Portrait Professional

[ktinkel]

Portrait Professional is described by its maker Anthropics Technology as “intelligent portrait airbrushing software that has been ‘trained’ in human beauty.”

The page in the link gives a before-and-after comparison (if you wait a little while and pay attention). The tools automate such processes as these: reshape any aspect of a face; repair skin blemishes; diminish or remove wrinkles; remove sweat or shiny highlights from the skin; enhance lighting to make it more flattering; remove red eye; and whiten teeth and eyes.

The promo says “these operations require no artistic ability” because the software has built-in intelligence. To prove this, a free trial download is available at the site. After reading many long lines of tiny white type on a black background, I was unable to find any reference to platform, so I don’t know if it runs on Windows, Mac, either, or neither. There is a forum; maybe someone there will blurt the platform info out in a moment of indiscretion. I did see a price of 80 English pounds somewhere in an old press release; and there may be two versions, regular and pro, but I couldn’t swear to it.

Do not mean to be snide; this looks like a cool tool if you deal much in faces. The site leaves much to be desired, however. Please let us all know how it works if you download the trial.

[Michael Rowley]

KT:

I was unable to find any reference to platform, so I don’t know if it runs on Windows, Mac, either, or neither

There is a clue: it was reviewed by Personal Computer World (UK), which is generally not a Mac magazine.

[terrie]

It appears to be pc-based--from the trial download link: "You are about to download the latest FREE TRIAL version of Portrait Professional software to your PC. This is compatible with Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003 (in all cases this assumes current Windows updates)."

I figured it was going to be quite pricey but at $60, it's pretty reasonable...I think many of their examples are too soft but given their description, it's a matter of being judicious in how much to apply...

Looks very interesting...

Terrie

[ktinkel]

Originally Posted by terrie

It appears to be pc-based--from the trial download link: "You are about to download the latest FREE TRIAL version of Portrait Professional software to your PC. This is compatible with Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003 (in all cases this assumes current Windows updates)."

I figured it was going to be quite pricey but at $60, it's pretty reasonable...I think many of their examples are too soft but given their description, it's a matter of being judicious in how much to apply...

Looks very interesting...

Thanks. I was unwilling to click the link because I feared it would simply download something (the site seemed likely to do that).

Thanks for clearing that up.

[terrie]

kt: Thanks for clearing that up.

You're welcome...

Terrie

[iamback]

Originally Posted by ktinkel

Portrait Professional is described by its maker Anthropics Technology as “intelligent portrait airbrushing software that has been ‘trained’ in human beauty.”

What human beauty? Can it make a face more wrinkly? Bah, apparently not.

Portrait Professional has been shown hundreds of photographs of beautiful human faces

Old, wrinkly faces can be quite beautiful... I'm guessing it has not been shown such faces.

Remove pimples and red eye, OK. Sharpen details, OK. Whiten teeth or eyes, sort of OK. But the rest? Not. Real beauty is in personality. You cannot airbrush that on.

[ktinkel]

Originally Posted by iamback

What human beauty? Can it make a face more wrinkly? Bah, apparently not.


Old, wrinkly faces can be quite beautiful... I'm guessing it has not been shown such faces.

Remove pimples and red eye, OK. Sharpen details, OK. Whiten teeth or eyes, sort of OK. But the rest? Not. Real beauty is in personality. You cannot airbrush that on.

You know that, I know that. But professional models, who evidently need to look bland and everyone-like, they don’t know that.

[Bo Aakerstrom]

Originally Posted by iamback

What human beauty? Can it make a face more wrinkly? Bah, apparently not.

You would have to run it in backwards mode!

I agree that charchter is more important than blandness, so for pictures of real people it isn't a neccessity...

[iamback]

Originally Posted by Bo Aakerstrom

You would have to run it in backwards mode!

No, no, there's another, much more interesting tool for that!

[Bo Aakerstrom]

Originally Posted by iamback

No, no, there's another, much more interesting tool for that!

Lovely stuff, I like the music too!