A Pretty Red Head In Highland Village

Greetings and Happy July 4th Weekend.

I decided to take a moment to show once again the importance of retouching an image even though it is created under controlled lighting conditions in a studio. The following pictures are of Jessica. As you can see she is a very attractive young lady. I can brag a little bit because she is one of my daughters.

The first picture was taken after taking a custom white balance and carefully metering the lights to ensure proper exposure. It's a very complimentary picture, but it is being seen directly out of the camera without any retouching. You can even see evidence of some sensor dust from the camera in the image.

The second image is the same image after doing some of the following. Retouching the eyes, retouching the skin, adjusting the hue of the skin and removing some dust spots. Even if your skin is as smooth as Jessica's if you light a portrait correctly it will reveal the smallest of flaws.

The point I'm trying to make is that retouching a portrait is a must although the levels of retouching will vary.

I hope you enjoy viewing the portraits.

Thanks for looking,

EJ

P.S. For Facebook users who see this post, you must select the BLUE link at the bottom of the entry that says "View Original Post" in order to see the images."

Now, I think I'm even cuter

I was just doing a little photoshop practice today. I'm taking two of the same images to show what a little skin softening can do for an image. This skin touch up was VERY slight. If you apply too much it can make the image begin to look like plastic. Which image do you prefer?

Thanks for looking.

EJ

I'm really cute now.

Another portrait day in Highland Village, TX.

This is another picture made during the June 26 session. Now, he's not trying to scare me and just playing around with me. This portrait is also one light and a reflector, but it was not converted to black and white.


Thanks for looking and Happy July 4th.

EJ

I'm really scary

It was hot today in Highland Vilalge, so Jonathan was more than happy to play with me in front of the camera. He put on his scary face, growled.and did his best to scare me.


This image was converted to black and white and then some simple burn and dodging was also done to personal taste. This image was a simple one light set up with one reflector. There were also some less scary images made which I'll post later.

I hope you enjoy.

EJ

Portraits with puppets

Here are a couple of portraits of Rebeca, Chino, Cassie. Rebeca is a ventriloquist and these are her "babies".

These portraits were done with 1 large main light and 1 light on the background. There was also a reflector used to the right of the set up to keep that side of the subjects in less shadow. These pictures were done in a home in Highland Village, Tx.

Thanks for looking,

EJ

A Boy and His Toys

Sometimes you have to distract them in order to get them to cooperate.  This little guy was having a great time playing while I talked to him and took some portraits.


If you'll notice, the second picture shows more contours of the face.  This was achieved by allowing the subject to be just a little more back lit.  These images were done with a 3 light setup using white vinyl as the backdrop.

Digital Creations

Hello Everybody,

Here are 2 more digital creations that I've been working on today.  The props were created in house and then combined with little Jonathan to create this image.  I hope you like them.

EJ