Skin tones - little feedback, please...

I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy. I tried to process with this in mind, and ended up
adding a warming filter in CS2 at about 13% - 18%. Anyway, do these
look usable? Not in a commercial sense, but for a benefit, blown up
to around 18x24...

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/studio_bw_pics

Thx,

Ben

I think they need more contrast.

I like Ross.jpg and Michael.jpg




"Ben Miller" wrote in message
ups.com...
I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy. I tried to process with this in mind, and ended up
adding a warming filter in CS2 at about 13% - 18%. Anyway, do these
look usable? Not in a commercial sense, but for a benefit, blown up
to around 18x24...

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/studio_bw_pics

Thx,

Ben

Ben Miller wrote:
I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy. I tried to process with this in mind, and ended up
adding a warming filter in CS2 at about 13% - 18%. Anyway, do these
look usable? Not in a commercial sense, but for a benefit, blown up
to around 18x24...

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/studio_bw_pics

Thx,

Ben

They look OK, but why did you choose B/W for candid portraits?
Had you taken them in color you would have had the option of editing
them in color or grayscale.
Bob Williams

"Ben Miller" wrote in message
ups.com...
I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy. I tried to process with this in mind, and ended up
adding a warming filter in CS2 at about 13% - 18%. Anyway, do these
look usable? Not in a commercial sense, but for a benefit, blown up
to around 18x24...

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/studio_bw_pics

Not bad - you've done a good job of capturing the subjects' facial
expressions. About 1/3 of the images are too dark, and may not look good
once printed.
--
Mike Russell
www.curvemeister.com

Ben Miller wrote:
I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy. I tried to process with this in mind, and ended up
adding a warming filter in CS2 at about 13% - 18%. Anyway, do these
look usable? Not in a commercial sense, but for a benefit, blown up
to around 18x24...

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/studio_bw_pics

If those are pretty much straight representations from the camera,
you're fine. They look muddy because they're too dark and have too
little contrast in the relevant portion of the range, but they're easily
within the fixable range.

Look at channel mixer for doing B&W reductions from color originals; you
can probably get a better B&W representation than these have.

You may be having some trouble with veiling flare from the strong
backlight, as well. Not much to be done, other than get a better lens
(and that isn't always possible or even sufficient), when the light
source is actually in the frame.

On May 23, 2:46 pm, David Dyer-Bennet wrote:

You may be having some trouble with veiling flare from the strong
backlight, as well. Not much to be done, other than get a better lens snip

It's the Indian, not the arrow...the 70-200 VR is a fantastic lens.

On May 23, 4:48 pm, Bob AZ wrote:
On May 23, 11:32?am, Ben Miller wrote:

I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy.

Ben

Bump up the brightness until they still look OK. Then do an "Auto
Contrast". But then again they still look OK for your purpose.

If they were for commercial use I would take the advise of others here
and do them again in color and reproduce in B&W or whatever.

Bob AZ

I punched this one up a little bit - lost some highlights, but that's
ok, I still feel it fits the vision:

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/image/79305289

How's this?

On May 23, 6:41 pm, Ben Miller wrote:
On May 23, 4:48 pm, Bob AZ wrote:





On May 23, 11:32?am, Ben Miller wrote:

I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy.

Ben

Bump up the brightness until they still look OK. Then do an "Auto
Contrast". But then again they still look OK for your purpose.

If they were for commercial use I would take the advise of others here
and do them again in color and reproduce in B&W or whatever.

Bob AZ

I punched this one up a little bit - lost some highlights, but that's
ok, I still feel it fits the vision:

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/image/79305289

How's this?- Hide quoted text -


It wants a password.

--
YOP...

On May 24, 1:09 pm, Nervous Nick wrote:
On May 23, 6:41 pm, Ben Miller wrote:





On May 23, 4:48 pm, Bob AZ wrote:

On May 23, 11:32?am, Ben Miller wrote:

I took these shots yesterday for a non-profit art studio. The
subjects are all autistic adults taking art lessons. At any rate, the
shots are B&W, and they came off of the camera looking all blue and
grey - very mushy.

Ben

Bump up the brightness until they still look OK. Then do an "Auto
Contrast". But then again they still look OK for your purpose.

If they were for commercial use I would take the advise of others here
and do them again in color and reproduce in B&W or whatever.

Bob AZ

I punched this one up a little bit - lost some highlights, but that's
ok, I still feel it fits the vision:

http://www.pbase.com/sirchandestroy/image/79305289

How's this?- Hide quoted text -

It wants a password.

Had to do that. They are concerend about the anonymity of the
students, and I have to respect that. Thanks for all of the input,
guys.