Raven

[KimC]

Terry, I apologize that I did not see your response until now. Thank you so much for your very kind well wishes. It was a big decision :-)

Yes, Raven and I are starting Chapter 2 together. I couldn't have a better buddy.

I agree, the cloning was not good... Def an area I need to improve upon. Thank you for providing possible causes that led to the poor results.

I do see the specular highlights on her coat & cleaning them up would only enhance my pretty girl.

Thanks for mentioning sharpening her eyes. Usually I brighten the eyes and add a bit of saturation, but hadn't considered sharpening. Also appreciate your thoughts on the catchlight.

I really appreciate your detailed and thoughtful response - thank you so much.

Hi Kim!

Congratulations on May 8th! Wish I could say the same!

And congratulations on Raven as well! She is a total cutie and I know she will have a great life having you as her Human! Love the demure pose you caught her in!

You have nailed a lot of things here in-camera. I’m kind of wanting to see all of Raven here instead of cropped, but who cares what I want anyway! The right third works well with her looking camera left.

But I’m going to have to disagree with most of the opinions on your post production and agree with yours. I’m sorry to have to say that the cloning of the dandelions failed.

There is a “border” around the clone area, and the clone area doesn’t match at all. I’m afraid it is very obvious. It looks to me that you have tried to clone too much area at once and possibly used too hard a brush. There is a repeating pattern and it is easy to see that it came from the immediate left and down a tad from the cloning area. Further, there is a leaf that shows in front of Raven’s shoulder in the cloning area. These are all dead giveaways and very obvious in Raven’s case. The clone, I’m afraid, is much more of a problem than are the dandelions.

Then, there are the spots that are appearing as specular highlights on Raven’s coat. Easily fixed and I would say worth the effort.

Since the shot is cool of her? I would give her some TLC as regards her eye (sharpening for sure, maybe a 5% enlargement) and clean up a bit around that. Maybe a bit of catchlight defining with the one spot to the right of the main catchlight eliminated. She is just like a Human (may already think she is one) and her eyes are the window to her Soul. Just like human portraiture, her eyes will be the key when you are shooting her this tight.

It’s a cool shot Kim, no doubt. In the case of this shot of her it is a matter of post production technique that Raven will have to depend on you to make happen for her!

It seems that the two of you have each started a new road for your lives. And you two are going to do it together! Awesome!

Can’t wait to see it happen!