DPP Part 4 - Reality and Intervention - Exercise 3 - Enhancement

DPP Part 4 - Reality and Intervention - Exercise 3 - Enhancement

This exercise explores the next level of intervention and allows you to make changes that many would say go beyond reality.

The exercise asks for a close-up, head and shoulders portrait in available or natural lighting taken without flash or photographic lighting, the face should not be in direct light but face toward the camera with both eyes clearly visible.


Selection 1
This should be of the whole face which I should adjust increasing brightness and contrast. The result should draw the viewers attention to the face.

Starting Position:

This image was taken with ISO at 2000 to boost available diffused light



I've then zoom copped on image, drawn round the face with the magnetic lasso, feathered the edge so its not so sharp and then increased contrast and brightness to 12 so that there are changes but not so as to appear excessive

I've then sharpened the image using unsharp mask and cropped the image to reduce some of the bland background.

Selection 2

I've created a duplicate layer for each eye then used the lasso and drawn freehand around each eye on its individual layer. For both eyes I've:
 - adjusted contrast to 40
 - adjusted brightness to 40
 - adjusted saturation to 30

I've the used unsharp mask to sharpen the image:

The question the exercise poses is: At what point between lighting the face for visibility  and altering the eye colour do I consider I have tampered with reality?

Well this is a personal view point and in its extreme tampering with light is perhaps tampering with reality. However I see this as a more acceptable change as light can also be changed artificially and also to adjust the differences between what the eye may see and the camera sensor may capture.

In terms of the eye colour changes then the changes I have made are subtle but for me is much more tampering with reality. Fashion and TV magazines will sometimes even change the eye colour completely, this is also seen in many pop videos. However I think that there is an acceptance that fashion / model studio images do come with some change and there is a movement from reality. This is often performed to sell products, music or magazines and many other items. 

Where change perhaps could be seen to be unacceptable is where eye colour and brightness is enhanced on the basis of attempting to sell a product that does this. This for me is not only a change from reality but is also promising results from a product which in this image at least where not caused bu sung the product so is published under false pretences.

Another change change is often the use of soft focus and in the film industry I recall a TV series which starred Joan Collins whom whenever was in scene always seemed to get a special soft focus lens used for the filming. Its use, perhaps as a result of the technology for its tome, was in fact obvious to see so the illusion for me actually failed