Fix It Friday

Another fix-it-friday! WOOO! I know you're PUMPED and have been refreshing my blog minute after minute waiting for this. The reason for the delay is (1) I wrote another blog post this morning, so if you haven't read it scroll down and do so and (2) they don't post the fix-it-friday photo until Friday so I have to edit it and write the blog post in one day. I know. So sad.

Moving on... For today's FIF, I wanted to do a little step-by-step with pics. So if you don't care about this kind of thing, just look at the pretty pictures, ooh and ahh, and move on to the next post. If you do care about this kind of thing, please don't hesitate to comment with questions or thoughts :)

Here's our beautiful original.

And now for the step-by-step. Follow along left to right.

1) crop original photo
2) adjust levels to bring out the whites
3) adjust curves to brighten more
4) MCP Magic Skin action - opacity at 50 percent
5) adjust color balance by lowering the blues and upping the yellows just a tad
6) new levels adjustment to bring down the reds in her face in select sections
7) readjust curves (I wanted it a little brighter) and get rid of her stray hairs with clone/healing tools
8) add texture of "sunshine" at 10% opacity

Here's our final. It always amazes me the powers of photoshop. Really, our touches were pretty minor, but together they make this okay photo stunning! (Self pat on back)

Alright. Black and white. I'm not going to do the step-by-step photos since it's pretty basic. First thing I do is start with my edited color version and desaturate. Then I adjust my levels -- in this case, I left the white slider alone and only upped the blacks. Then I added a black and white gradient map at 50%, added a very subtle warmth layer, and they ya go.

Hope you enjoyed it!