,flawlessly done, a little to flawless for me

Hot damn! That's beautiful and almost hypnotic. Love it!

A haunting piece of art; more than just a portrait. The eye is a standout. The face is probably touched up, but it's flawless finish opposes the wrinkles in the hood very well.
I'm not sure if I'd prefer the fingers under the mouth. I would crop just a small bit from the bottom. Overall: excellent

To me, it's far too plastic-looking. If the skin looked more "real," this would be outstanding. There's a fine balance between too much and too little post-processing and this one is way over the line, imo.

The Afghan girl meets black velvet Elvis. I think this sort of concept works better when you keep your kitsch in separate buckets rather than mixing it up.

It is a good question as to whether the processing is over-done (and I definitely think that it is), but to compare it to Elvis on Velelvet trivializes the discussion from the outset, Gordon.

I would like to see the original, in order better to examine the post-processing options that confronted the photographer.

I do believe that this had the potential to be a great photo. Where it ranks now is problematic, but I think that it is a good pick for Photo of the Week if the point is to stimulate discussion.

--Lannie

Well Done Bader.
The expression on the innocent face and the eye contact with the viewers over come any sort of post processing, this is a wonderful portrait and of very unique lighting and a remarkable tone, having said all that the Elvis did a great job picking this image to be this week POW and I feel glad that they did.

Landrum

If you want to involve yourself in yet another pointless discussion about post processing, have at it. I stand by my opinion of this photo. It is a trivial photograph, consequently trivializing it seems entirely appropriate. If you are correct in your assumption that the elves deliberately select photos with specific flaws in order to generate comments, I do wish they would come up with another flaw besides over the top post production to stimulate discussion... that particular horse should have long ago been pronounced dead!

Sorry but this to me is a non-starter - over the top cliched to begin with, there's the fake black background, and the rest of it is so over-photoshopped that it looks like it was entirely computer generated in Maya. The actual photograph might have been great - I suspect it was because it's a fundamentally compelling graphic image - but who knows.

I rest my case.

Gordon, ;)))

I feel as if I'm looking through a filter . . . at a female Frankenstein, a fabricated one-eyed monster. It's a case where, for me, the seeking of perfection has stripped out feeling, emotion, and humanity. It is as frigid as it is warmly-toned. The 8 portraits in Bader's portfolio are consistently stylized and cartoonish. On the plus side, there is a distinct vision, and hard work was put in to achieve it. It looks to me like heart and soul went into it. But the heart and soul and a sense of humanness, craft, and refinement never got together.

How about actually giving us viable photographs to discuss, or maybe not allowing Photoshop jobs like this to be called "Photo" of the Week. It really hurts the credibility of the site IMO. I refer people to PN all the time, telling them it's the premiere place to see the best photographer's work (and this person is a great photographer). If they then came here for the first time and saw that something this computer generated was chosen by the site to be the "Photo" of the Week, out of millions of images, I think it's very damaging to the integrity of the site.

--

I like her placement on the frame and the color of her scarf , but I echo Kim Slonaker's comment about too much PP. The skin tones, the too dark shadow on part of her face, no details at all ( in comparison to the other eye.) Interesting imo , to see the original portrait and color palette .