Beach pics of family

Hey guys, We went to Panama City Beach back a couple months ago and took these pics, but not sure how to edit them. Can anyone give me some pointers on it?

Played around a little with levels, curves and saturation on the first one.
Sure it can be done even better, but you wil get the idea.
Also straightened the horizon...

HOSTED PHOTO
please log in to view hosted photos in full size.

I have improved your beach picture using Lightroom 2.5

The settings I used were:
Temp +2 to bring out more red/yellow in faces.
Exposure +0.67 I prefer it a little lighter without blowing out image.
Sharpening 14
Radius 1.0
Detail 25

Did not play with Noise Reduction since I ussually do this with larger size images.

The image is not the same size due to exporting in lightroom

HOSTED PHOTO
please log in to view hosted photos in full size.

ndelacova wrote in post #10905931
I have improved your beach picture using Lightroom 2.5

The settings I used were:
Temp +2 to bring out more red/yellow in faces.
Exposure +0.67 I prefer it a little lighter without blowing out image.
Sharpening 14
Radius 1.0
Detail 25

Did not play with Noise Reduction since I ussually do this with larger size images.

The image is not the same size due to exporting in lightroom

Thanks ndelacova, that looks better than the original. i guess i need to install lightroom and play around with it. i gotta get better at these programs

Exposures can be brought up a bit, and the skin tones can be adjusted.

One of the bigger issues of shooting with on-board flash is the shiny faces. There are a variety of ways to tone the shine down.

Here's an example of some things you can do...

1. I adjusted the overall exposure with curves and did some local work with dodging/burning.
2. I adjusted the skin tones and also reduced the shine. Reducing the shiny faces alone will make a big difference.
3. I rotated image to fix the horizon and then cropped.
4. I cloned out a small cloud near the left edge of the frame.
5. I cloned out a patch of mom's "fly-away" hair, which is always a challenge at the beach.

ok..so i was playing around with lightroom and done this to the photo

definitely better.

Agreed^. I would clone out the bird and the phone camera left. I would also practice practice practice getting better images in camera then touch it up in LR or PS.
I think Adam did some good stuff here, but I would lower the highlights a tad....at least on the faces.
If you could, take gausian blurr and set it to about 23-25 opacity to soften it up.

how sweet

1downfall wrote in post #10916777
Agreed^. I would clone out the bird and the phone camera left. I would also practice practice practice getting better images in camera then touch it up in LR or PS.
I think Adam did some good stuff here, but I would lower the highlights a tad....at least on the faces.
If you could, take gausian blurr and set it to about 23-25 opacity to soften it up.

thanks downfall, i will definitely try what you suggested. haven't had a chance too in the last couple of days. the bird that you are referencing is actually a cloud. i'll edit that out..

Your kids are simply adorable.

thanks roy!