How is this acheived? A real puzzle

Does anyone know what this photographer is doing to his photos in post?

http://ambrel.net/girlieaction/
http://ambrel.net/girlieaction/pages/IMG_7814_contrastshift.htm

The photos themselves are quite good, but he is doing something in post that I cannot figure out. I'm logically guessing that for this kind of event photography, he is using a light, mobile set up: digital camera, dedicated flash unit, maybe a bounce.

So the resulting image must be done in post. I thought at first it was a "Diffuse Glow" filter, and while that may be part of the solution, its not the only thing he's doing. There seems to be some sharpening going on. But some other effect to create the kind of silvery, high contrast lighting effect seen on the faces.

Can anyone figure out how he's doing this??

It looks a bit like cross processing. Search Google for "photoshop cross processing"