High end retouch

[L33t]

For this you need Photoshop CS to CS4. (Im used CS4 for this)

I will show you how you can archiev the look you find on magazines on celebs, smooth even skins with no blemish. This tutorial is Intermediate users. Some images can be harder to do than other. If you're new to photoshop or not used to photoshop, get michaels photoshop crash course!

You will need lots of free time and lots of experience with different tools (can be learned from michaels video)

(I didn't add sharpening technique but it was done on final image)

What's inside

- Blemish removal
- Skin evening (Same smoothness as you find on magazines)
- Color correction
- Color improvements
- Sharpening


1. Begin with finding a large resolution images or from your CF, it's best to use CR2 (raw files) to contain images color informations.
Here I choose image from internet
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c1.jpg

Make copy of the background, to have two copies of the image. Begin to remove larger of blemish of the person using Healing Brush Tool (J) use a decent size brush that almost fit to the blemish and grab a sample and then heal it. Compare to the first image everything while you do this, hold ALT key and press the eye in layer palett on the background and you will see before and after to make sure it doesn't leave healing trace. I put the retouched image into a map, it makes me easier to know what is what)
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c2.jpg

2. Make copy of the image you have just retouched (make 2 copies) Go to curves and do following. You will get overexposed image and underexposed images. Now add vector mask to both of your images and fill with black color (This will hide the effect)
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c3.jpg
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c4.jpg

3. Make two new layers and fill it with black. Change first image blending mode to soft light and second layer to color
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c5.jpg

4. Zoom it at 400% or more to see much closer and find area that is not even, It's black areas (look at the image) and grab Brush Tool (B) set opacity to 8%-10% and flow 20% and start brushing easy on black areas. This takes every long time. This take very long time to master and takes long time (can take hours). You can turn black and white off to see result. This make you to see more of the black areas sometimes it's better to turn off or on.
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c6.jpg

5. After you're done you should have very even and smooth skin. Now flatten image, change to lab color and go to curves. Go to A and B channels to add more colors using the slider upper corner and down corner. Change back to RGB.

Now duplicate background and go to curves, do something similar.
http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c7.jpg

Duplicated that layer you've just changed curves. Go to Image>Adjustment>Channel Mixer and change to red filter. Change blending mode to soft light and lower opacity.

6. Final result!

http://www.piyada.net/pslesson/c8.jpg


See more result at my website http://photo.piyada.net/ ("http://photo.piyada.net/)

[mark]

personaly i think you could have stopped after you removed the skin blemishes and just softened the skin tone a touch ... the finished product is a little too plastic for my taste ... but thanks for the leson just the same

[ultima16888]

the hair on her faceaccentuatedby the contrast (edge) is bothering me a bit. .. but still.. thanx for the tutorial

[L33t]

It's up to you what you like or not, but mainly it was about how to retouch skin without using blur that newbies always uses.

[Keith B]

If you want that really smooth look, duplicate the layer, use dust & scratch filter untill the skin looks smooth. It may look a little blotchy so then Gaussian Blur a little to really even out the tones. Add a little monochrome noise to give a little texture back, to make it believable. Add layer mask fill with black and then with brush tool set to low flow setting paint over the bad spots.


As with any image resolution determines settings so you will have experiment with the actual amounts. If you go too much you can later fill mask back in or adjust the opacity of the softened layer. this will ad texture back also.


It's not about using blur. It is how you use it. Call me a newbie, but I haven't gotten too many complaints.


My way also gets rid of the peach fuzz in a believable way too.

[L33t]

It's up to you, but I've tried to many diff tech but this would give me best result. Everyone has their technique.


If you like yours, fine :) no argue stick with it.

[Keith B]

No worries. I'm sure you way is good. I just thought the newbie comment was way out line. 9 years later and being told I was a newbie, struck me funny.

[clemmb]

PS Elements and Portrait Professional


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[Colin]

You guys make me want to learn photoshop...