B&A #40

[BitterSweet]

This game is to help those of us who are trying to learn new tricks when it comes to editing.

Here's the breakdown of the game. I will post a picture that I choose, resized to exactly 800 pixels maximum on the long side. Outside of being resized it has to be unedited...meaning no adjustments to any levels, it has to look like it did as it came out of the camera.

The game will last 48hrs and whoever can produce the best edited image (as judged by me) will be picked and it'll be their turn to post their unedited picture for all of us to take a crack at.

The participants must have their "Image Editing OK" turned on and they must provide at least a simple breakdown of how they edited the image, some entrants are a little vague on this point, please give us all details so we can learn and share tips. For instance if you use the unsharp mask tool or Smart Sharpen, provide us with the adjustments you used so others can try them out.

You can post multiple images, but the first image you post will be the one that is judged - all other images will be considered for knowledge and tip use only.

Also, please keep all comments, be they positive or negative, to yourself until after the game has ended.

If you happen to be the winner of the game please start the next one with the title of the game and the following number. For example…the next game should read (Before and After # 40)

This is all about having fun so have at it!!!

This game will end on Monday, March 31, 2008 at 10pm PST

This picture was taken by kyle ( ZeroOne86, because I ran out of shots for right now and need to barrow one from his) at the Georgia Botanical Garden last Nov. Hopefully everyone will have fun with it.

http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh261/bittersweetphoto/ba40.jpg

[TheSonofDarwin]

Crop
B&W (Yes, really)
Colored in only greens
Glamour Glow
Increase contrast
Saturation + Burned some shadowed areas
Angled strokes @15% Opacity
Border

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y173/thesonofdarwin/garden_edit.jpg

[SilverHCIC]

1. Reduce red in stone building
2. Increase green in trees
3. USM 70,1,1
4. Rotate right 1 degree
5. Decrease exposure to simulate early morning via levels adjustment
6. Add lens flare @ 70% intensity at window to simulate morning sun peeking through window
7. Burn leaves
8. Resize
9. Add layer @ Difference Blend Mode @ 50% opacity to create transparent border
10. Add stroke frame style

[i-hunter]

-Crop
-Add sky using gradient fill + Gaussian blur
-Burn in overexposed foliage
-Gaussian blur
-Diffuse Glow
-Solid colour (pink) adjustment layer
-Monochrome layer using channel mixer, soft light blend mode.
-Black border added
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v602/cyberdrummer/Comp.jpg

[SQuiP]

-Crop
-Sepia and colour adjustment
-Curve adjustment
-Burnt selected areas
-Slight diffuse
-Blurred selected areas
-Sharpened minimal areas
-Selected burn/dodge to create glass-like frame

Did anyone else notice the crying girl (face) peeking through the one doorway? :)

[ilmk]

My goal was to make it look sorta dreamy here goes....

- added "Blast'em blur" filter
- edge preserving smooth
- color boosted
- added untouched image to a second layer
- changed the blend mode of the second layer to "hard light"
- lowered the opacity to 50% so it wasn't as dark
- Added the girl and repeated the same steps as above to get the same dreamy feel
- merged all
- duplicated and locked layer
- added a watercolor script
- opened untouched layer and changed the opacity to 36% just to bring back some details.
- added the dreamy frame and a solid black frame
- as a finishing touch i made her ear a bit more pointy then natural

[kab8715]

I really have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to pp :)
So I mostly just slide things around until I see something I like. So if I remember correctly, this is what I did:

Adjusted blue and green hue and saturation
added inner border
added text
added lensflare
vignette
used whispy dream action


I did see the face after you mentioned it squip - very weird!


http://yourmemories2dvd.com/after40.jpg

[BitterSweet]

in what door way? I see one in the left side but it looks like the rock (and smiling).

[kab8715]

The one that I believe they were talking about (or at least the one I saw after it was mentioned) is in the window on the left. To me it looks like 1 side of a face... an eye and eyebrow.
Now I keep looking for what you mentioned... I feel like its one of those ISpy pictures! haha

[TheSonofDarwin]

Oh I see it now.. that's a tad creepy. Wish I had seen that earlier, though :cry:

[SilverHCIC]

... Did a young girl mysteriously perish in this building years ago, and the spirit returns occassionally???

[ilmk]

oh how cool! I never noticed that earlier either. lol

[SQuiP]

Yup :)
That's the one KAb!

Here's the full face :lol:

[ilmk]

That's wicked! :lol:

How did you get her to come out? I got her eye beautifully this morning but gave up after messing around with the nose and lips for about an hour and a half. lol

[SQuiP]

Little mirror, bits of cloning, tiny lightnen, bit of brightnen
... now, she would really look good with a great set of hair....
(I can almost HEAR Justin cursing under his breath ;-) )

[neumanns]

I'm not up to snuff with you guys but I'm gonna play anyhow...

Almost all done with clone stamp, dodge, burn, sponge, sharpened a bit and then compressed severly to meet file size.

I hadn't noticed the girl till she was pointed out, but I definatly see her.
And now I cannot look at the picture without going straight to her...Wierd what the mind does.

[BitterSweet]

hey can some one do me a favor and take the original picture and circle or zoom in on where you guys see her because I see like 3 faces in that one area and they're all rocks so i don't know if I'm missing something. I watch ghost hunters all the time and don't miss stuff on there lol so this is really stumping me.

[neumanns]

Look in this window...It's half a face, eyebrow eyeball etc.

It's not the rocks...it's the leaves.

[suzyb]

For this one, I really wanted to get that really bright tree out of there, but didn't want to cut off the wall, so I created a fake end and cropped.

Then it looked a little odd, so I thought it might look better with the window on the left so I rotated the picture horizontally.

After that,
I brought the highlights down,
Added contrast,
Messed with the levels,
then the green and yellow saturation,
The leaves were still too bright for me, so I added a black & white layer, then lowered the opacity way down,
Sharpened a little,
Cloned a few leaves up in the corner,
Added a vignette then a border.


http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2280/2378699684_77fa1f6afb_o.jpg

[SilverHCIC]

hey can some one do me a favor and take the original picture and circle or zoom in


Tracey - First, look at the image I posted below. Now go back to any of the original images, and step back from your computer a few steps. ... It's spooky.

[BitterSweet]

Oh ok thanks SilverHCIC. I just keep looking at that area and saw 3 different faces and then some in other places lol. It is creepy but I think it's just the rock. That I know of there isn't much about that place. I tried to look it up but I don't know where to start. These are the faces I saw.

[BitterSweet]

Well I'm glad everyone had fun on this one trying to find the face in the picture. Everyone did great on editing the shot too.

The winner is SuzyB- when me and kyle were going over the pictures to pick a winner we were saying what we liked and didn't like about some of the shots but then we saw yours (for the first time) and both of us went Wow so we knew you were the winner. To me your edit was flawless. I love the way you did the rocks and were able to bring down the brightness on the leaves. I also like how you are always flipping the shots to be different. Great edit.

2nd has to go to SQuiP and TheSonofDarwin- I really liked your edits too the colors look great on both of them.

kab8715- I liked yours but the only thing that I think would have made it better is if the border was alittle darker or the middle a bit brighter. Great job on your first B&A.

And to everyone else again great jobs on the edits and hope everyone has fun on the next one.

Can't wait for your post SuzyB.

[TheSonofDarwin]

Congrats Suzy! I knew you'd win once I saw your post. It doesn't even look like the same photo, but rather Kyle took the original and Tracey took the more composed shot you posted :lol: I kid, I kid

[kab8715]

kab8715- I liked yours but the only thing that I think would have made it better is if the border was alittle darker or the middle a bit brighter. Great job on your first B&A.




Thanks! I played and played with that picture... I had a lighter version as well and another version were I did the border on top layer.... I couldn't decide which I liked better :)
I think I found this game when it was around #7 and have watched each one since.... tried a couple pics but could never do anything. So it felt good to have 1 I was happy enough with to submit!

Thanks again!

[SilverHCIC]

Congrats SuzyB and all the others. I thought this was a tough picture, but you guys really did a nice job on it. Can't wait for # 41 !!

[suzyb]

Thanks!

It looks like a really cool place. It really looks like something you'd accidentally run across when hiking in the middle of nowhere, not someplace "structured" like a botanical garden.

SQuiP - I liked your take on it. I'm going to have to try a border like that sometime. It framed the picture without taking attention away from it.

I'll get the next one up in a little bit.