So Lee, Patrick and I have sifted through all the entries into the Alien Skin contest hosted over at our Fstoppers Facebook Group. We loved a lot of them and selecting a top five, let alone a winner, was challenging.
We decided on the shots below because we believe that the retouching truly enhanced the image and made for a final that we ourselves would have been proud to produce. This is not to say that there were not other entries that we felt the same about, these are just what we consider to be the best.
FIRST PLACE
William Praese Chik
All three of us were shocked at seeing the before and after. William, you did beyond an excellent job with this retouch. Well done! For that, you win the entire AlienSkin Production Suite ($500 value). Just send me an email at jaron@fstoppers.com. Congratulations, you deserve it!
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Marcus Hyde
Viktoria Gridley-Haak
Lluis Gerard
Kenton Anderson
The 'Read the full post' link on the front page & feed snippet links to the wrong post.
The winning photo is lovely, but not a photo worth the first place for the purpose of using Alien Skin; that photo could simply have been changed in Photoshop RAW.
There were other entries where the entire background were changed and the results looked really authentic.
I think the winning photo shows how you on a day-to-day basis can use the plug in. That's the way I use it most of the time. Choose between some pre made favorites, and go from there.
Although it's a nice shot, I think you could've shown more of the narrow stuff that you only get with the Alien skin exposure in a fast and easy way. Not to sound like some commercial, but I really like the software. I'm bummed that the contest had to be on Facebook, otherwise I'd definitely joined in.
Just to show what I mean, and this is no self-promotion. Here's two of my favorites, that I've edited in Exposure 3.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jensmarklund/5300512233/in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jensmarklund/5713206247/in/photostream
Congrats to the winner! The change is subtle but it a professionnal touch and makes a huge difference in my opinion. Makes me want to get it! ( And I will ). Congrats again William.
thank you sir and I love your food shots, now I'm hungry =P
The winning image was simply retouched....
I agree with some of the posters above...it looks like it was only done in the raw editor ... Hmmm take a good looking photos that is poorly exposed and touch it up .. Win a Prize.. Take a great photo ad add Layers of the the software that you should be using and ... NADA ...At least some of the honourable mentions look like they used the software.
Thank you very much for the mention! :)
O.k., call me stupid but where are the pics??
I don't wanna be that guy, but just to show what people are talking about. I made a quick example. Now I didn't have the original file, so I just force opened the jpeg above, in Camera Raw. Since I didn't have a raw file, the highlights are a tiny bit more blown out.
http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/1648/fstoppers.jpg
From top to bottom: Original, Alien skin, Camera Raw + a curve.
Cheers
I did the same thing. so no point in me posting my photo too.
LOL looks like my won had upset some of you guys, I'm going to hell =D
To me, I like William's photo. Why would someone enter the contest if they already owned the software? So he showed what he could do with PS/Raw editor. He deserves the software :) Congrats William!
oh bro thank you but I bet you didn't read the rule of the game, you need to use that plug-in in your final edit
one last time, how do we see the images?
The images should be embedded in this stoppers post. So just below the text.
thanks Jens, for some reason they're not showing up, apologies for making an ass of myself!
Thanks for the mention! Congrats @facebook-674970194:disqus
Can William or some one else please explain how the image was retouched in camera raw to get those rich colors?
oy! Beautiful work :) Congrats! How can i be a member of the Fstoppers Facebook Group? I want in :))
THIS CONTEST IS NOT PROFESSIONAL , I THINK IT'S FOR BEGINNERS