Looking to achieve shiny silvery effect in Photoshop

October 7, 2007 4:57 PM

I'm retouching some portraits in Photoshop, and lately I've been noticing in magazines, especially fashion magazines, some images with what is apparently a filter which gives the pics a shiny, luminous, almost silver, wet, oily appearance. Does anyone know if this is a filter in Photoshop CS or a filter that can be downloaded or how to otherwise achieve this effect?
posted by theperfectcrime to Media & Arts (19 answers total)

Could you link to an example?
posted by Memo at 4:58 PM on October 7, 2007

Response by poster: I'm trying, so far drawing blanks. I'll link as soon as I find an example.
posted by theperfectcrime at 5:28 PM on October 7, 2007

Yes, sample please. It may be how it's shot, and not a filter.

(Related aside: I've had people ask me if I blur the background in my portraits in Photoshop, since most people shoot with cameras that don't allow shallow depth of field.)
posted by The Deej at 5:30 PM on October 7, 2007

You may be thinking of "High Pass" photography. If you're doing this in Photoshop CS, it's fairly easily to replicate. This page goes into detail.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 5:43 PM on October 7, 2007

It could be PS work, but its likely due to great makeup and lighting technique!
posted by blaneyphoto at 5:55 PM on October 7, 2007

Does it look like the effect you get when you use "Smart Blur"? I see that effect a lot, although it's done way better than Smart Blur does it.. I assume it's usually manually airbrushing or a Smart Blur with added retouching.
posted by wackybrit at 6:41 PM on October 7, 2007

Best answer: dave hill is famous for the kinds of photos I think you are referring to.

bad news though: what you seem to have in mind requires a lot of work before you take the shot as well. a little bit of psd filtering can't save a mediocre shot. this specific look requires some intense lighting and probably loads of baby oil on the model.

I recommend looking at various groups on flickr, such as the technique and strobist groups.

here are some basic discussions I found while spending 20 second searching flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/strobist/discuss/72157594577686705/?search=dave+hill

http://flickr.com/groups/technique/discuss/26795/

http://www.flickr.com/groups/technique/discuss/72157600179993226/
posted by krautland at 6:43 PM on October 7, 2007 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Does Jill Greenberg's work look like what you're trying to do? (Crying baby alert.)
posted by thehmsbeagle at 7:28 PM on October 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

My first thought was that you were talking about HDR photography, which it looks like krautland hit on with Dave Hill (though it appears there's more to his shots than just HDR).

If this is in fact the kind of photography you're thinking of, it's generally regarded as a technique that has to be done on the shooting end. There are a few ways to "fake" it on the back end, but the effect is mostly lost at this point.

For more info on HDR, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_imaging

Also, my friend Alec Feld is a great young photographer in NYC, and he takes some nice HDR shots from time to time. Check out his Flickr for some examples: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alecfeld/1492728806/in/photostream/
posted by joshrholloway at 7:48 PM on October 7, 2007

nah, dave hill doesn't do hdr. he does hi-pass meets gloss.

hdr is tough to do with humans because you need multiple f-stop variations. it doesn't really yield the same results if you process one .raw file into under- and overexposed copied and merge them and you can't usually make people sit absolutely still for three or five or seven shots.

there are, of course, exceptions.
posted by krautland at 7:57 PM on October 7, 2007

Response by poster: Thanks, thehmsbeagle, this is exactly what I'm looking to do. Most of my shots are done with natural lighting. I do occasionally use strobe with softbox, but the portraits I'm trying to apply this effect to are with natural light. Any suggestions?
posted by theperfectcrime at 8:11 PM on October 7, 2007

I think that's a lighting effect, not a filter. At just a quick look, it almost looks like 1940s style Hollywood lighting, using a saturated film or added saturation in-camera or in post-processing.

I'm sure I read an article about the method... I'll post if I find anything.

And there is also a chance I am entirely and totally wrong. Yeah, like that'll happen.
posted by The Deej at 8:39 PM on October 7, 2007

Jill Greenberg's photos rely heavily on the ring strobe for the effect. This was discussed in the monkey thread where the eye reflections gave a clear image of the lighting and it's all about the ring flash. Also known as axial lighting, the light is coming directly from the place from which the image is captured, there are no shadows visible, things facing the camera are bright and shiny, and fall off as they round out. It's a very unnatural look, and is particularly suited for high-pass edge emphasis, because there are no shadows to look unnatural at the edges, all edges are image content.
posted by StickyCarpet at 8:43 PM on October 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

Best answer: OK, armchair analyzing of the photo you linked:

Looks like:
-Background light on the floor, aiming up onto the backdrop.
-Hairlight to the right and behind subject, probably a couple stops hotter than the main light.
-Main light to the left and aimed at the subject's face, and probably just barely higher than the subject's head. I'm guessing it's either a big softbox or big reflector.

Here's a cheap way to try something, and I have done it before with pretty good results.

Get a "space blanket" (camping store, or camping section of Wal Mart). It's just a huge piece of silver mylar. Tape it to a wall, and set your off-camera flash to reflect off of it and onto your subject. You'll have to experiment with the distances, but it gives a good soft light, yet the silver gives a nice glow.
posted by The Deej at 8:51 PM on October 7, 2007 [1 favorite]

Oh, and I don't think you'll be able to make already-taken photos look like this. You may be able to tweak some things like saturation, contrast, and brightness, but that only goes so far.
posted by The Deej at 8:55 PM on October 7, 2007

Jill Greenberg in Popphoto July 2006:


The lighting is very dramatic. How did you accomplish that?

It's the same lighting I used for my portraits of monkeys, and I've been using it for some recent magazine cover portraits. It's really flattering frontal light, so the subject doesn't have to have any actual shine on his or her skin to appear shiny. None of the kids had any makeup on. And also I work on that shiny quality in postproduction.
posted by blaneyphoto at 6:31 AM on October 8, 2007

Best answer: I've seen videos of Greenberg working, she uses two silver umbrellas behind and to the sides of the subject and then a ringlight from the front. I'm sure she mixes it up and adds other background/hair/etc. lights but that's the basic gist of it and it's not all that hard to replicate it (I've done it as kind of a technical exercise for myself), but you need a lot of strobes and a working knowledge of light. There's no Photoshop trick that will do it, just old fashioned photography.

She also does a shit load of retouching. There's a reason she's called "The Manipulator".
posted by bradbane at 8:23 AM on October 8, 2007

Somewhat late but while browsing for something unrelated I found a plugin named LucisArt that, I think, does something similar to what you want. Like this. More examples.
Sadly, it's quite expensive: $169.00
posted by Memo at 6:14 PM on October 8, 2007

Response by poster: Thanks so much everyone; noodling around I think i've devoloped an approximation.
posted by theperfectcrime at 10:09 PM on October 8, 2007