C&C welcome

[knb25965]

 

[Glen]

Very '70's I think, was in nappies for most of them

 

[dazzajl]

Very '70's I think, was in nappies for most of them

Most of a decade in nappies, bet your folks were glad when you left home.

That does look very seventies to me too, which could well be just the look you were after of course.

I think it could be a little smoother on the eye if the blur was blended in a little more. It's goes pretty quickly from sharp to very soft and might benefit from a less visible transition.

 

[mmcp42]

I agree about the blurring
mebbe keep the necklet and face sharp and blur the background
good pose though
nice skin and hair tones
no visible post processing (apart from the blur that is)

 

[knb25965]

Hi thanksfor C&C, just playing around with old photo i had, and thought i would post it....
Its something i woud like to get into more(portraits) and also landscapes. A huge learning curve ahead me thinks.

Kev

 

[cjnicolai]

Always be careful that the special don't overpower the subject. In this case, the original image is really very nice, but because of the obvious post processing, I can't tear my eyes away from the blurring.

As mentioned above, select carefully the areas you want to blur, but then also dial the effect back quite a bit. You'll get the look you want without being quite so obvious.

- CJ

 

[knb25965]

Hi, here are the originals. a messy in the background as was just trying out camera as only a week old then.
1

2

 

[oldgit]

The first when compared to the original is frankly very poor.
Learn how to duplicate layers and create masks, then you can blur/reduce the impact of the background.

 

[cjnicolai]

The first when compared to the original is frankly very poor.
Learn how to duplicate layers and create masks, then you can blur/reduce the impact of the background.

Or better yet, just do it in camera by knowing how to control your aperture. It's far simpler and will always look better than trying to fix it in Photoshop.

The original is actually not bad in terms of the background. A little less DOF would have been nice, but it wasn't bad to begin with. Sometimes the efforts to minimize something actually make it much more glaring.

- CJ