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How to bring face details out in this photo?


DaBoo

DaBoo

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Any suggestions on how to bring out the details and colour of the proprietor's face in the photo below? The dodge tool, as you can see, flattens the detail and causes a certain amount of pixelation. At the root of the problem is the fact that it's a scan of an old slide in TIF format. I don't have the ability to rescan at present so would like to make the most of what I have. I'd like to preserve the glint on his glasses and keep the contours of his face as much as possible.Because it's in the shadows with low contrast, it hard to grab the edges with the magic wand.

URBAN031.jpg
 
Hi @DaBoo
Pretty difficult to pull out much from the image. The whole image has the resolution less than a 1Mpixel camera and the pixels of the subject has a lot of noise.
One step would be to link in the TIF file via a file sharing service instead of the JPEG file supplied.
Not sure that would help without a much better scan with less noise (unless that is in the negative).
The image below shows the Luminosity, Hue, and Saturation extracted from the image and you can see there is not much to work with from a color basis.
I gave it a go yet not much luck in any good result.
Thought I would share what I found though
John Wheeler

EDIT - the uppper left image is the original yet labeled it wrong FYI

URBAN031-adj.jpg
 
If you could provide a headshot of the proprietor's face, there would be a better chance to achieve an appealing result.
 
No... you don' have to rescan this image.
If it is possible, please ask the lady to give you good foto of her head.
Post this foto here, and some talented members will photoshop this foto into the image of the grocery store.
 
I found the original scan and saved it in PSD format without making any alterations. It can be downloaded here. Size 53 MB. I'm not sure where to go from here other than farting around with the burn tool.
 
This is about the best I can do with my skill set:

urban0003c.jpg

If I try to bring out more of the proprietor's face, it just starts to pixilate...
 
Sorry for lack of replies. I did try to pull an image out of the shadows but there just isn't enough "information" there. It ends up being a ghost-like image.
Possibly someone else will jump in. But those shadows are pretty deep.
- Jeff
 
JeffK said:
Sorry for lack of replies. I did try to pull an image out of the shadows but there just isn't enough "information" there. It ends up being a ghost-like image.
Possibly someone else will jump in. But those shadows are pretty deep.
- Jeff
Click to expand...
Did you use the large scan [53 MB] from 3 posts up?
 
DaBoo said:
Did you use the large scan [53 MB] from 3 posts up?
Click to expand...
Yes - used that large download.
I tried camera raw, curves, shadows/highlights...really wasn't able to bring him out any better than what you showed.
Here's a portion what I could recover:
urban0003a download edited closeup.jpg

I may just be at the limit of my knowledge base. Possibly others will jump in that we've revived the discussion... :)
- Jeff
 
JeffK said:
Yes - used that large download.
I tried camera raw, curves, shadows/highlights...really wasn't able to bring him out any better than what you showed.
Here's a portion what I could recover:
View attachment 120961

I may just be at the limit of my knowledge base. Possibly others will jump in that we've revived the discussion... :)
- Jeff
Click to expand...
Thanx for taking the time, Jeff. It's too bad, I love the shot. Wish I'd had a digital camera at the time.
 
daboo,

out of curiosity, why is this picture so important?
as has been pointed out, there's hardly any info in the pic to be manipulated... surely inserting an existing, clean pic of the proprietor would be the easiest, and possibly the only, solution
 
ushere said:
daboo,

out of curiosity, why is this picture so important?
as has been pointed out, there's hardly any info in the pic to be manipulated... surely inserting an existing, clean pic of the proprietor would be the easiest, and possibly the only, solution
Click to expand...
As I said it's not possible. The other thing is I'm not interested in fiction, I'm interested in compensating somewhat for the limited latitude of film. Finally, it's a good shot, technical shortcomings notwithstanding: I had noticed this little shop on Vancouver's West Pender Street from the bus window on numerous occasions and, though at first glance it wasn't much, something about it kept nagging at me. Finally I decided to take a stroll in that direction, on the prowl for fresh graffiti and other urban mayhem with the ultimate objective of getting a shot of the shop too. Not until I had viewed the photo after the fact did I realize the payoff. I started to notice details like the stuffed monkey swinging among the delightfully floating bananas, the five cent discount on bananas with a smile, the cross-cultural "Dairy & Ginseng" sign and, the pièce de résistance, the proprietor's face gazing up and out of his forlorn little world. Even the lottery signs speak eloquently of desperation.
 
Here is a proof of concept. Pretty rough. I brought out what I could in the entire background.
Beyond my skill levels for a quality result
John Wheeler
urban0003a-proof-of-concept.jpg
 
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