Hi Cher,
I like this shot, it would make a nice 60c piece with emporer Ross from the Province of Murbah on the obverse!
It is good to see a profile portrait.
You ask about soft filters etc in Photoshop. This particular one is for CS3 which incorporates 'smart objects' (allows non-destructive editing)
Try these steps as a work flow, whch you can record as an 'action' for easy repetition:
1. Open your source .jpg or Raw image and save a copy as a tiff or PSD file to a new location (I use a new folder called 'edited' and psd. If you keep the image as a jpg, each time you resave the quality will degenerate)
2. Create a duplicate layer.
3. Convert to a 'Smart Object' (in the filters menu)
3a. If you have an earlier version of PS create an adjustment layer.
4. Select filters > Blur > Gaussian blur and set to 30px.
5. Set the opacity of this layer to around 30% lower for kids with smooth skin, maybe a lot higher, as wrinkles increase to a maximum of about 38% - (Perhaps a lot higher for Ross
)
6. If using CS3 click the adjustment window that will appear alongside the layer and set a black brush to a little larger that the size of the eyes of the subject at 100% opacity and carefully go over the eyes, the lower edge of the nose, mouth, edge of cheek line any lines betweeen fingers. (you can adjust the brush size to suit. You can undo or decrease these changes by swapping to a white brush).
This etches back through the the gaussian blur in the areas and provided "focus cues" for the viewer.
6a. If you don't have adjustment layers use the eraser tool instead, set to a much lower opacity and perform the same action. If set to high, you will leave visible edges where you have erased through. The first method is better if available.
7. Create a new duplicate layer. Change the layer property from the default of normal to 'mutiply'. This will significantly darken the image.
8. Using the lasso tool set 'feather' to around 250px, to depending on the background, either draw an elipse covering about 85% of the image or free-hand around the subject outline plus about 10%, now hit delete. This will leave you with a nice natural vignette. You may need to undo this step a couple of times until you are satisfied. Again, you can use the opacity slider to decrease the effect to suit.
That is the basic steps.
Now in addition, you can add additional effects by adding another adjustment layer to increase of decrease, saturation, maybe one that has a sepia tone, or whatever and these can be blended via the opacity slider.
Another great effect on heavy lined faces (No Ross, not yours) is to leave out the Gaussian step and instead go to Filters > Other > High-pass.
Set this to between 5 & 10%. The screen will go grey and show lines and wrinkles highlighted. Go to the layer properties again, only this time, instead of using 'mutiply' - use 'overlay' then 'layer > merge down' this layer to the background layer. You will now have a more gritty world-weary look.
You can repeat the process again quite successfully, in some cases.
Lastly, add new layers to tweak your contrast, or use curves to tweak the tonal variations.
I suggest using new layers for every step. That way you can not only delete and redo but blend any combination for a wide variety of outcomes.
