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wildflower essentials for lr4 is here! | wildflowers for lr4

admin — Mon, 14 May 2012 17:24:37 +0000

Finally. It’s here!

The Essentials for Lightroom 4.

My most popular, most purchased and most used (by me too) set of Lightroom presets I sell.

I know it took me a while but I really wanted to use these for a good month (after I was done tweaking them) to make sure that I just really loved them. I had to make a lot of adjustments. With Adobe really giving Lightroom a huge overhaul in version 4- I had to tweak the heck out of these things to get them as close to my Lr3 version as I could. Not only do I love this set- but because of the new tools in Lr4…I love them even more. With new Clarity improvements in version 4, I had to make use of that hard hitting version of Hazy Daisy BW called the Film version. Chocolate Lily also has a friend called Lite Matte and she is lighter and brighter. Works well on shadowy images where you want a hazy image with shadow lightening.

What about the rest of Wildflowers? Are you going to update them too? Yes, I am! I am going to actually finish up updating Squeaky Clean for Lightroom 4. THEN I will begin on updating the rest of Wildflowers for Lightroom4.

To see more Samples go HERE. You will find purchase info for the Lr4 version at the bottom of the page, in addition to this page.

Before sooc:

Chocolate Lily | Lite Matte plus Earth Tint and warmed up the image using Temp slider.

(both versions come with your purchase. please install ONLY the one that matches your lightroom version)

Lr4 Version is NOT compatible with Lr1, Lr2 or Lr3.

sample 3 color flower presets, 1 bw flower preset, 2 lush tints and our rad moody vignette

chocolate lily, gerber daisy, texas bluebonnet, earth tint, flax tint, edge burnt vignette and hazy daisy bw presets

PLUS 2 more presets exclusive to Lr4 version: Hazy Daisy | Film & Chocolate Lily | Lite Matte

Bold & Bright, Soft & Pastel, Hazy & Soft, Hazy & Bold

Your purchase includes BOTH Lr3 and Lr4 version. Please install the correct version after purchase.

Presets ideal for: RAW images, outdoor, *some indoor, landscape, creative portraits, for the retro/vintage photographer and for the playful clean processing photographer who wants just a little kick in their images.

$18

still shopping? don’t checkout out yet! keep shopping- we’ll remember what’s in your cart!

*****

What’s in my cart?

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IMPORTANT UPGRADE INFORMATION:

To get it for FREE-

Upgrade from Lr3 version to Lr4 version FREE

Please remit your Paypal receipt showing your purchase to amy@amymcmaster.com

A screen shot is acceptable. Please to do not send me a purchase/confirmation number only.

spring fling voting starts now | april 19-20

admin — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 23:43:58 +0000

And the WINNER is…..

Image #5. It was REALLY close though with 2 other images but this one took it with 45 votes!

Thank YOU so much to all the photographers who played and all the voters who voted.

Ericka, Congrats! Be on the lookout for your winning email!

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Thanks for playing our first monthly photo contest!

This month the theme was Spring Fling.

Winner will get a pre-release of my Spring Fling Lr3 or Lr4 set of presets, a month to Evoking You and a $25 Starbucks gift card.

TO VOTE:

The Image Number is located ABOVE each image. To vote, see poll at the end of this post and select the image number of your choosing.

I also inserted the images INTO the poll so you never lost your place or voted for the wrong image. I would love for you to use the blog’s comment section to let me know if you liked how I did this contest + poll. I am trying to make sure that what I end up doing for our future contests is easy to use and understand.

That’s it!

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NOW VOTE!

Take Our Poll

new name, new lightroom 4 presets, retiring sets 50% off and a contest oh my!

admin — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 07:33:12 +0000

Yay it’s Spring. Which means….Spring cleaning!

First we were AMP, then Olive Juice now back to AMP. What the heck? Exactly. I need to keep my business simple. For tax purposes, for paperwork- shoot for my sanity. So back to AMP and AMP we WILL stay.

If you go to my Facebook page- you’ll see we are having a Spring contest. Winner nabs themselves a $25 gift card to Starbucks, one month to Evoking You forum and a brand new set of Lightroom 4 presets from AMP. What about Lightroom 3? Well you choose which you need.

Sets Retiring and currently 50% off:

(discount applied at checkout)

Lightroom: Monochrome vol1 and Jewels

Photoshop and Elements: Autumn Days, Beyond Shades of Gray, Little Wonders, Vintage Recess, Nostalgia and Summer Haze.

Get’em while you can!

Sets that will be updated to Lr4:

Squeaky Clean and Wildflower Collections

At this time no others will be updated. Both updates will be offered to current owners of the original set for FREE.

—–

Where else can you find me?

Pinterest: amymcmaster

Instagram: amymcmaster

Twitter: amymcaster

See a common theme here?

I’d love to see your Spring image- send’em on over! We’ll be holding a MONTHLY image contest so be sure to check in May what the new theme is!

coupon code game | celebrating 3,000 likes on facebook

admin — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 22:00:36 +0000

THANK YOU!

i love what i do. i love that i get to work with new and seasoned photographers.

i love this business.

it is stressful. i work long hours maintaining my business.

researching ways to help it grow. thinking up ways to show current customers how much i appreciate them.

it takes both time and money to do what i do. i price myself so that i can cover my costs and have a little left over.

my goal has always been to offer a high quality product with high quality customer service at a price

that neither breaks your bank nor causes my money bank NOR my family time bank to go bankrupt.

i hope i am accomplishing that.

i think i am. 3,000 likes feels ah-mazing to me.

THANK YOU!!

—–

blah blah blah right?

—–

where’s the codes woman??!!

—–

Each day this weekend Friday/Saturday/Sunday I will hand out:

1- 100% off code

2- 75% off codes

5- 50% off codes

10- 35% off codes

_____

CODES RELEASED IN DESCENDING ORDER.

PLEASE REFRESH THE PAGE FOR NEW CODE.

IF YOU TRIED A CODE AND IT DID NOT WORK- SOMEONE ELSE GOT IT FIRST.

_____

RULES:

Any codes unused by the end of that day (Midnight) will be deleted before a new set is released the next day.

PLEASE pay careful attention to spelling when typing the codes.

If you won a 100, 75 or 50% off code- you may not play today or any of the other days.

There are no refunds on past purchases.

You may not use a 35% code today and win a 100% off code tomorrow and get a refund of the previous win’s purchase.

You can NOT give away any purchase you are unable to use. That violates my Copyright.

Buying a Digital Product means that you are the one and only legal owner. The ONLY owner and END user.

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HAVE FUN!!

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THANKS FOR PLAYING!!

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These remaining codes will be available until Midnight tonight or they are used up- whichever comes first.

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2012 New Year Discount off ANYthing OJS!

admin — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 19:27:06 +0000

OJS Juicy Offer of the Month!

Love OJS? Love a sweet deal? Who doesn’t!

Use the code: happytwenty12 to get 15% off a single purchase of actions or presets OR an entire purchase! Expires January 12th.

All my customers are valued by me. That’s why I have customer rewards called Thank You sets. Exclusive to customers who buy 3 or more sets of Lightroom presets.

3 or more sets purchased gets you Dock of the Bay- a funky little color shifting set. Great for vintage and color shifting fun. PLUS my exclusive Twilight set of presets for your Twihards (guilty!).

4 or more sets purchased and you get those 2 PLUS my set of Crush. Soft and sweet pastel colors.

To get the Thank You sets – please remit the Paypal receipts showing your Lightroom purchases to info@amymcmaster.com/shop

Exciting things coming up in 2012!

New actions for Photoshop AND Elements PLUS I will be adding Thank You sets for Action buyers too!

I will also be releasing a newly updated version of Squeaky Clean for Photoshop (an Elements version in the works), as well.

ACR users will also get to enjoy smaller versions of some of my favorite Lightroom sets! Scaled down to work in Photoshop’s ACR minus all the boosters to optimize space and ease of use in ACR.

Olive Juice also offers custom presets in 2012!

Beginning January 31, I will begin taking orders for custom Lightroom or ACR presets. My smallest package A Little Juicy will include 3 presets custom created on your images. You decide all color, all black& white or mix and match. We can start from scratch or you can pick a preset we already have in the shoppe and we can build from there. Pricing will begin at $45. Stay Tuned!

Olive Juice Little Big Christmas Giveaway!

admin — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 18:00:38 +0000

Winner Announced!

LORI Z Please contact me about collecting all your AWEsome prizes!

Winner has 3 days from this announcement to contact me to collect their prizes or I will select a new winner. Dec25.

For those of you who played and did not win:

Please email me at info@amymcmaster.com/shop

And collect a $10 gift code to my Shoppe.

Thank you ALL so much for playing and a very Merry Christmas!

________

The Olive Juice Shoppe Little Big Christmas Giveaway!

who? me and a few other givers in the Christmas mood

what? over $600 worth of photog goodies!

when? Dec16-20

and then when? winner(s) announced Dec22

why? why not?

The Details:

I LOVE my customers! It’s because of you that I get to do what I love-

Create fresh & fun yet functionally useful presets and actions for Lightroom & Photoshop!

So I thought I would give away my FAVORITE photography processing tool—> Lightroom.

I really wanted to gift this awesome program to someone… So I bought it and it’s sitting here by my desk – ready to go to a good home!

And to put icing on your Christmas sugar cookies- I pulled together a few other kickin’ prizes from vendors I love.

I didn’t contact just ANY vendors to get their goodies. I handpicked these prizes from people I actually know and love!

——

Prize 1: So in addition to winning Lightroom 3 (depending on Amazon’s mood can cost up to $299!) …

Prize 2: You will win a fantastic seat (worth more than $200!) in a Lightroom: Down & Dirty Workshop. At your own pace learn the basics and beyond of Lightroom. Kylie at Photoshop Naked is a super sweet gal and I know you’ll love this workshop! People ask me why I don’t teach Lightroom. Why? Kylie can do it a hundred times better than me and my ADD self could! (link takes you to more info on the workshop!)

Prize 3: Whether you are just starting out and need to put a brand together or need to re-brand, Kim at Madilu Designs can help you! The winner gets $100 to go towards custom branding from Madilu Designs. (I love working with her. She did the logo and my branding for all my photography materials like CD cover and business card!)

Prize 4: Evoking You Ahhh I love this place! Kelsey is the founder of Evoking You. Be inspired. Check out her site. You will get sucked in. I’m warning you- just sayin’. Winner gets an entire year pass to Evoking You Forum! A total non-business forum. Art served straight up. Come in to inspire and be inspired. Climb out of that box and rediscover your love for photography!

Prize 5: Loooops of Love Soft & sweet newborn head band. A fellow photographer who creates some sweet head bands and hats and more. Love nubby materials and earth tones? Then check out Kaitlyn’s work! I especially love her delicate earth-toned and pastel colored headbands. Elegant touch for newborn baby girl sessions!

Prize 6: Stella B Designs I have a ton of Brooke’s stuff. I asked her to make me some Lens Critters and poof! She did. I love using them on toddler sessions! Sweet hats that my own daughters love to wear? Got’em! Her owl hats caught my eye and I just HAD to beg her to donate one to the giveaway!

Let’s see…what else was I giving away?

Oh yeah!!

Prize 7: You pick a set of Olive Juice presets OR handpick 10 individual presets from various Olive Juice sets of presets and I will custom tweak them to YOUR images!

Awesome?

Check!

***

So what do YOU need to do to enter?

***

This is the cool part.

You don’t have to like a bazillion Facebook pages or ANY for that matter .

(But you certainly will make these vendors day if you do!)

1. On MERIT I ask you to personally go to each person’s link and check out their work.

(links above. plus you’ll learn more about their prize!)

2. After you check them all out, please post about THIS giveaway with a link to this giveaway on your Google+, Twitter or Facebook.

3. In ONE post – come back here and tell me that you checked everyone & posted a link to the contest.

4. That’s it, yo!

***

THAT is your entry. Just ONE entry per contestant.

IF we get 200 entries, I will add a Second prize.

I will give away my ENTIRE Shoppe to the Winner (in addition to me custom tweaking one set or 10 individual presets)

PLUS I will draw a second random number and THAT person will also win their choice of a PSE & LR or PS & LR Bundle!

**you can share the contest link MORE places and more often- if you’d like to bump up the stakes BUT you do not get extra entries.

***

So pass the word on our Little Big Christmas Giveaway and bump up the stakes!

**Domestic shipping of physical products will be paid by the vendor. International shipping costs will need to be covered by the winner.

Want to see more info? All through the Giveaway I will be posting tidbits, images from the vendors and sharing more stuff on our awesome Vendors!

Checkout my Facebook to stay updated on the Christmas what-nots and see how close you are getting to the 200!

Olive Juice Shoppe

***

You don’t have to check/fan/like these to enter- but just in case you wanted to…

Facebook Links for our awesome contributing Vendors!

Photoshop Naked/Lightroom Down & Dirty https://www.facebook.com/phauntpsn

Madilu Designs https://www.facebook.com/MadiLuDesigns

Evoking You https://www.facebook.com/pages/evoking-you/242201895805464

Loooops of Love https://www.facebook.com/Loooopsoflove

Stella B Designs https://www.facebook.com/stellabdesigns

sharpen this | sharpen action pack for ps and elements

admin — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 18:06:56 +0000

For PSE6-CS5

Sharpening is so personal and to taste that I just wanted to share what I use- and not charge for it. I actually use this set on all my images. ALL. I round out my corners if I want, I add my watermark and then run one of the sharpen actions. The defaults are my own. So some adjusting of the opacity will be in order. And maybe even some masking. If you are familiar with my action shares- you’ll notice I am sharing a whole set. Wow right?

About the actions.

There is a web wallets action that sizes to 350px on the long end. I sometimes use this action (or the 600 one) for the websized versions I give to clients on purchased images. Watermark it and if they try to print it- it will look sooooo bad (and if you are a client reading this going say what?? how rude! realize that web versions are never for print). You will note that these come in V (vertical/long/portrait) and H (horizontal/wide/landscape) versions- as these actions size the longest end of that orientation. Almost all the actions, except the print sharpening actions have a V and H version.

And then there are 3 (6 if you count them individually) Facebook resize and sharpen actions. You can absolutely use them for anywhere, but I tweaked the sharpening for my personal use on Facebook. That’s why the label FB.

They come in 3 sizes: 600, 700, 800 pixels. I use 600 in client galleries. The 700 for images for Facebook- personal and fan page. And I use 800 for my blog. But I sometimes use the other sizes on Facebook too. And of course the V and H versions for the correct image orientation.

Proof 4×6 Prints: Then my handy little action that I use when I am printing a large amounts of 4×6 prints from my lab. I use this action for actual 4×6 cropped images only OR if I want very large web versions of an image. Why would I use this for 4x6s and reduce the pixel size? For uploading times. If I am uploading 30 4×6 images to my lab- it takes less time to get them uploaded. You may never need these actions though. It’s also handy if you sell a scrap pack digital collection (where you sell 4×6 sized digital images rather than full res). In Photoshop it can be batched and it’s so darn handy. I use this action too if I am sending files to family- knowing they only want the file to print a quick 4×6 of my toddler or something from Walmart (think personal family snapshots).

And then finally my printing actions. These do not resize at all. Or change resolution. They simply sharpen. One is USM (unsharp mask), another in USM but inverted so you use a white brush and simply paint on the places you want to sharpen and then lastly- High Pass Sharpen adds clarity.

USM is the most used sharpening method. A little goes a long way. Watch the eyes and hair. We don’t want sparkly hair and alien eyes. Err I hope. Pull back the opacity or mask if you see this happening. I LOVE using the inverted aka Paint On version of the USM the most. I paint my subject and let my bokeh be sweet and creamy without any sharpening. I also use these on any images I don’t want to resize- even if it’s for web. Sometimes I size other sizes than my (600, 700 and 800) and these actions come in handy. Although I need to dial down the opacity a lot.

With High Pass some people use it as their sharpening, some use it at a low opacity to add a little clarity. Especially on textures..bricks etc. Looks so awesome. You can invert the mask (ctrl + i) and paint it on parts of the image you want to pull out little details- like veins on petals, bricks, cars etc. Elements users please note that when you play the action that contains the sharpening actions (USM and High Pass) it will appear to do nothing. You must turn on the layers yourself or use a white brush on the black mask of the paint on USM version.

A before and after. Although I almost found it hard to do this. Harder to see sharpening affects because monitors vary so much.

For Web:

with web. you get what you see. that’s why i always make sure i size as close as possible to the location the image will be in and THEN sharpen. it will look it’s best this way. like with fb- they scrunch your image to 720 pixels on the long end. if it’s larger than that- facebook shrinks it and this can make your image appear softer than it really is. that’s why i use 700 almost exclusively. smaller looks great too. but not bigger than 720.

*update: now Facebook resizes to 960 pixels on the long end. I now personally use my 960 Facebook action for resizing and sharpening for blog and web. But you pick what works best for you!

For Print:

be sure to zoom in at 100% to see how it’s really sharpening. sometimes it looks great until you zoom into 100% and go oh crud- way too much!

Sharpen This!

[for pse6 to cs5]

FREE!

sharpen this | sharpen action pack for ps and elements

admin — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 18:06:56 +0000

For PSE6-CS5

About the actions.

A before and after. Although I almost found it hard to do this. Harder to see sharpening affects because monitors vary so much.

For Web:

*update: now Facebook resizes to 960 pixels on the long end. I now personally use my 960 Facebook action for resizing and sharpening for blog and web. But you pick what works best for you!

For Print:

be sure to zoom in at 100% to see how it’s really sharpening. sometimes it looks great until you zoom into 100% and go oh crud- way too much!

Sharpen This!

[for pse6 to cs5]

FREE!

960 Facebook Sharpen and Resize Action

admin — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:12:16 +0000

I didn’t just make this action but I have been personally using is for – well a really long time. All my images on my blog are resized and sharpened with them. Now that Facebook has made room for a larger image viewing you have the option of sizing up to 960 pixels.

Yay! I’m a fan of “bigger is better”. I just love how wider shots you take will show more detail. As always, Facebook is not known for image quality. I took the school of mind of “oh well. it’s free. deal with it. no one is pickier about my image quality than i am anyway.” So no more FB quality stresses for me. It is what it is. But if you want some more awesome nerdy tech info about the whys of FB sizing check out Damien’s (who is the shiz on geeky photoshop and digital image stuff) blog post on the subject.

Back to 960. They are sharpening actions- you need to adjust the sharpening to taste. Since this is from my personal stash – it was made especially for my images. You will likely need to adjust the opacity of the sharpen layer. Included in the free FB sharpening set is a tip sheet for the paint on sharpening actions. The one labeled with a V means vertical- it means it will take your tall/portrait/vertical oriented image and resize the vertical long end to 960px. The one labeled with an H means horizontal- it means it will take your wide/landscape/horizontal oriented image and resize the horizontal long end to 960px.

Why not sharpen the whole darn image and be done with it? Frankly- it’s all about my image. Not just the image but MY image. I want it to look as good as I can and if I pick where the viewer is going to look first by interesting crops/framing then I am going to go the extra step to also sharpen only what is important in that image. And usually for me it’s the eyes, hair, some of the lips and clothing. For me there is just a teensy more visual impact. BUT there are absolutely times when you want to sharpen the entire thing. Check the tip sheet (pdf included) for tips. Not to mention that you completely avoid sharpening the noise in the image and the skin -making the skin appear slightly smoother without actually smoothing. Bonus!

What’s the action without the H or V in the name?

The action that does not have H or V in the name- is the original one I sent out. I decided to include it as people love it so. It sharpens horizontally to 960px and sharpens the entire image.

Ok I am using a personal snapshot for the first sample:

(my son is in the background holding his pet alligator lizard haha)

And the second is a black and white client image.

This little mini Facebook sharpening set is free from me to you. Hope you find it useful!

It can be batched easily in Photoshop (not Elements) and you can go in and simply paint where you want your sharpening.

Cost? Zero. Zip. Zilch. Nada.

Free!

Got some more shopping to do? No need to check out just yet. Just keep shopping. At any point you are ready to check out- click on any of these little View Cart buttons and everything you added to your cart from my Shoppe will be in it.

clean edit | lightroom to photoshop

admin — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:06:00 +0000

so i thought since it’s been a while since my last tweaker- i should share one.

i wanted to use a plain image to illustrate just a good basic clean.

my image was ok sooc (straight out of the camera) but very cool and blah.

i really just wanted to clean it up a little.

my white balance was great after warming it up in lightroom. so no further tweaks were required in photoshop- but this is not always the case.

in a future tweaker i will be sure to show some tweakers where i have to fiddle with skin tones or color casts.

in lightroom i played the preset {delight} from the squeaky clean set. now i have to note here- that you will likely need to try a couple on a new image to see which best fits the image.

lighting, colors, white balance- so many things can affect how a preset will look. many of the presets will look great on sooc cool images as they tend to warm them up inside the preset.

there are a few that are a tad bit ‘not clean’ and just a little sweet on color and tone. and they can work on the right image. for example- {rose water} is a perfectly lovely preset but it is really best played on backlit images where some natural sun haze comes into play. it adds just a pinch of sweet pinkness.

but always never forget- you must adjust presets and actions. playing any action or preset and expecting it to magically transform your image from meh to ah-mazing is really a beginning editor’s ‘mistake’.

although i ran the {delight} preset i still needed to adjust the lights (too bright), added some fill light (pulls shadows out for harsh lighting. got unpleasant shadows in the eyes and face- fill light is yo friend!) and a tad bit of recovery because i could see my highlights were still pushing ‘too bright’ status on this particular image.

ah-mazing are the results of almost always tweaking sliders (lightroom/acr) and masking layers and adjust layer opacities in photoshop. tweak tweak tweak!

if you do not know what a mask is or know how to mask (for photoshop/elements users)- that is something you definitely want to educate yourself on. your life in elements and photoshop will absolutely transcend what you thought your images could look like.

although lightroom is my main program- i never ever EVER use photoshop without doing some masking.

masking is like putting on makeup. you don’t put a thick gob of mascara on your lashes and leave it all goopy. NO! we comb through those lashes and get the clumps out. we don’t just put an inch of eyeshadow on our eyes- no way! we use several colors and we use a brush to blend blend blend and remove where some color might have shifted to (like a cheek) and we don’t want it there right?

and dudes…think of it like detailing a car. you have all these tiny little tools to help you go in after a big paint job to make sure that are no air bubbles, creases, cracks, globs, smudges, fingerprints…masking allows you to place effects EXACTLY where you want it. anything you do in photoshop- pretty much- can be masked.

so here we go. we take the lightroom image from above that we played {delight} preset on and then tweaked and now we run it through photoshop.

now you might have noticed i did not cover ALL the layers that you get in in the squeaky clean CLEAN action. there are several. these are the ones i usually hit on a basic clean edit.

there are layers to help strip color casts. it’s called Stain Lifters. it’s a very simple action that helps you lift ’stains’. open up that layer and use a soft WHITE brush on the black layer mask. i like to start at about 40% opacity on the brush and swipe on the color casted areas. i swipe again if needed. i hit X if i need to erase (X changes my brush back to the opposite color and in this case since we started with a white brush- it will change it black. now i can erase the effects off areas i may not want it to go. i often use the red and/or orange layers for reddened eye rims, pimples, scratches. the green and yellow layers are good for the darn little casts you sometimes get from grass reflecting on your subject. remember that it’s purpose is to minimize not be a magic wand.

there is also a toothbrush in the action- but there are no teeth showing here. there are also level layers, curve layers and color balance layers for fixing exposure/tone and white balance and skin tones. these layers DO require user input. you can’t play the action and expect it to automatically scrub the image. starting from the bottom layer and working your way to the top most layer is usually the most effective and efficient way to use this action. you do NOT need to shoot raw to have the squeaky clean action set. it works really great on sooc jpgs. and often you will not have to reduce opacity of the More Color layer. some jpg shooters even select this layer and tap CTRL J and duplicate the layer for extra color- some masking may be required on the yellows/greens as they can get a tad nuclear if pushed too far. the layer itself is generally pretty kind to skin tones however.

ok so let’s recap! another before and after and after.

now see the final image? it’s just…nice. colorful but not too much. it’s just clean.

your images may require more or less. it depends on lighting, your shooting style, equipment used (flash/studio often requires less ‘cleaning’)…so please always look at each image as a new dish.

it might require a different amount of spices than a previous image or a new spice altogether.

so get tweaking!