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Message: <blockquote data-quote="STM" data-source="post: 121683" data-attributes="member: 12827">If you plan to do any portraiture work, you might look into a program called Portrait Professional. It is reasonably priced and does a lot of the heavy lifting for you. I will use it occasionally but in many cases what it does to the image is too extreme for my tastes, even after I tone it down. The surface blur tool in PS is usually enough and you have more flexibility and precision.  Subtlety is the key to success, regardless of the subject's age. ! I HATE the "plastic", mannequin look that is still all the rage. NO ONE looks like that in real life except a mannequin in a department store. Real people do not have picture perfect complexions, deal with it. Here's a tip, NEITHER do the models on the magazine covers. If you were to look at them without makeup and Photoshop, you would not recognize them!When I print portraiture stuff in the darkroom, I will often use a Cokin diffusion filter under the enlarging lens. It does a couple of things. First, it will essentially erase grain, not that there is much to begin with with the Hasselblad. Second, it will knock down the sharpness to a much more flattering level. My Hasselblad lenses, the 150mm f/4 Sonnar C especially, combined with Kodak T-Max 100 (B&W) or Ektar 100 are ABSOLUTELY RUTHLESS! They will not only show every hair (peach fuzz) on their face, I can actually see the Staphylcoccus bacteria in the pores of their skin. Ok, that is somewhat of an exaggeration but I digress. For portraiture, they are often way too sharp so you need to tone them down. I had even heard of photographers using of a piece of a woman's nylon hose as a diffuser under the lens, though I never tried it. The Cokin filters work perfect for me.</blockquote>

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