Photo Processing Tutorial for "Illustrated" Look

Link to PDf tutorial on post #11

I originally posted this under "Glamour and Nude" but got such a good response to the tutorial that I have decided to post it here in the Processing section. I have always enjoyed the "illustrated" look. Think Dave Hill, Alvarado and others. Their work influenced me to try to develop my own style. Not to duplicate theirs, but to try to see what I could develop on my own. I've put this together in a step by step pdf of what i ended up with in terms of work flow. It's not perfect by any means, but I've been pleased with the results and am still fine tuning. I've attached samples of the image results below. I'm offering the PDF work flow to anyone interested. Just e-mail and I'll send you the pdf. I use the following software to accomplish the final results

Photoshop CS4
Noise Ninja Plug in for Photoshop
Dynamic Photo HDR (stand alone module)

I do know there are software packages out there that can accomplish a similar look (Lucis, Topaz, etc). I love Topaz but have not quite been able to achieve the look I wanted just yet. But i think Topaz has great potential once I can become better versed in it. And I do plan on experimenting more with Topaz.

I felt I'd share what I've learned so far and hopefully someone out there can help refine the process and continue to improve it. The look is not for everyone, but if you like this style of processing, feel free to write and I'll send the pdf. Thanks

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Additional sample with process tweaks. Basically eliminating the Dynamic Photo HDR processing steps. Very interesting results toned down a bit.

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Soliz387, thanks for sharing these and for offering up your tutorial -- there are plenty of people here who want to know how to achieve similar results and ask about these things, and I hope you get plenty of inquiries!

One thing that could maybe spark some added interest in the thread is if you posted at least one "Before" shot, showing lighting and exposure and all gave you a "starting point"...?

tonylong wrote in post #9887785
Soliz387, thanks for sharing these and for offering up your tutorial -- there are plenty of people here who want to know how to achieve similar results and ask about these things, and I hope you get plenty of inquiries!

One thing that could maybe spark some added interest in the thread is if you posted at least one "Before" shot, showing lighting and exposure and all gave you a "starting point"...?

Hello Tony,

I've received a little over 300 inquiries so far from this site and Retouch Pro. Apparently there are quite a few people looking to achieve similar results. I'm glad to share the processing. I would have loved to have found a tutorial like this a few years ago. . lol. But i tell you it was very educational doing the research and developing the processing manually vs simply processing the image in Lucis or Topaz. But dont' get me wrong i am currently experimenting with Topaz to try to achieve similar results . Just hope people can benefit from the manual version tutorial. Camera settings are as follows

Shutter speed: 1/125
ISO: 200 (would have like to shoot at 100 but the room was a bit dark)
Lighting: 2 200 watt continuous light softboxes. Tricolor Light
White Balance: Auto
Aperture: 3.2 (varying slightly for each shot depending on pose)
Fill Light: 430EX on camera set at 1/32 power

See lighting diagram below. Basic 2 light set up. Fill light may have been a bit more in front of the model than what is shown below. But pretty basic and standard light set up. Realigned the lighting depending on the poses. Tried to keep the main light about 4-6 feet away from the model and the fill about 3 feet away at 1/2 power

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Before and after shots. Before is straight out of the camera. Using light set up illustrated above.

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Very nice, Soliz387! The lighting setup together with the Before/After shots to me really give "meat" to this! Thanks on the behalf of many!

tonylong wrote in post #9889316
Very nice, Soliz387! The lighting setup together with the Before/After shots to me really give "meat" to this! Thanks on the behalf of many!

No problem Tony. Hope others can benefit and find the information useful.

If anyone is interested in the process flow please send me an e-mail to rs387@verizon.net
I will respond with PDF Tutorial. Thanks for viewing

Soliz387 wrote in post #9889532
If anyone is interested in the process flow please send me an e-mail to rs387@verizon.net
I will respond with PDF Tutorial. Thanks for viewing

out of curiosity is there any particular reason you don't just have a link to the pdf?

SpinningCone wrote in post #9908487
out of curiosity is there any particular reason you don't just have a link to the pdf?

No reason really. Just never got around to saving it up anywhere. Would have just uploaded it here if possible. Great idea though. If anyone who has received the pdf wishes to set up a link please feel free to do so and post link here. Thanks

Link for pdf below

http://www.4shared.com …_work_flow_to_i​nclud.html

Soliz387 wrote in post #9922085
Link for pdf below

http://www.4shared.com …_work_flow_to_i​nclud.html

Thank you sir...this is exactly what i was looking for

nice!!!! thanks for sharing man!

When I get to step 24 I have a super white looking "inverted" image still, is this how it should look at this point? What does it mean to "perform levels step"??

After each time I flatten the image I am left with what the NEW duplicate layer I made looks like as my image, am I missing something here and not doing something correctly?