Skin Smoothing in CS3

[24Peter]

OK - for anyone who actually cares, I broke down and got Photoshop CS3 ($299 upgrade from Elements). And the first thing I tried was a little skin smoothing.

Now I must say: I thought Stephanie's skin was great to begin with. But now I think it looks fabulouso if I do say so myself :D

But what'd you guys think?

Before (straight out of camera)

http://photos.imageevent.com/24peter/uploads/upload3/large/IMG_0110.JPG

After (skin smoothing and a little brightness/contrast/sharpening)

http://photos.imageevent.com/24peter/uploads/upload3/large/IMG_0110PSedit1.jpg

Full rez:
http://photos.imageevent.com/24peter/uploads/upload3/IMG_0110.JPG
http://photos.imageevent.com/24peter/uploads/upload3/IMG_0110PSedit1.jpg

Oh, and to give credit where credit is due, I followed this guy's recipe: http://djure-eng.blogspot.com/2007/09/my-potrtrait-workflow.html

[cdifoto]

Nice job Pete! I tend to cheat when it comes to skin smoothing. Portrait Professional does a pretty good job. :D :p

[TheWengler]

What version of Elements did you upgrade from?

[droopy1592]

What's the best way to smooth skin in CS3? Anyone can point me to a tutorial?

[TheWengler]

What's the best way to smooth skin in CS3? Anyone can point me to a tutorial?

Did you see the link Peter posted?

[24Peter]

What version of Elements did you upgrade from?

They'll take anything from ver. 2-6 - but you have to call (unless you get an email directly from them with a working link): Offer good until 2/29/08 [though I think they do it pretty regularly]

"To order by phone, call 1-800-585-0774 and mention offer code 27105. Have your Adobe Photoshop Elements serial code ready for verification. " (They never asked for mine BTW though I did have ver. 2 registered with them.)

http://direct.adobe.com/v?xJlqHqlEJTqTJvP

[gmtech79]

The skin smoothing does look good (not overdone like you see a lot of portraits done) but one thing that really stands out to me is the big difference in color between her face and chest.
I made an edit of it, I hope you don't mind. Just let me know and I will immediately remove it.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2146/2276877589_b8ee822665.jpg

[24Peter]

Yeah, thanks gmtech, I noticed that too. I was so excited to work on her face, I almost forgot about the rest of her. Plus my lighting was setup to emphasize her face, so her torso ended up being darker. I would end up cropping much of her body out of the shot I think anyway.

I should add I think the great thing about Jure's process is it leaves pores visible in the skin. So much of the smoothing I see out there (esp. from the glamour guys) makes the skin look unnatural/plastic-like. I think the pores make for a more natural look.

[droopy1592]

Did you see the link Peter posted?

oops, thought they were all full size pic links

[michaelb]

Wow, that second image is amazing Peter; very nice PP and doesn't seem "overdone" to me.

[24Peter]

Wow, that second image is amazing Peter; very nice PP and doesn't seem "overdone" to me.

Well that was my big concern (i.e., overdone), so thanks for confirming that.

[FLiPMaRC]

:cool: Very nice!

And thanks for the link :)

[FLiPMaRC]

Nice job Pete! I tend to cheat when it comes to skin smoothing. Portrait Professional does a pretty good job. :D :p

:cool: Thanks for the tip! I just tried it out and it works great :D It even makes my ugly mug look good, LOL! This makes it easy just like Photomatix makes HDR easy :)

[D Thompson]

OK - for anyone who actually cares, I broke down and got Photoshop CS3 ($299 upgrade from Elements). And the first thing I tried was a little skin smoothing.

Now I must say: I thought Stephanie's skin was great to begin with. But now I think it looks fabulouso if I do say so myself :D

But what'd you guys think?

Peter - I think you'll really like CS3. There are a lot of nice features in Bridge also. Layers are your friend in PS ;).

I think I've seen that technique or very similar somewhere else and have used it. You did a nice job on Stephanie and like you said, her skin was great to start with, and you only improved it.

I've been trying to get away from using any blur technique lately. A lot of high-end retouchers sort of frown on blurring, but IMO it has its place when used well. I see some of the plastic looking crap where the features are just completely obliterated. Your retouch looks very natural and that is the key - not being able to tell it was retouched. There is only one place that shows up on the hi-res version and that is the line on the left side of her face down by her mouth. I doubt it shows anywhere but the hi-res version. Again, very nice job.

I hope you don't mind also that I worked on it. I'll remove it as well if you request. This was done using dodge & burn on a soft-light layer filled with grey. No pixels were blurred. Workflow was dup bg layer (always), then used the spot healing brush on a separate layer on a few minor spots, dodge and burn the skin on a softlight layer, added just a bit of color to the lips on a layer and reduced opacity on that layer, added another softlight layer and d&b the lips, added another softlight layer and did a bit of d&b on the hair, and finally a curves adjustment layer to bring it out a bit. I didn't do anything to her eyes or teeth and I'd probably clean up a few stray hairs, but had spent enough time.

[D Thompson]

What's the best way to smooth skin in CS3?

IMO, the best method, although the most labor intensive is dodging and burning either a overlay or softlight layer filled with 50% grey.

[FLiPMaRC]

I hope you don't mind also that I worked on it. I'll remove it as well if you request. This was done using dodge & burn on a soft-light layer filled with grey. No pixels were blurred. Workflow was dup bg layer (always), then used the spot healing brush on a separate layer on a few minor spots, dodge and burn the skin on a softlight layer, added just a bit of color to the lips on a layer and reduced opacity on that layer, added another softlight layer and d&b the lips, added another softlight layer and did a bit of d&b on the hair, and finally a curves adjustment layer to bring it out a bit. I didn't do anything to her eyes or teeth and I'd probably clean up a few stray hairs, but had spent enough time.

Here is a link to the hi-res version http://www.bellsouthpwp2.net/d/w/dwthomp1/dcrp_pete.jpg

:eek::eek::eek: Whoa !!! :cool:

[24Peter]

Peter - I think you'll really like CS3. There are a lot of nice features in Bridge also. Layers are your friend in PS ;).

I think I've seen that technique or very similar somewhere else and have used it. You did a nice job on Stephanie and like you said, her skin was great to start with, and you only improved it.

I've been trying to get away from using any blur technique lately. A lot of high-end retouchers sort of frown on blurring, but IMO it has its place when used well. I see some of the plastic looking crap where the features are just completely obliterated. Your retouch looks very natural and that is the key - not being able to tell it was retouched. There is only one place that shows up on the hi-res version and that is the line on the left side of her face down by her mouth. I doubt it shows anywhere but the hi-res version. Again, very nice job.

I hope you don't mind also that I worked on it. I'll remove it as well if you request. This was done using dodge & burn on a soft-light layer filled with grey. No pixels were blurred. Workflow was dup bg layer (always), then used the spot healing brush on a separate layer on a few minor spots, dodge and burn the skin on a softlight layer, added just a bit of color to the lips on a layer and reduced opacity on that layer, added another softlight layer and d&b the lips, added another softlight layer and did a bit of d&b on the hair, and finally a curves adjustment layer to bring it out a bit. I didn't do anything to her eyes or teeth and I'd probably clean up a few stray hairs, but had spent enough time.

Here is a link to the hi-res version http://www.bellsouthpwp2.net/d/w/dwthomp1/dcrp_pete.jpg

Dennis - you did a nice job here considering you did it all by dodging and burning. But I have to say, what I like about Jure's method and what is missing in your edit for me is the "glow" the skin takes on using his method. (Maybe it's just a levels adjustment to yours?) (Yours also looks very yellow on my monitor.)

These shots were supposed to be beauty shots like you see in cosmetic ads. While I realize photographically I still have a way to go, those ads usually portray perfect skin - that is, the way skin would look if it were perfect. So I feel Jure's method also takes me a little closer to that look.

You are clearly much more knowlegable about what professional retouchers are doing these days. I've also seen several other skin smoothing techniques out there. And I'm not sure how effective Jure's method would be on badly damaged skin. So I'll keep looking.

What is Adobe Bridge about?

[D Thompson]

:eek::eek::eek: Whoa !!! :cool:

Thanks, ......................I think ;).

[D Thompson]

Dennis - you did a nice job here considering you did it all by dodging and burning. But I have to say, what I like about Jure's method and what is missing in your edit for me is the "glow" the skin takes on using his method. (Maybe it's just a levels adjustment to yours?) (Yours also looks very yellow on my monitor.)
Thanks Pete. There is nothing wrong at all with his method and I know what you mean about the glow. I still use various forms of that technique from time to time. Lately, I've been trying to use only d&b and thought this was a great image to practice on. I have no ideal what her true skin tone looks like, I was just going by "the numbers" and yes, there is more yellow in mine, but it doesn't look very yellow on my monitor. In the original I measured little to no cyan, and magenta higher than yellow. Typically, in caucasian cyan should be the lowest and yellow should be slightly higher than magenta. In most places I'm still reading little to no cyan (typically, higher values of cyan show up in tanned or darker people) and yellow slightly higher in a few sampled places and equal to 1 or 2 points less in a few after my curves adjustment. The curves adjustment lowered magenta a bit and upped yellow a bit.


These shots were supposed to be beauty shots like you see in cosmetic ads. While I realize photographically I still have a way to go, those ads usually portray perfect skin - that is, the way skin would look if it were perfect. So I feel Jure's method also takes me a little closer to that look.

and you did a very nice job on it. As always, whatever works for you.


You are clearly much more knowlegable about what professional retouchers are doing these days. I've also seen several other skin smoothing techniques out there. And I'm not sure how effective Jure's method would be on badly damaged skin. So I'll keep looking.

Not too sure of my knowledge :eek: about pro's. There are a lot of skin smoothing techniques around and you just have to find one or combine parts of different techniques that will give you the result you want. Some images will take better with one, some others with another. I don't think there is just "one" way to do it. I keep looking myself. It would be great if there was that one holy grail method. I think bottom line, there is just no quick fix. It takes a little time to end up with a good result.


What is Adobe Bridge about?

IMO it is highly improved with the release of CS3. You can use it to import your images and make a backup copy to another location, add metadata, sort, rate, and preview your images. Adobe Camera Raw is IMO a great RAW converter if you shoot RAW. I don't remember if you do or not. It will also process jpegs, just not with the same flexibility. I'll be glad to try to answer any questions.

Thanks again for posting fantastic images. Still hoping for another Emily J shoot! ;)

[ejhart]

Hey peter great job with the photo! Now that you got CS3 your gonna find yourself spending lots of time in there playing around figuring things out lol. I mainly wanted to comment on how great of a job you did, but now that I'm here I might as well throw some links your way. Who knows you might even get some use out of them.

The first link is
http://tutorialbucket.googlepages.com/psindex.html

Lots of great video tutorials, but the best 2 are under cosmetic retouching. The first one is called Digital Facial Scrub, and the second is Digital foundation makeup. The foundation makeup is basically the same technique that you used, but the facial scrub is pretty nice also.

The second link is
http://www.photoshopmama.net

IMO she is one of the true masters of natural looking retouched portraits. She also has some videos on youtube under the same name photoshopmama on all kinds of different things you can do in CS3 plus many on portrait retouching and makeup. On her site she also sells some great action the best one I think is her Powder action which might be worth the price for you since you do so many great portraits.

As I said hopefully you'll get some use out of those sites, and again just wanna say how much I admire your work.

[24Peter]

hey ej - thanks for the links (good stuff) and kind words. :)

[r6isnum1]

Nice job(s), everyone.

Thanks for the links everyone. I've been wanting to learn how to do this for some time now.

[ejhart]

Just to throw this one out there, here's yet another technique I found on how to smooth skin. It's somewhat similar to the high pass/Gaussian blur but very different at the same time. I think it produces the better results and more natural looking skin in the end. That said Imo nothing beats Mama's Powder actions in terms of natural look.

Anyway here is the link enjoy http://freeonlineclasses.net/index.php/Photoshop-Classes/Adobe-Photoshop-CS3-Photo-Retouching-Techniques/Professional-Skin-Smoothing.html