i <3 faces: fix-it friday

I have in the past actually downloaded the pictures for fix-it friday... but then somewhere along the way threw it all away getting annoyed with the project for one reason or another. However, today, I did not feel such annoyance. Instead, this was a little like therapy for me. Maybe it's the fact that I've been trying to learn so much about working with raw files that working with a jpg was like a breath of fresh air... :)

This was the original:



I actually really liked the crop on this picture, so I chose not to change that part from the original. After a few adjustments this is what I came up with for color:



I use photoshop cs3 and I have a few actions that i just love using.

Here's what I did for the color one:
boutwell magic glasses (tra action) - 100%
fresh and colorful (pioneer woman action) - saturation 40%, soft light 100%, light 25%
brightness - +20
contrast - +30

Then the black and white conversion was actually a little more difficult than I thought. Since the original didn't have a lot of depth or contrast, I ended up adding quite a bit to make it stand out without being too contrasty (in my opinion)



black and white boutwell magic glasses (tra action)
contrast - +50
bitchin bw - (tra action)
contrast - +30

Then there is this for comparison



If you like this and would like to try it yourself, head on over to I <3> and check it out!