Giveaway of the Day Forums

1. 

   mikiem2
   Moderator

   SoftSkin Photo Makeup isn't anything extreme... It's not terrible software to use or install, adding a single "SoftSkin Photo Makeup" folder that holds the program's files. [Didn't record *Anything* like the mysterious updater that Richard Sebire posted (#2 comment).] As far as the registry goes, there's a new key for uninstall + a new HKCU\ Software\ softorbits\ SoftSkinPhotoMakeup key. If you read the software's readme.txt file you'll see it was tested with, & presumably designed for "Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 6, Windows 2000 Service Pack 2 and Windows XP operating systems." That might explain irene's post [#3] about having to run SoftSkin Photo Makeup as admin for the app to show registered -- I've seen this on a few apps that weren't designed for Vista or later.

   The software itself has a simple, easy to use interface, with a basic spot remover, auto image correction or enhancement, & a few paint-on tools. You can make a relatively crude selection, which you'll need for the smudge filter for example. Based on the ad copy up top ["... you no longer need to apply numerous layers in Adobe Photoshop."] My Guess is that it's targeted for the user who wants something hands-on -- as opposed to apps where most or all adjustments are automatic -- but doesn't want to bother with any sort of learning. That's not meant as criticism -- there are plenty of things I have little or no interest in, & I don't spend a lot of time learning anything related to them either.

   So in a nutshell, SoftSkin Photo Makeup is very useable, & you can edit & hopefully improve the head shots you've taken with your camera -- I stop short of saying portraits because to me there's a real difference between a portrait & a snapshot of someone's face, & I don't think anyone is going to use today's GOTD for minimally serious portrait work. If it has a weakness it's that much [most?] of its intended market takes pictures with their cell phones, using the filters either on their cell or on the site they upload their pictures to. There's much better software available, but it takes time & effort to learn how to use it, and SoftSkin Photo Makeup doesn't seem designed to compete with those apps anyway.

   Posted 10 years ago #
2. 

   mikiem2
   Moderator

   From the download page...

   #6: "In other words, make the picture artificial and not real. All those changes are not making it better, they are exaggerating the shadows, blending of the colors and the ambient to something else. If you like to play with it, it is fine, but a professional photo loses all the value when re-colored or re-tinted, unless of course you wanted to fool someone into thinking that you are a “real” photographer."

   This is NOT a critique, moriss2, but rather just info that hopefully someone might find of interest...

   Very, very few photos that are sold have not been altered, either in the darkroom or in software or in both. In fact a Big difference between camera A & a more expensive camera B is that the more expensive camera does more to alter the image it captured before it's recorded to storage. [That's a huge advantage of saving RAW images -- you have the original data that's been captured & can therefore adjust everything. If you camera captures jpg, the images have been altered.] The truth is there is no perfect way to capture an image, using film or digital gear, using cheap plastic or the most expensive lens. By their physical nature both film & sensors are limited in the amount of data they can capture, and the raw data in a negative or from a sensor has to be massaged a bit on the way to becoming the picture you see. The best lenses are close, but none are 100% distortion free in all circumstances.

   So, everything's altered just to get you minimally close to what you saw when you took the picture. In the old days the equipment processing your negatives performed the same sort of automatic adjusting lots of apps do today with digital photos. A photographer or enthusiast edits to come closer to that vision, & many add some vision of their own to make the image more striking than what the camera saw -- if you've got to edit anyway to get closer to the real world view, why not improve on it a bit? If their work is competing with other photographs, making the photo more interesting or striking increases their odds of being chosen.

   Images of models for magazines or TV may be the most extreme examples -- not only do they often use stand-ins for less flattering body parts [no one is 100% perfect], but every mm of a published picture has been gone over, almost every pixel adjusted somehow -- it would take plastic surgery to come close to the results in the real world.

   A pro or semi pro will take lots of shots [that hasn't ever really changed], making basic adjustments to all of them rather quickly, e.g. the light will probably be the same for all the pictures you took at one location, so you can adjust all the pictures you took there for the same lighting. Then they'll usually single out what they feel are the best few shots, & those will get an additional workup. How much additional workup depends on what the image will be used for, & often in the case of pros, how much the client is paying. Because photographers generally don't want to spend tons of time editing, they'll do everything they can to make the original shots closer to what they imagine, setting up & adjusting lighting & backgrounds for example, or scouting outdoor locations at all times of day/night. A great black & white photo [what editing apps call grayscale] for example Very often starts out as a color image taken with lighting that emphasizes certain colors, because that gives the photographer the maximum data where they need & want it.

   Posted 10 years ago #

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