Can this photo be saved?

[MissBianca]

Great photographers take lots and lots of photos to get just the right shot. Mediocre photographers like me can barely get one they like--and if it involves people, maybe not that many.

So I'm starting this thread to present problem photos and see what our photoshopping gurus can do with them. The results can be amusing, beautiful, or anything in between.

I'll start us off. I went to WDW with my oldest younger brother Carl and his family when the kids were 8 and 14. They don't pose for pictures much and I have very few of their whole family, so I'd love it if this one were able to be saved.

Have at it--what can you do?

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/snowleopard55/TagrelStuff/carlandfamilyatwdw.jpg

[Robin]

My first question would be how important is it to keep the background?

When you originally take a picture like this (on the average automatic camera) your flash will not be able to reach your background. If it could it would probably be too strong the people and they'd have that white washed out look. So if the background isn't well lit enough, it won't come out well in your photo.

So, first thing I would do is crop out some of the background that's too dark. Next, I try to tweak the color on the people. That's the tricky part for me. And finally, I'd paint out the red eye.

[MissBianca]

Not important at all to keep the background, though I'd like to keep the fountain where they're sitting. Definitely cropping is a first thing to do! I hate fixing red-eye and that whole family is prone--help?

Oh and if it helps, the skin tones aren't as far off as you might think. Allie is quite dark and Jasper got her complexion while Arielle got our family's pastyness.

[Frogman]

I usually make two copies, one of just the people, and one of the background. Then I tweak the color of the people to be "correct" without making the background change. If you don't it makes the black into a dirty gray which isn't appealing.

[MissBianca]

On a picture like that one, Brian, how would you seperate out the people? It's pretty complicated!

This is one where I'd actually turn to Photoshop Elements above any other tools I've used--it has the ability to paint a selection area in or out which gives excellent control.

[Frogman]

It isn't too complicated once you up the brightness and contrast, the lines of their heads etc. are all clearly visable (I checked in Fireworks). From there I would cut them out by hand. I do almost all of my stuff that way and it isn't too time consuming if your good with a mouse. I am too picky to let a magic wand do it. :lol:

[MissBianca]

Ah, I see! I wasn't suggesting using the magic wand, this is a brush tool--literally painting stuff in and out. You have control over every pixel and the fuzzyness of the edge with it. I want it in Fireworks :lol:

When something's small, I tend to use a magic wand and then go around and remove the rest of the pixels I don't like with an eraser. I need to work on lassoing skills.

[Tagrel]

I enjoy cleaning up photos, especially when I don't have a few hundred to do all at once! :peri:

I use Paint Shop Pro 8 and find the auto enhance does a very good job on adjusting colors/brightness/contract about 85% of the time. It worked fairly well for this picture, and then I used red eye removal to fix the eyes a bit. I tend to shy away from REALLY changing a picture, unless I have lots of time to play and repaint things. I save that for very special pictures. :yes:

Here is what I came up with - took about 5 minutes.

http://tagrel.com/images/misc/fixpic.jpg

[MissBianca]

That looks soooo much better, doesn't it? I was amazed how much detail came out in the background! All it needed was cropped. Plus I took those white spots out of the background (they aren't scanner artifacts but they sure look like it). And just for kicks, I applied the automatic color levels from Fireworks. They chose a slightly bluer pallette than PSP.

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/snowleopard55/TagrelStuff/fixpic.jpg

[Ursulinda]

WOW! Those are GREAT fixes - five minutes, you say?

[Tagrel]

WOW! Those are GREAT fixes - five minutes, you say?

PSP has built in automatic photo enhancement which works very well on lots of pictures. It does a good job of color correction and lighten backgrounds without washing out the subject which is usually bright enough already. Pool pictures, pictures with lots of sand, and some with big sections of very bright colors (like red) can throw off the auto enhancement. At that point I have to adjust things manually which can take MUCH longer to get 'just right'.

The red eye editor is manual so you can get very nice results. But I've gotten fairly good at using it so it doesn't take me too long anymore. That comes with practice and would definitely take longer the first few times.

When I come home from Disney or anytime Kristen gets a hold of a camera I have a jillion shots, and it takes a while to clean them all up for printing. Just did around 200 from Easter and the girls trip to Plymouth, MA. Kristen actually watched this time and now appreciates how the cleanup process can REALLY make a difference and can make a bad picture MUCH better. AND she appreciates how long it takes when you have a lot of photos! :yes:

[MissBianca]

Okay, so who wants to post a "problem photo" for us? Dave, do you have any that you aren't yet satisfied with?

Or someone post one that they think can be improved even though it's already wonderful!

[LimeGreenCheri]

I would love to have this picture saved. I'm not sure if it can or not. I've noticed looking back on my pictures how fuzzy they all are.


http://tagrel.com/photopost/data/515/2004_038.jpg

[Frogman]

I don't have the fancy software at work but here is what the program I do have could do:

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g67/Frogman1983/LGC.jpg

I am assuming you have the photo in a larger version as well and shrank this for posting online. If you apply these changes to the picture THEN shrink you will remove even more of the blur. :yes:

[LimeGreenCheri]

You can really remove blur? Really!?!? I have got to learn to do that. I would say that 99% of the pictures of my children are blurs.


ETA: that was a great clean up!

[Tagrel]

Here is my cleanup attempt using PSP. You can sharpen images, but you have to be careful not to overdo it! :yes:

http://tagrel.com/images/misc/lgcCleanup.jpg

[Frogman]

No matter how high I set the contrast/brightness/hue settings they didn't appear to be Disney characters. What is up with THAT Cheri? ;) I would have thought they wouldn't have a choice! :rofl:

Great fix tag!

[LimeGreenCheri]

No matter how high I set the contrast/brightness/hue settings they didn't appear to be Disney characters. What is up with THAT Cheri? ;) I would have thought they wouldn't have a choice! :rofl:

Great fix tag!

Actually Ethan Shaun Yu from Mulan, so see, they don't all get a choice ;) .


And Dave, that is an excellent cleanup!! I'm going to have to check into that software to clean things up! :yes:

[MissBianca]

Hey, these look a lot better! I'll have to try this one too.

If you want to focus on an area to see the changes, look at the front door. You can really see how different filters effect the color of black.

Cheri, what is the green thing on the door. *squints* Looks like a pea pod with a face to me.

[Frogman]

There is a witch on the door. :yes:

[WDWNJ]

Looks like a pea pod with a face to me.

Yup - nothing says halloween like a pea pod.... :lol: Poor Linus is gonna have a heck of a time trying to figure out which pea patch the great pea pod will rise out of.....

[DizzneeMomma]

I tried to fix this once, then gave up because I was making it worse. Would love to see it saved.

http://tagrel.com/photopost/data/500/Boo.jpg

....also would be nice if I the messy house in the background was magically cleaned.

[WDWNJ]

I can't help with the pic, but what a great costume! Very cool.

[Frogman]

I didn't do anything but tell Photoshop to "Autofix" it. One click! :yes:

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g67/Frogman1983/NewBoo.jpg

[MissBianca]

Well, no way could I improve the color, etc. more than Brian did--but I could get rid of the messy house. :lol:

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/snowleopard55/TagrelStuff/boobooboo_byB.jpg

[Mark]

Here's my attempt. I raised the black level considerably. I cut out the background and applied a guassian blur to it. I did a slight noise reduction on the subject. I sharpened the subject. I cloned out a distracting element on the wall.

http://barbieri.smugmug.com/photos/147048430-M.jpg

I think it would also be useful to give comments on how the photo could have been taken differently to reduce the amount of "saving" needed.

1) Use a less distracting background.
2) Don't use an on-camera flash. Bounce the flash if you can. Move the flash far away from the lens if you can. Stand your subject near a window receiving indirect sunlight if possible. Direct on-camera flash makes for flat lighting and harsh shadows behind the subject.

It's good that you got down on the level of your subject. Too many kid photos are taken by parents towering over their children.

[Tagrel]

Wow - great job Brian, MissB and Mark! :yes:

[DizzneeMomma]

COOL! I love them all and am very impressed. Hannah loves that the Monsters joined her!!! I'm definitely going to order prints of that one. Thank you, thank you!

I guess I should upgrade from my antique version of Picture It. My boyfriend uses Gimp. Do most of you use Photoshop?

[Robin]

I used Photoshop Elements 2.0. It came free with my scanner. :peri:

I'm still getting used to the features. I've been playing with sharpen and it works much better than in other programs. Sometimes autofix is good, other times it seems to over saturate the photo. Unnaturally glowing colors.

The biggest pain is cropping doesn't show the size of the photo. I have to crop, then peek under resize, back and forth, back and forth. Very time consuming. Often photo albums want photos of equal size, so I want them all the same.

[MissBianca]

Yeah, Robin, that is one reason I often use the outrageously expensive Fireworks instead of Photoshop Elements. Much more control over size of things all the time.

One hint would be to use the change canvas size feature as often as possible. It doesn't allow exact placement of everything but if you crop off one edge where you want, you can size the picture off of one of the corners on that side. Did that make sense? If not, I will draw you a picture.

[MissBianca]

I finally got around to trying my hand at the Halloween picture with the witchy peapod in the background. This is a good example if you oversharpen :( I just couldn't get the highlights on the costumes to do what I wanted.

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b78/snowleopard55/TagrelStuff/2004_038_B.jpg

[kathleena]

Mark and MissB - how do you cut out the subject/background so well? I'm supposing you use the lasso or another tool? Do you zoom way in and just keep drawing around the subject? And then you have to put it into a new layer?

Love her in both of your edits!

ETA!!!! Oooh, oooh, I figured it out I think. The magnetic lasso tool. Took me a while to figure out the layers......here's my attempt. I had a hard time choosing there was so much to do. I used a soft underpainting on the background and then adjusted the color so it had some splashes of purple. I color adjusted Boo also, but didn't do any sharpening.

How'd I do for my first attempt? I messed up a little on the bottom- I meant to crop the photo before I saved and uploaded, but I can fix that easily. It was a little error in trying to close out the lasso. The line wouldn't keep straight and I hurried.

http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q28/nkathleena/Misc/BooKathleena.jpg

[Robin]

The I tried to 'fix' it, halfway through I realize I'd lost the stems of the anntenna do to it being hard for the software to 'see' it against the background.

[kathleena]

The I tried to 'fix' it, halfway through I realize I'd lost the stems of the anntenna do to it being hard for the software to 'see' it against the background.

Ya I can see I missed a bit on the antennae on the left there. That was me not being able to distinguish background from the costume. I think I can fix it tho.....

[MissBianca]

You did a GREAT job for a first try, Nancy! Really super. Yes, I used the magnetic lasso tool, also the eraser for areas where I didn't like what it did. If the photo doesn't have much contrast, you have to use the regular lasso, but for the Boo one, the magnetic one worked great.

Something to try is to "feather" the edge of your selection. That can give very effective results depending on the use.