Free The Art of Pregnancy Photography by Jennifer George

Midnight filter, you can use the settings in the Nik Selective palette to selectively apply the effect. To do so, you can apply the effect to the overall image, as outlined above, then use the Erase tool in the Selective palette. To do so, choose the Erase mode, select a suitable brush size in Photoshop’s Options bar, reduce the tool’s opacity, paint over areas that should appear slightly lighter and sharper (e.g., the eyes and the highlights in the hair), and hit Apply. Alternatively, you can simply select the Midnight filter from the Selective palette, adjust all of the sliders in the Basic and Advanced palette as desired (see steps 3 and 4 above) and then click on the Paint button to selectively add the filter to specific image areas. When the image appears as you desire, hit Apply. For the majority of the images in this book, the entire image was covered except for the eyes, lips, and sometimes hair.
    BASIC RETOUCHING AND ENHANCEMENT
    The steps below illustrate how making a few refinements to this touching family portrait made for a more attractive and salable image. You can employ these techniques to correct similar problems in your own images. Note: Be sure to save a backup copy of all of your images before retouching them so that you always have an original file to revert to should the need arise.
     
To remove the visible veins and blemishes from the mother’s stomach, the background layer was duplicated (Layer>Duplicate Layer).
Next, the Healing Brush was used to retouch the stomach area.
The Clone tool, with an opacity setting of 100% was selected next, and skin was sampled and stamped over the visible portion of the girl’s shorts. Note that this tool can also be used to extend the background area if need be and to add more fabric to better cover the body (or stamp skin tones over some clothing that’s peeking out from under a tulle wrap).

    This screen shot shows two images—the final portrait (left) once the retouching was complete and the filter effect was applied, and the original (right).

    (Left) The Healing Brush was used to retouch the subject’s stomach area. (Center) The mother’s stomach was selected with the Lasso tool. (Right) A layer mask was created to isolate the woman’s stomach.

    This screen shot shows the Nik Midnight filter Basic palette and the settings chosen for this image.
4. The stretching of the skin across the pregnant mother’s midsection resulted in a slightly lighter skin tone in this area. To solve this problem, the stomach area was isolated with the Lasso tool. With the selection active, I clicked on the Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette and changed the blending mode to Multiply. The layer opacity was reduced to 57% to ensure that the stomach area matched the rest of the woman’s skin.
5. The layers were merged (Layer>Flatten image), and a new duplicate layer (Layer>Duplicate Layer) was created.
6. The last step was to enhance the new duplicate layer with Nik Software’s Midnight filter. To create this image, settings of Blur = 51%, Contrast = 52%, Brightness = 98%, and Color = 89% were selected in the Basic filter palette. If you desire, you can use the Advanced palette (accessed by clicking Advanced at the top-left corner of the Basic palette) to specify the degree to which the image highlights and shadows will be protected when the filter is applied. For this image, those values were Protect Highlights = 50% and Protect Shadows = 20%. Next, I clicked OK to apply the filter.
7. With the desired effects in place, the image was flattened (Layer>Flatten Image) and saved.
    NIK’S MONDAY MORNING FILTER
    Nik’s Monday Morning filter (also available in the Nik Color Efex Pro 2.0 filter set) is another great option for finishing an image. The following technique is courtesy of Patricia Mathis, who is also the model in the image!
     
Patricia accessed Nik’s Monday Morning filter through Photoshop’s Filter menu. In the Basic palette, the sliders were