Photo Retouching – Skin Photoshop Tutorial
May 23, 2006 by Oli · 68 Comments 
This will be our first tutorial on the subject of re-touching a photograph in photoshop. We will be working on a photo of a model and using a few techniques to smooth and even out the skin.
Photo re-touching is a fine art used mainly in the media for magazines etc, that doesn’t mean though, that we cant get good results fairly easily using a few photoshop techniques.
The starting photo we will be using :
The first technique we will be using is the clone stamp tool :
You use this tool by holding down ‘alt’ , selecting an area of the skin that is unblemished but near to the blemish so the skin tone is similar. Click on the clear skin, let go of ‘alt’ and click over the blemish – this will replace it with the area you ‘alt’ clicked with:
Have a play around with this, zoomed in to the image and go around removing the big blemish’s.
Once you have removed them, duplicate the layer you are working on and click Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur.
Blur this layer by around 0.6 pixels :
Now staying on that layer and selecting the eraser brush, delete around the eyes and lips so these stay sharp :
Next, take the opacity of the layer down slightly, (right click on the layer, select blending options) :
Now we will create an adjustment layer, on your layer pallete window click this button :
And choose ’selective colour’
This step is a bit harder to explain as you will need to play with the settings by eye, these are the settings used in this example :
Once that’s done you should have something like :
As you can see from this comparison, a few simple touches can improve the skin texture quite a bit:
use the clone stamp tool
This tutorial is very rudimentry and does not give the best technique for something so simple.
You have lost all detail in the hair and everywhere else. I do not use this method, and as a result, my final image is much better looking than yours!
Thanks, nice tutorial!
Hi. My doubt is in colour replacement. I would like to know how to replace the colour of a person whos fair to a person whos dark. Lik say the colour of an American replaced to an African. Can u pls help me out in it?
I totally agree wiyh Ryan. Ever use layer mask instead of the eraser tool. It’s more flexible.
just my take on things I like the picture myself to look alittle more real, this was done with image masking, hue saturation, heal brush, and brightness and contrast. take your time and you can get nice results just cause its a beginners tutorial doesnt mean it has to be a rush threw tutorial, all things done to this image here http://img292.imageshack.us/my.php?image=justmytakeonthingsub9.jpg
good try on the tutorial tho
djslide69@gmail.com
Not really the greatest tutorial in the world… For a start you blurred out a lot of the finer details of the image. Secondly you didn’t tidy up her hair at all, i know this was only a skin tutorial but to make it look half decent you do need to pay attention to other areas, and yes, NEVER use the eraser tool, layer masks are amazingly more versatile.
dave
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Thank you Sir for this nice tutorial
i agree with john & ryan.
but,
the tutural, was good
I have a touch-up tutorial that takes another approach other than gaussian blurring. You can link to it by clicking on my name.
This site is truly a great resource thanks for all your hard work