Pimp My Portrait: May 2011 Selections

PORTRAITURE

We did not get many submissions this month. Are people just afraid or not interested? I am not sure. In any event I have two portraits here that I pimped out. Check it out.

Nataisha from Bronx, NY

Nataisha is a good friend of mine and I love this photo. She is a beautiful thinker. So that is the direction I went with this portrait.

I always start off with adding contrast and saturation and some texture. Then I removed little hairs and smoothed out her skin a little. I started playing with the colors and had them really pop out but over time I did not think they did justice to the original photo. Eventually I settled with a more moody b&w.

The b&w helped remove the distracting background to help us focus more on Nataisha. It was important to add grain and darken the image to give it more of that melancholic look. Nataisha can be very contemplative so this final portrait captures both her beauty and her reflectiveness. I call it "A Beautiful Meditation".

Jenna from Florida

I wasn't sure what direction I would take this photo. Jenna with her friends on the beach already works. The original image did not have much detail so from the jump I knew I would play with some cross processing to give it more of a film look.

At first I enhanced the image quality and smoothed out their skin a little. Then I brought back some detail which was not there. Purple seemed to be the color that popped out most for me so I went in that direction.

I oversaturated the image right before I tacked on another frame to blend in with the black frame in the original. And that is how I came to this original pimped portrait.

These are the photos for the May 2011 "Pimp My Portrait".

Stay tuned for the next round of submissions at the end of June. Thanks for enjoying the blog.

Pimp My Portrait: May 2011 Submissions

PHOTOGRAPHY

Considering this is the last week of the month it is now time for “Pimp My Portrait”. Yes this fun little contest brings me great pleasure and also allows two special people to get really beautiful one-of-a-kind photos.

So for the next 70 hours I am accepting submissions of portraits YOU have taken. Out of all the selections received I will select two of them to "pimp" or "remix" in a fun/artistic way. I will post the before and after of the selected photos on my blog and on FB by noontime this Friday. Check here for last month's photos.

Here is the submission process. Email one portrait. Yes, email ONE portrait to josephdominickphotography@gmail.com. Submissions start right now and end on Thursday at 11:59am EST.

The portrait must have a person or persons included in it. This photo remix is not for landscapes, birds, cats, flower shots, etc. This is strictly portraiture of people. No nudity.

Sole discretion for selection of portraits belongs to Joseph Dominick. In light of the number of submissions, some great photos may not be selected. Please don't take it personal.

All people are encouraged to submit, regardless of your level of photographic skill. Please send your image in the highest quality jpg.

Upon completion of the portrait pimping, it will be emailed to the original photographer.

With email submission, please include your full name and what city/state or city/country you represent.

Thanks. And let the contest begin.

Pimp My Portrait: April 2011 Selections

PORTRAITURE

This month we did not receive many entries. And the entries that were in focus were pretty decent pictures already. So I really looked for some inspiration this morning.

Garfield from Bronx, NY submitted this photo

What could I do with this pretty family photo? First of all I always do my basic adding of contrast, saturation, and clarity. Then I went in to fix slight blemishes and smooth out their skin a little.

I tried this image as a Black and White but it didn't work. So instead I added some texture and then sanded it down with a silverish/purple filter. In this way I remove the background as a distraction and put more of the focus on the faces. Then I decided to add a border to finalize this image which I am truly digging.

Sheena Lee from New York

This portrait is already beautiful. It was done by a professional photographer. Sheena looks gorgeous as usual so I thought I would go in a very abstract/comic style direction.

In the original image Sheena's skin was very smooth which I think is great. I decided to bring back detail in the image by playing with the tonal qualities. The color version looked amazing. But since I wanted to stay away from the glamorous look of the original I proceeded to add a comic book style to the image.

I went into my chemical digital lab and took the image through a cyanotype process. That is when this new image started to come alive. Here is my comic book version of Miss Sheena Lee.

These are the photos for the April 2011 "Pimp My Portrait".

Stay tuned for the next round of submissions at the end of May. Thanks for enjoying the blog.

Pimp My Portrait: April 2011 Submissions

PHOTOGRAPHY

This is the last week of the month so it is time again for “Pimp My Portrait”.

For the next 70 hours I am accepting submissions of portraits YOU have taken. I will select two of them to "pimp" or "remix" in a fun/artistic way. I will post the before and after of the selected photos on my blog and on FB by noontime this Friday. Check here for last month's photos.

Here is the submission process. Email one portrait. Yes, email ONE portrait to josephdominickphotography@gmail.com. Submissions start right now and end on Thursday at 11:59am EST.

The portrait must have a person or persons included in it. This photo remix is not for landscapes, birds, dogs, flower shots, etc. This is strictly portraiture of people. No nudity.

Sole discretion for selection of portraits belongs to Joseph Dominick. In light of the number of submissions, some great photos may not be selected. Please don't take it personal.

All people are encouraged to submit, regardless of your level of photographic skill. Please send your image in the highest quality jpg.

Upon completion of the portrait pimping, it will be emailed to the original photographer.

With email submission, please include your full name and what city/state or city/country you are from.

Thanks. And let the contest begin.

Pimp My Portrait: March 2011 Selections

PORTRAITURE

Pimpin four portraits last time was too much so I decided on doing two this time. The two I finally selected were photos that actually worked well on their own. This made it quite interesting for me to figure out what direction I would go with each piece.

Once again thank you to all who submitted portraits for me to pimp this month. This will be a regular monthly thing so please be encouraged to submit again. Happy viewing.

Tara from New York submitted this photo

This beautiful photo was taken in Haiti during a recent missions trip. Upon first seeing it I really was not sure what to do. It was already black and white so I did not see myself trying to make it color. I decided to enhance the black and white with some layering, texturing, and contrast to help bring out the details in the guy's face. By adding definition to his face I wanted to bring the viewer closer and quicker into his reality.

The edgier background and the light vignette help draw the viewer's eye right to his face. I wanted his eyes to pop out of this image.

I also added a little light to the little boy's face to help us see his head better while still keeping the viewer's focus on the man's face.

My desire was to create a stark contrast to highlight the somberness, pain, and urgency of this moment in Haiti.

Michel from Bronx, NY submitted this photo.

This photo was taken during a theatrical performance. The colors and pose of the actors were so strong I immediately decided to push the envelope on both. Initially I enhanced the contrast and saturation, and then added in some texturing. I then placed a silver glowing tone over the entire image which really made it look good. But I was not satisfied with the image. It needed something more.

After some time I decided to posterize it hoping it would give me something remarkable. With a little time and tweaking I was able to find that right look.

These are the photos for the March 2011 "Pimp My Portrait".

Stay tuned for the next round of submissions at the end of April. Thanks for enjoying the blog.

Pimp My Portrait: February 2011 Selections

PORTRAITURE

I thought I would be ambitious and go for four portraits to pimp. Wow, next time I will stick to only two portraits. Time wise it is more efficient.

Thank you to all who submitted portraits for me to pimp. Here is what I have for your viewing.

Jenny from the Bronx, NY submitted this photo

The original photo was less than two inches in size which did not provide a whole lot of information in the image. I am a fan of this portrait of Jenny so I was glad to work with it. The first thing I did was add contrast and definition to her face and body. Then I cleaned her skin to minimize the pixelation and color grain which was in the photo. I added some glow. Then I played with a yellowish filter to enhance both the sunlight behind her and the overall ambient light. This brought out both her and her outfit. The resulting image is a richer, dreamier version of Miss Jenny.

Julissa from Warwick, NY submitted this photo.

This baby looked so cute I was not sure what direction I should go. I cropped the photo to draw more attention to the face. I removed the hair on her face and added some contrast and texture. Then I started to play with the coloring. It was only at the end I decided to add this old newspaper look to highlight the structure of her face and hat. The eyes popped out more when I did this and seeing both her and the hat with their tongue out was precious to me.

Melissa from Florida submitted this photo:

This was another photo which was small in size. I did not like the positioning of the body because it made Melissa's left arm appear bigger than it actually is. Because it is the closest element to the camera, the wide angle lens makes her arm look similar in size to her head. So I wanted to remove the focus from her arm to her face. One way I did that was by removing the distracting elements in the room. I settled my focus on her and not the room, which did not add anything to the portrait. I added a moonlight texture and cleaned up her skin. Then I added some more brightness to her face and brought down slightly the brightness of her left arm. I then topped it off with a lil glow.

Michael from Brooklyn, NY submitted this photo.

Michael photographs his family which he loves dearly. So I know this subject is his wife. I went to his Flickr site to see the other photos he has taken of her so I could go in a direction that was different than what he had already done.

The first thing I did was go to her face and remove a few strands of hair which did not need to be there. Had I had more time I would have removed more in the forehead area. However I thought for this photo it worked. I cleaned up the skin on her face and added some more contrast. I topped that off with a little glow which highlighted how Michael lit this portrait. If you notice he had his main light concentrated on the right side of her face. Then I started playing with pastel colors. I really liked her blue shirt so I wanted to stay in that color range. Once I found the coloring I liked I added a small frame to the edges.

So those are the photos for the "Pimp My Portrait" Contest of February 2011.

Stay tuned for the next round of submissions at the end of March. Thanks for enjoying the blog.