how did i do???

[Southerngal]

followed some direction that I read yesterday on another post.....skin smoothing....


Before

After

 

[Peniole]

Too much and too obvious on the face. The arms look good, although a little less and they'd look great.

 

[aimeefriedland]

mmm she looks like her face is plastic

 

[Big Mike]

I agree...it's too much.

The trick with skin smoothing is to keep it subtle...well that's usually what you want to see. Sometimes the 'plastic' look is what you are going for. Use a lower opacity brush and or lower the opacity of the blur layer.

The very best retouchers will smooth out the skin but keep some of the natural texture...which is much more believable...but it's a more advanced technique.

Also, when you are removing the blemishes and what not...it would have also been a good idea to remove the glare on her face. Of course, it would be better to start with a photo that was lit better...in this one the light (flash) is too direct and maybe too strong.

You are off to a good start...practice is the key so keep it up.

 

[Southerngal]

Thanks for the comments.

It wasn't really the job I did on it, but the fact that I did it. For me, that is a very new technique. I was proud to have done it. I definitely need much more practice

 

[rmh159]

When I do this I zoom in pretty far and then using a quick mask I try to avoid bluring any lines (smile lines for example). Then zoom out, flip back to Normal mode, add the blur and then adjust the layer opacity until it looks good.

If I just confused the hell out of you PM me and I can write a quick tutorial. :blushing:

 

[WDodd]

I saw that you had "My photos Are OK to Edit" so I gave it a shot.

I was wondering if you used the step-by-step that I linked in the graphics programs section?

As far as yours I do think its a little overdone on the face but I'm not sure how much better I did. I applied a photo filter to add some sepia color and I think that threw it off.

But in any case, rmh159 had a really good tip. I do that as part of my smoothing process. I do just about all my smoothing really zoomed in so that I don't screw up any lines and make it look funky.

Keep up the good work! :thumbup:


Edit: By the way the flash left a lot of bright spots on her face and arm. If you use an external I would try and bounce it off a ceiling (if there is one of course), diffuse it somehow, or just now use one at all.

 

[Big Mike]

It's much better to start with a high resolution file...but I thought I would give it a shot...

 

[PNA]

BMike...You did well removing the highlights in her face , but now it seem flat....OM'sO

 

[deanimator]

Just a suggestion about another point, if I may...
I think the picture is a bit too light...
Maybe it would benefit from a little burning in around the edges too
What do you think?...give it a go?

 

[Big Mike]

BMike...You did well removing the highlights in her face , but now it seem flat....OM'sO

I agree, it does seem to be missing something now. I've never been one for painting in some contour...but it might help in this case.

 

[WDodd]

Nice re-do Mike. Removing the highlights was great.

 

[DeepSpring]

Do you have the link to the original thread you were reading? I'm curious to see if there is something else I'm not doing.

 

[WDodd]

Do you have the link to the original thread you were reading? I'm curious to see if there is something else I'm not doing.

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=86022 :mrgreen:

The last post has the link to the step-by-step tutorial for the method that I use.

 

[Garbz]

Just as a complete aside from how the retouching has worked, you should look into the lighting more, it can be fixed for $10

The flash has made a shadow on the background which gives the model a bad outline. Also it has flattened the features of the entire photo. It looks too 2dimensional.

Now it's a bright sunny day and am I right in assuming the model was standing in the shade? That's good, but one thing you can do to improve the lighting is use a reflector. Either a large white sheet, or silver sheet which can be had from Ebay for pennies and reflect the natural light back onto the subject. If you can't afford the pennies you can literally make it for nothing using a sheet of cardboard and some aluminium foil.

This has a few affects. Firstly if you reflect the light from the side it adds depth to the face. Secondly a flash gives a light source that is a few sqcm, but if you use a 1x1m reflector the lighting becomes very soft and actually helps cover up skin blemishes which makes retouching even easier