Skin Retouching

[speedneeder]

Hello,
I was trying some flash techniques outside today with a ND filter and built in commander mode on my Canon 60D - the results weren't bad!
Well my lovely wife volunteered to let me take some photos of her (OK, actually she tolerated my camera and flashes while she texted on her iPhone), and I got to wondering if any of you had some good ideas hints/tricks for skin retouching? I'm not crazy about how the skin looks in this photo, and since it is my lovely wife, I would love to be crazy about it! I healed a few spots, applied a gaussian blur, and did a little smudging on wrinkles. How can I do better? Thanks.

[Andrew1]

I think the software you are using may have a bearing. What do you have?

[speedneeder]

Hi Andrew, I edit with GIMP.

[Andrew1]

I can't help too much with PP but your wife did look a bit red from my perspective. This is hard because there are so many different complexions you pretty much need the person sitting beside you to get it accurate. Try dropping the red saturation a bit and move the Hue just a touch towards the blue. It worked wonders on my screen. I'd also up the exposure a bit.

Just out of curiosity, why do you have your EV set so low?

[vladimir]

Great shot of a beautiful lady there!

Two of my favorite articles on skin retouching:

On skin tones:
http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/93363

And general flow for "Facial Retouching"
http://psd.tutsplus.com/tutorials/ph...al-retouching/

They all talk Photoshop. How those things apply to GIMP? No idea!

[speedneeder]

Just out of curiosity, why do you have your EV set so low?

Haha! This was part of the experiment, using flash in aperture mode while changing EV, in effect for the background.
Odd that I didn't think it was too red? I am using a different monitor than I usually do...hmmm. I'll have to compare on my other monitor.

Edit:
I forget what I did with the WB in DPP - darn experimenting
Thanks for pointing that out to me. I have a habit of getting so focused on one thing that I forget about others

[speedneeder]

Great shot of a beautiful lady there!

Two of my favorite articles on skin retouching:

On skin tones:
http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/93363

And general flow for "Facial Retouching"
http://psd.tutsplus.com/tutorials/ph...al-retouching/

They all talk Photoshop. How those things apply to GIMP? No idea!

They apply pretty directly actually. Sometimes the terminology is a little different, but the tools are the same.
I'll check out your links, thanks.

[gregj1763]

Hi Brian.
Have a look at this software. It has a free trial and I bought and use it for editing when I do portrait shots of women after they have had the works done to them in my wife's hair salon.
www.portraitprofessional.com/
Hope it helps. Greg

[speedneeder]

Vladimir, thanks for the links - I learned a few things! As far as retouching goes, the biggest thing I learned was my blur radius was way too small I like the effect much better at like 40 pixels instead of 10 on that size file. I guess I was never 'brave' enough to try that much blurring! (along with reduced layer opacity of 50% if I remember right)
Greg, I have heard of that software before but have never tried. I'll try anything for free

[Dave Humphries]

Although the before and after examples on their website are enough to put you off trying to take portraits for life

[speedneeder]

Although the before and after examples on their website are enough to put you off trying to take portraits for life

I agree completely, that's why I haven't been interested in trying it.
If GIMP had an easy way to add a vignette, like Lightroom does, I would be a happy camper with what I have.
The vignette in the photo in this post is actually 4 linear gradients on 4 different layers in GIMP

[Colin Southern]

Hi Brian.
Have a look at this software. It has a free trial and I bought and use it for editing when I do portrait shots of women after they have had the works done to them in my wife's hair salon.
www.portraitprofessional.com/
Hope it helps. Greg

Hi Greg,

For what it's worth - in my experience - this program is responsible for more damage to portraits than just about all the other programs combined. The program itself is possibly not the culprit - I'm guessing that it's the users getting too aggressive with the sliders - but just about every photo I've ever seen come out out of it (including those on the manufacturers website) ends up with a very over-processed look with very plastic looking skin.

In my opinion, one just cannot beat a good old-fashioned hand-retouch.

[Colin Southern]

Hi Brian,

Sorry I'm late

To my eye, the skin looks fine in terms of texture and colour (albeit a touch on the red side, as previously pointed out), but the tones are quite flat. Try raising your black clipping point slightly - raise your exposure about a stop - and then lower your brightness to pull the midtones back into line.

You've also got part of the brickwork pattern adjacent to your lovely lady showing (the vignette didn't hide it) - so a couple of swipes of the burn tool set to shadows should clear that up.

[speedneeder]

Colin, you're not late
I always appreciate your input. As far as the bricks go... hmmm... I'm OK with them. This was an exercise in skin though, and I did a few things differently than I normally would just for the sake of doing things differently!
This is more my usual processing, though I did use the more powerful gaussian blur effect for skin smoothing.
Thoughts?



PS, don't tell my wife I posted her pic without makeup

[Colin Southern]

Colin, you're not late
I always appreciate your input. As far as the bricks go... hmmm... I'm OK with them. This was an exercise in skin though, and I did a few things differently than I normally would just for the sake of doing things differently!
This is more my usual processing, though I did use the more powerful gaussian blur effect for skin smoothing.
Thoughts?



PS, don't tell my wife I posted her pic without makeup

Hi Brian,

I think it looks OK - reason I say "think" is that the image is at the lower end of what I need (resolution wise) to be able to properly evaluate it. Personally, I post images with the short side at 800px these days.

With regards to the "no make up", you just need to think outside the box - along the lines of "no makeup? Noooo ... you're kidding me right? I don't believe it ... NO woman looks that good without makeup"

[speedneeder]

Colin, I thought I posted at 1024, I will check, cooking dinner now

[Colin Southern]

Colin, I thought I posted at 1024, I will check, cooking dinner now

No - only 800px on the long side. What's for dinner?

[speedneeder]

Fillet mignon

[Colin Southern]

Fillet mignon

Yum

[speedneeder]

OK, how's this for pixels!?