Thursday, April 30, 2009

Picture of the Day – Pearls



This is a photo I took at a wedding last summer. It is a very simple composition, obviously of the bride’ pearls. However, simple can often be the quite pleasing.

The color version was OK, but nothing spectacular. I decided it needed some special touches. I cleaned up any minor skin imperfections and converted the image digitally to monochrome by using a selenium tone…then turned down the contrast as low as I dare.

As it was a close-up, many of the pearls are slightly out of focus. To make that more acceptable, I used a white masked vignette and played with the opacity till I got what I wanted. That is what gives the outer edges of the photo a sort of misty look.

I think it turned out very nicely and far better than the original image.

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