First time playing with Lightroom

To me the quality of the photo seems to have gone down..I wonder what I did. Plus I failed miserably at sharpening. The picture seems soft. I have a lot of learning to do!
Please C & C - I am always willing to learn!
Here is my cutie.

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One thing you can do in LR just is pull down the exposure or brightness and add a little fill with the fill light slider. Right now you have a bit too much contrast in light and dark tones on the face. If you even it out a bit, you might be going in a better direction. It looks like the original was shot with narrow DOF and missed focus on the back eye.

Agree with andrea. The nice thing about lightroom is you can go back.

Yes, too much contrast. The inside of his mouth is pure black. Remember to click on the shadow and highlight warnings when you go into developing files.

I agree too! I am learning so I will take any advice I can get. I will see what I can do and will post back again. Thanks!

I just brought down the contrast and exposure a little bit but it looks a bit dark? No? May be it is my 8 years old monitor.

There's many more adjustments with Lightroom than exposure and contrast. Adjusting the curves is your best option. And I don't know what lightness the child's face is supposed to be but it now looks too dark and oversharpened. Most people apply too much sharpening to digital photos simply because they can

If you've just started to post process your files and with lightroom, you'll likely have a long learning process to understand what elements go into a proper looking photograph. Good luck!

I agree I have a long learning process!

Thanks for your reply!

I just looked at my photos through my work LAPTOP and they suck!!!
Well atleast now I know I shouldn't be using my personal laptop as the monitor sucks!!

Thanks!!!