High-End Skin Retouching & Sculpting in Photoshop

I'm super excited about this so today we can learn a very interesting and advanced technique to really go ahead and sculpt the skin in Photoshop you can go ahead and manually paint on the skin literally paint on the skin we repair and reconstruct it now this gonna take a lot of time yes it will this is gonna take a lot of work a lot of patience but at the end of the day the kind of results that you get the high quality smooth skin that's totally worth it so without any further ado let's get started so here we are in the mystical world of Photoshop and this photo was submitted by Posse Aravind PAH you gotta go ahead and check out his amazing work right in here he's an awesome portrait photographer so as we have imported it into Photoshop it opens up in Camera Raw because this is a raw photo and this one was taken in Canon 5d s so this is a 50 megapixel image so I've done just minor adjustments probably increase the contrast just a little bit highlights decreased it why it's increased its shadows increased it and very minimal adjustments if I just show you if I just set it to defaults Camera Raw defaults see minimal adjustments so let's go back and let's go ahead and open up the image after doing just minimal adjustments with your photos like contrast and stuff once you're satisfied go ahead and open the photo all right click on this open image just as a side note you can also do it in Lightroom so after you've done those minimal adjustments you can also go ahead right click edit in Adobe Photoshop 20 18 or whatever version you are using so here we have our image so as you can see if we zoom in she has a really nice skin to begin with so the first thing that we need to do is to remove the blemishes before applying any kind of softening reparation of skin and stuffs frequency separation always remove blemishes you don't wanna mess with that when you soften the skin right because that's gonna appear strange so remove blemishes first always how to do that very simple create a new layer name this blemishes if you want to for organization purposes alright and take the regular healing brush tool not the Spot Healing Brush tool regular Healing Brush tool if you don't have time in your hand you always go ahead and choose the Spot Healing Brush - but I prefer the regular Healing Brush tool because you want to determine which area Photoshop is sampling from right so if you want to remove this take a sample from here by holding the alt or option take a sample and then just paint over this area and also pro tip if you want to see where the blemishes are clearly here's what you can do you can create an adjustment layer called black and white click on this one and take down the Reds all the way to minus 200 depending upon the skin tone you can also go ahead and take down the yellows just a little bit and increase the blue sometimes it helps all right now you can clearly see where those blemishes are select the blemishes layer and then with the regular Healing Brush tool make sure not all layers but current and below is checked because we don't want to sample from the black and whites right so make sure current and below is checked and then sample paint sample paint right you can see exactly where the blemishes are much more clearly just like this very easy now this is gonna take some time right you can also do it through Spot Healing Brush tool but then again if you are taking the time to sculpt the skin you might as well take a little more time and just remove the parameters right so it's very simple to do but it's time-consuming for some of us it might be fun I mean it's fun for me to do this okay I don't know about you man but I kind of like doing this but I'm gonna spare you the time I've already done it so I'm gonna open that image where I've already done it and after you have done removing the blemishes do not forget to delete the black and white adjustment layer so here we have removed all of the blemishes that we could see so let me show you the before and after so this is the before this is the after and if you have a look let us just go ahead and delete this black and white adjustment layer we don't need it any more blemishes are on its own layer the removed blemishes so have a look so these replaced areas are on its own layer on the blemishes but the replaced areas now if you are not satisfied with any of the removals or replacements you can always go ahead erase that and that's that bondage of having this in another lab but here's the catch after this is finalized you have to create a merged layer right so make sure you have removed all as the blemishes make sure everything is all clear and all good and only after that go ahead proceed so let us go ahead and turn on the background layer and create a merged layer a merged layer of everything that you see on the canvas right now or a merge layer with the blemishes removed all right so to do that press ctrl alt shift + E if you're using a Mac that would be command option shift + E ok now it's time for us to apply the concepts of frequency separation and this is gonna get exciting now what is frequency separation well as simple as it gets frequency separation is separating the high frequencies from the low frequencies in the high frequencies we have the skin texture in the low frequencies we have the skin color and the skin tone why it is separate it a good question because we want to work on them separately you see when we are working on the color and the tone of the skin we don't want to affect the skin texture we want it to be intact because otherwise it will be just like the beauty mode in your phones everything will be waxed out you don't want that to happen you want to soften the skin at the same time you want to retain the skin texture on the other hand if you want to remove something like wrinkles or stuff and you don't want to affect the skin color you can do that as well by just working on the high frequencies ok make sense all right let's jump straight in so this layer will just have the color and the copy of it will just have the texture so make two copies of it ctrl or command J and name this one color and name this one texture and by the way if you really want to know what is frequency separation the science behind it what is frequency and stuff you gotta go ahead and check out this video right here in this video we really go in-depth into what is frequency separation all right now what do you have to do turn off this texture layer and come back to color let go to filter blur and then Gaussian blur now let's zoom in quite a bit you could have created smart objects that kind of makes things a little slower so I'm resenting from that all right so decrease the radius all the way to 0.1 now let's take a sample from this area just click on this area and have a look we see the big preview of the skin texture just go ahead and increase it to the point where the skin textures go away right just at the point where the skin texture go away stop okay it's still there it's still there it's still there it's still there now it's going away now it's going away now let's sample other areas it's still there in this area so we'll go for something like nine-ish let's stay at 9 it okay once you're satisfied this contains the color right and this contains the whole image this doesn't contain the texture so if we subtract the color from the original image what will we be left with the texture right so select the texture layer go to image and then apply image now we want to subtract what the color layer right so let's go ahead and select the color layer and channel RGB is fine and then blending mode very easy subtract height very obvious and make sure the values of scale and offset are 2 and 128 again why these values 2 and 128 we have to make sense of it right so go ahead and check out this video if you really want to know why we use values of 2 and 128 once that is done hit OK change the blend mode of the texture layer from normal to linear light okay now make a group of both of these so if we just go ahead and press and hold ctrl or command select the other one and then press ctrl or command G this creates a group of this if I turn off the group the image is the same if I turn on the group then which is the same which means that have a look these both images are different this is different this is different which means that they both combine together to give you the original image so we have successfully separated the texture and the color now here comes the most fun part of the tutorial we're gonna go ahead and create a brand new skin for her this is the essence of this technique make sense now let me show you what I mean by that okay let's go ahead and create a new layer and this is just for demonstration purposes let's create a new let what we gonna do you're gonna take the brush and we're gonna sample from the skin and we gonna create a brand new skin just like painting it's just like painting right so something like this this is very heavy-handed I'm gonna increase the flow on opacity 218 the skin all over again like that just just like sculptors okay creating the skin again considering in all the lights and shades and all that stuff you're gonna create the skin like that this is too heavy-handed but we're gonna go very soft on this one just like this so you get the idea what are we gonna do here right so carve out a nice skin for her that's the whole motive of this technique have a look at this this is of course very too much but you'll get an idea what we are actually doing keep all the ups and downs in mind now have a look we don't want this right there we don't want this wrinkle or these dark circle over there whatever you call it I don't know what to call it but we don't want it right there so we're gonna remove it so how to remove it don't consider it you don't take a sample from here and create this no take a sample from here we want this to be bright so paint this with bright and consider in all the skin all the dimensions of skin so this is the cheekbones and just constructing the skin from the scratch and this is what we're gonna do and this is just demo right this is not the actual process this is just to make you understand what are we gonna do so that way we're gonna create the face like that you get the idea right now have a look at what are we doing but we can apply it more smoothly and more subtly so where are we can apply this well very good question we're gonna create a layer between the color and the so that we still have the skin texture while we soften the skin and sculpt the skin really so let's go ahead and start our process so what are we gonna do take the brush okay and make sure the flow is very low somewhere around two or three whatever you comfortable with but make sure it's under ten I personally suggest it to be under five so I keep it somewhere around two or one sometimes so let's select two and let's zoom in quite a bit and reconstruct the nose so here's what we do take the brush take a sample from here and ask yourself this question now this is very important listen to it carefully whenever you paint ask yourself this what do I want that area to be colored in how do I want that area to look like okay so here's a protip where we are doing this done off the deck chalet it's much easier to work it that way okay it's it's distracting textures are sometimes distracting once you're done you can always go ahead and turn on the texture and you can turn it on and off time to time all right so here's what we do take a sample okay and then what do you want this area to be painted like so zoom out always zoom out veneer doing this this is not a thing where you're zoomed in this is not blemish removal you have to be zoomed out because if you're zoomed in if you're doing something you later realize when you zoom out that it looks horrible so make sure you have zoomed out a bit and then doing this all right take a sample from here what do I want this area to be painted like straight just like that this area just like this and once you're sampling make sure you are sampling enough pixels so let's go ahead and select the eyedropper tool and make sure it's something like 11 by 11 5 by 5 or even 31 by 31 average now what do I mean by that when you have point sample selected okay when you have point sample selected it samples from one pixel one point we don't want that to happen we want to take average of a collection of points so that's why we choose something like 5 by 5 or 11 by 11 and anyway do not forget this image is blurred to 9 pixels right so anything below nine pixels 5x5 3x3 won't make much of a sense so you can go ahead and choose 11 by 11 or 31 again remember this is a 15 megapixel image if you're editing a 24 megapixel image it might be lower for you depends upon the size of the skin on the canvas all right so let's go for 11 by 11 that's fine also make sure you do not select anything like 101 by 101 because that's gonna take an average a lot of pixels so you don't want that to happen so 11 by 11 is fine let's come back to the brush and we talked about it a lot all right so let's select this sample it's constructed that way now what do we want this area to be colored like this sample and here's a protip take a lot of samples okay take a lot of samples make sure we create a straight nose like that and this is gonna take some time this is gonna take a hell lot of time and patience and practice but it's worth it okay it's worth it totally worth it let's look at the before and after we did just one straw let me show you the before and after so here's the before look at the nose here's the after just one stroke look at how straight and refined the noses now we can name it nose I've not done it completely but you can go ahead and name it nose and you can also go ahead and create a lot of lesson between them not necessarily just one layer and then you can decrease the opacity if you don't like it so much so probably for this one will go with somewhere around 62 ish 60 65 ish that's fine now that looks good before after look at that area now this is gonna take quite a while but this is totally worth it so what we gonna do we're gonna make the video a little faster so that you can witness the whole process so there we go enjoy [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so here we are our image is done just have a look at the skin so it features zoom in have a look at the beautiful skin that we have right now let's zoom out just a little bit and let me show you the before and after so this is the before this is the after isn't that a classic difference now let me show you what we did first we did the nose as I showed you before and then we decrease the opacity because that was necessary always make sure that you don't forget to play with the opacity if 100 percent opacity looks good to you please go for it but if that doesn't make sure to reduce it okay now after you have done all of that you can also go ahead and select the group and decrease the overall opacity if you want to but I like a tad hundred now after the nose I did the left face left cheek that area and if you want you can also go ahead and decrease the opacity but I like it hundred again it's a personal preference if you want that perfect skin you can choose hundred if you want it to be a little more natural you can decrease the opacity but I like my opacity to be at hundred don't judge me alright so after we have done this beautiful skin we can complement it by dodging and burning now what is dodging and burning just a quick little recap we have talked about this before dodging and burning is brightening and darkening particular areas of the image to add dimension to it right that's all there is dodging is brightening and burning is darkening so whatever is facing the light whatever is protruding in the direction of light make it brighter whatever is facing away from the direction of light make it darker whatever you want to bring forward make it brighter what if you want to take it backwards make it darker alright in this image I don't think we need to Dodge because some areas are really really bright they look good we can also just go ahead and burn it you see dodging and burning doesn't necessarily mean that you have to do both dodging and burning you can do just one right so let's go ahead and create a curves adjustment layer and take it down now there are tons of ways to dodging but this is just one of them alright so take it down just like this select the mosque make sure it's selected and then press ctrl or command I then simply take the brush decrease the flow to somewhere around 1% or something like that maybe 5% whatever your choices I just press the backward slash key by accident press that again all right take the brush make sure the foreground color is white and simply paint on the areas which are facing away from the light so or the areas where you want to create a dimension kind of stuff so cheekbones if you want to bring it forward you can just paint dark in there like that I know that was too much but you can always play with the opacity and you get the idea what we are doing here so let's have a look at the before and after so this is before this the after of course decrease the opacity here also what you can do let me give you one more tip okay I'm gonna show you the final result but let me give you one more tip after you have just painted this area to make sure that you have not painted on the bright areas just double click on the right hand side of the layer don't decrease the opacity now just double click that and this will open up the lens Styles dialog box what do you have to do take the slider of underlying layer from right to left and this will be opposite if you are dodging right now we are burning right like that this will delete the bright areas of the underlying layer from the current layer make sense right so in the underlying layer these are the bright areas right so it will delete these bright areas of the underlying layer from the current layer which is the curves adjustment layer so there you go now this is very harsh so you can always go ahead hold the alter option click on the slider and just separate them like that now that looks like something hit OK and then you can go ahead and decrease the opacity like that ok have a look at it before and after before flat after it adds some dimension you can also do it on the other side of course if we zoom in it looks strange so we'll decrease the opacity even more just something like 24 or probably 28 ish that's fine so there we go that's also what you can do similarly you can go ahead and dodge other areas but there's a caveat the caveat is this you might have to create multiple curves adjustment less if you want to use blend if because we have used blend if in this one have a look we have removed the bright areas so you really cannot go ahead and burn it because this area is already bright for this area you might have to create another curves adjustment layer so keep that in mind so just like this let me should show you let me show you take the brush and if you try to go ahead and darken it it just won't darken why because we have applied that blend it over there right so you might have to create another curves adjustment layer click on this adjustment layer icon choose curves take it down and you know the whole routine right so you can do that as well and if you're not using blended in the layer Styles dialog box you can go ahead and do it in the same curves adjustment layer just one alright and after you have done with dodging and burning you can always go ahead and retouch the eyes and have a complete playlist just on retouching eyes you can check it out right there now you can also top it off by using liquify so what you can do create a merged layer after you have done all of that create a merged layer by holding ctrl alt shift E I'm gonna show it very quickly and then convert this into a smart object this is a very essential now it is suggested and even I personally recommend it that you apply liquify in the beginning just after you import your image into Photoshop but there are certain disadvantages to it for example you want to change the shape just a little bit then if you change to liquify at the bottom layer you might have to reposition the blemishes skin softening everything might be in a mess you might have to create a merged layer again at the top and do it it's kinda it's gotta be messy so here's what I suggest you can also do this there are advantages and disadvantages to this as well so I'm just gonna show you another technique so after you create a merge layer then you go to filter convert for Smart Filters can wet this to a smart object then hit OK and after you do that after you convert that into a smart object then apply liquify go to filter and then liquify now Houston advantage to this let me show you how to work the liquify and then let me show you the advantages all right let's zoom in quite a bit and suppose you want to correct the lips right select the forward warp tool the shortcut to which is W and make the brush as big as the thing that you want to affect okay so in this case this lips so this is as big so brush size just like this and not just slowly decrease the pressure just a little bit and nudge it very slowly don't do it quickly very slowly budget decrease the size okay all right that looks good all right I have a look here it's a little asymmetrical very tiny adjustments no huge adjustments over there that's good this will go a little bit inside okay if you want to make it smooth you can do that as well make the brush as big as that and then let me get straight that's okay this side look at this bump we need to take care of this bring it out a little bit okay that looks good and you get the idea now after you have done all of that zoom out and have a look at it whether that looks natural or not then zoom in and click on this very nice button magical button called reconstruct click on that and as you decrease the amount have a look it returns to its original state if you think you have done so much you have done too much you can keep it in the middle but I think for me hundred is fine hit OK and hit OK if you're satisfied now this this is what this is a smart object you can always go ahead and double click on liquify and you can change it the way you like now what I its advantages now one of the biggest advantages of Smart Objects is that when you apply a filter to it it's a smart filter and that want to have smart filter is that smart filters can be copied yes they can be copied so let's zoom in and suppose you want to make a change for example you want to take it a little inside like that and hit OK ok that's fine now if you want to make a change in the face in the skin or something if you want to take it back probably remove this dodging and burning our stuff like that take it off remove it you can always create a new merge layer ok create a new much layer in case you want to change something down here and you've created a merge layer here's the advantage of this create a new merge layer get ctrl alt shift and E command option shift and E convert this into a smart object ok and then copy the smart filters - this one holds the alter option click and drag and paste now the smart filters will be copied to the new merged layer in case you want to change something in the bottom so liquify is adjustable now have a look the same effect has been applied to this one as this one look I just click look the same effect now we can go ahead and delete it delete the previous one and just we just have the new one and that is done now I actually went ahead and we touch the eyes did dodging and burning a little properly and this is what I got so this is the before and this is the after just have a look at the beautiful skin that you can get using this so that's how to not only get a really good smooth skin but also sculpt out the face the wavy design just a quick little recap first of all remove the blemishes create a new layer with a healing brush tool or the Spot Healing Brush tool whichever is your favorite remove the blemishes and remember the tip to see the blemishes create a black and white adjustment layer take down the Reds you really will be able to see the blemishes then delete the black and white adjustment layer after you remove the blemishes and create two copies to merge layers one for the color one for the texture applied frequency separation separate both of them using frequency separation and between the color and the texture layer you can create new layers and paint in the skin the whole objective of this let me make it simple for you the whole objective of this if I just turn off the texture like that is to make the skin just like a doll just like one of those standing outside those clothes stores I just like those dogs alright now once you do that and turn on the texture you get the texture back if you want extra texture you can make a copy of this control or command J and then it's too much then you can hide that behind the mask hold the alt or option click on the mask button take the brush with flow somewhere around 20 ish and you can paint back in some texture right in there if you want some extra texture like that if you're into that some people do it and you can do that as well just like this isn't that wonderful so that's all there is I hope you enjoyed this video and if this helped you make sure to share this video and don't forget to subscribe and make sure subscribe ring the bells let you my friend don't miss a thing I will see you guys in the next one till then stay tuned and make sure that you keep creating [Music] you [Music]

Channel: PiXimperfect

Views: 2,506,107

Keywords: skin retouching, skin softening, skin smoothing, frequency separation, smooth skin photoshop, dodging and burning, skin sculpting, skin texture, sampling and painting, retouch, high-end retouching, advanced retouching, photoshop tutorial, piximperfect

Id: Ka-4x2vgh58

Length: 29min 49sec (1789 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 05 2017