How can I improve this? Niece Portrait

Suggestion on cropping or editing
cc welcome

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She's beautiful! Here's my try.

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Here's my take.

Cropped out distracting upper and lower parts of photo
Adjusted levels by bringing end sliders in slightly
Small increase in contrast
Slight tweak of saturation
Gentle nudge of USM

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ipschoser1 wrote in post #6215386
Mainly the image just needs some pop. I've taken the background down and bumped the contrast on select parts of the image.

ipschoser1, I think your contrast adjustment is quite reckless, because you've blown the red channel to smithereens. Be very careful when adding "pop" to portraits in this way.

The OP asked for suggestions. My suggestion is: "Don't do what ipschoser1 did".

my take on this but i think i blown out the highlights.

Bill

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Not a criticism but I learned a long time ago, spend as much time looking at what's behind/beside your subject as you do at the subject. It can make a beautiful subject almost useless or enhance it. Often it is a minor change of angle but it is worth the effort to turn a, "too bad the stick is sticking out the top of her head" into something that can be worked with.

bohdank wrote in post #6216891
Not a criticism but I learned a long time ago, spend as much time looking at what's behind/beside your subject as you do at the subject. It can make a beautiful subject almost useless or enhance it. Often it is a minor change of angle but it is worth the effort to turn a, "too bad the stick is sticking out the top of her head" into something that can be worked with.

I'll add to this watch the colors. Some colors just don't work. The color of your background play-thing just doesn't do justice to the beauty of the girl IMO. Other than that, good advice so far - and I agree with Damo77 about the edit(though I would have tried to express it a bit more graciously:lol.

Damo77 wrote in post #6216343
The OP asked for suggestions. My suggestion is: "Don't do what ipschoser1 did".

What am I missing? I do not see a post by ipschoser.....

Sorarse wrote in post #6215741
Here's my take.

Cropped out distracting upper and lower parts of photo
Adjusted levels by bringing end sliders in slightly
Small increase in contrast
Slight tweak of saturation
Gentle nudge of USM

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ETA Having looked a bit more carefully at the picture, I would also have cloned out that yellow thing by her left elbow.

Thanks for the edit and the suggestion !!!

Ipchoser deleted his/her post, lol.

Swift1 wrote in post #6219819
Ipchoser deleted his/her post, lol.

Since there seems to be so much interest...

I posted an edit in a friendly attempt to give the OP some CC as he requested. It was a quick edit on a low res jpeg and I made the mistake of bumping the red channel a bit. At that point some self proclaimed photoshop "expert" came in and acted like an a$$ about it for some unknown reason.

Let me state, photography is mostly a hobby for me. I enjoy it and that is why I post here. In that spirt I tried to give the OP my angle about his image. Since the replies were ruining the fun factor I normally have posting here, and the fact that I've got some trying things going on (tragically lost a friend last week for one), I didn't need anymore headaches and deleted my posts.

scorpio, I like your shot. Your niece is a beautiful child. My .02 is that the image lacked a bit of contrast and pop. I took the background down slightly with Nik's Viveza and brightened the little girl's face a bit to make a version I felt might be something you would consider. I also selectively sharpened her eyes to add a sparkle. Since I had long deleted the original edit, here's an rework. I kept close watch on the red channel for any photoshop "experts" out there. FWIW, I like the background you chose for an informal portrait. It says a lot about her personality and age and she looks relaxed and like she's having fun. The centered composition works here because the background frames her nicely. I hope you enjoy my comments and edit. Either way, you've shot a fine image.

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I'm very sorry to hear about your loss, but I'm not sorry for addressing your reckless and destructive original edit. You weren't doing the OP any favours, and I felt it necessary to raise it.

Your new edit looks safer.

Damo77 wrote in post #6220898
I'm very sorry to hear about your loss, but I'm not sorry for addressing your reckless and destructive original edit. You weren't doing the OP any favours, and I felt it necessary to raise it.

Your new edit looks safer.

He never posted a new edit. The photo he has in his post is the same as the OP's photo. Check the links.

And ipchoser is not the only one doing "reckless and destructive original edit's." There are so many people that think they can do something really well in Photoshop and they have a go at all the filters they think will make a photo look better...But really it makes it look not so good. Ipchoser didn't even do a drastic change as you make it sound. I thought it was better than Bill's and Sorarse's both. (No offence meant, please)

Damo77, I'm surprised you didn't say anything about Bill's edit. His is way more saturated than ipchoser's was.

I didn't think ipchoser's edit on the original photo was sooo bad in the red hues. He barely bumped saturation. Damo77, you sure your monitor is calibrated?

No one has said anything on my edit, quite disappointing, haha.

(I didn't mean any offence, sorry if it sounds that way...Just my opinions stated.)

Swift1 wrote in post #6221838
He never posted a new edit. The photo he has in his post is the same as the OP's photo. Check the links.

LOL! I didn't even check! I just glanced at it and thought "well, the channels look more or less intact there, so it's an improvement".

Swift1 wrote in post #6221838
And ipchoser is not the only one doing "reckless and destructive original edit's." There are so many people that think they can do something really well in Photoshop and they have a go at all the filters they think will make a photo look better...But really it makes it look not so good.

Damn straight. And I think it's the responsibility of senior members on these forums to point out recklessness and destruction where they see it, to help those people. Hence my post.

Swift1 wrote in post #6221838
I thought it was better than Bill's and Sorarse's both. (No offence meant, please).
I'm surprised you didn't say anything about Bill's edit. His is way more saturated than ipchoser's was.

To be honest, I didn't take any notice. Too late to compare now ...

Swift1 wrote in post #6221838
I didn't think ipchoser's edit on the original photo was sooo bad in the red hues. He barely bumped saturation. Damo77, you sure your monitor is calibrated?

I was using my cheap laptop. The monitor is calibrated (with an EODII), but I don't trust such a crap monitor. That was why I made no comments about colour. I was able to check the histograms, obviously, by opening the file in Gimp, so I could confirm what my eyes had told me about the red channel.

Look, this has all got out of hand. I was just trying to help - or rather, to avoid misinformation. If this were an car enthusiasts' forum and the OP said "I have a car that I love, how can I make it unique so it stands out?", and somebody said "drive it into a pole so the front end is all smashed up - then it will be unique" ... of course that's unwise advice. I would expect you, Swift1, and everybody else to point it out.