Photo Editing - "Saving Face"

Do you believe everything you see in photos? Judging by this layout... do you believe that I have unblemished skin with no wrinkles or freckles or dark circles under my eyes? Do you believe that my teeth are perfectly white and that I have eyes as deep as the sea? HAHAHAHA! I actually joke with my husband and say "Who needs expensive make-up and skin care products when you have PHOTOSHOP????" In this week's lesson... we will learn the art of touch-up. I have searched and begged for friends and family to loan me their photos for this process... but they all PROMPTLY protested. So... I chose a (not-SO-bad-one) of me. Luckily, the way the light hit my face as my sister-in-law took the picture (Thanks Candice!!!!), it's one that I don't mind so much sharing with the world in its unedited state. Sigh. :) So... here is the layout we will be creating today:

1.) The first thing you want to do is to Duplicate your image so you don't lose your original in case you mess up. You can either right click on your photo layer and choose duplicate and simply do your editing on a separate layer. This way, if you mess up, just delete that layer and duplicate your original and start over. However... I always choose to acutally duplicate my image and create a whole separate file. This is simply because once I'm finished... I'm sooooo likely to reach up and click 'Save' and then lose my original. This isn't so bad since I'm "fixing" my flaws... however, I usually do all of my photo editing in one shot. So the effect I use on my photo for my layout is probably not the effect I would want for simply printing the photo itself. Make sense?

**Here are the most common problem areas one usually wants to work on in a photo. So (as I take a deep breath before I feel all exposed, hehehe) let's zoom in on our photo.

2.) I usually start with the blemishes or freckles I want to get rid of since these are the easiest to fix. Choose your Spot Healing Brush from your tools palette.

3.) Now refer to the top of your screen for the Settings of this tool. For our purpose here, I have set mine as follows:

4.) Now that your cursor appears as a circle, place it over the spot, blemish, or freckle that you want to get rid of. I'll start with a freckle on my shoulder:

5.) Now simply click. Viola!! It disappears!!

6.) Now continue doing that on any places of the skin that you want "fixed". (Note: Be aware that some clicks are going to pull from an area nearby that doesn't match... if that happens, simply click in the same place again and it should pull from a different spot. If neither of those work, undo those clicks (CTRL+Z), zoom in closer to the area, make your brush a little smaller and try the process over again... that usually does the trick.) Here's my before and after photos just using the Spot Healing Brush:

7.) Now... let's move on to wrinkles. We're going to use a different tool for this one. Right-click on the Spot Healing Brush we just used and choose Healing Brush Tool.

8.) Refer to the top of your screen for your settings. Again, for our purpose here, I have set mine as follows:

9.) Now... this tool isn't as "automatic" as the Spot Healing Brush. We actually have to "define" the "color" that we want to "paint" over the area. But, since we have the hardness of our brush set as a softer edge AND we have our Mode set to Lighten, it blends in really well. So we actually have a little more control over it. Here are the main areas I'll be focusing on in this photo:

10.) So... your cursor should now appear as a circle. Zoom in pretty close to the area you want to remove the wrinkle or dark circles. Place your cursor in an area VERY close to the "offending" area. Press your ALT button (your cursor will change to a little "target" symbol) and click once, as follows:

That ALT+click actually "copies" the tone and color you want to use for covering up your wrinkle. Now, let go of your ALT key and place your cursor at the start of the wrinkle. Simply Click and Drag a short distance. Now... as you can see, when you start doing this, while you're dragging, it's looking like a big and very noticable line. Don't panic. It's supposed to do that. Once you let go of your mouse buttom, it will blend. This is why I only drag the mouse for a short distance... so that I can make sure it's blending well. (If it doesn't look right, just click CTRL+Z to undo that step and then, again press your ALT key, "copy" another area that's pretty close to the wrinkle and then try it again.) So... here's what it looks like as I'm dragging my mouse and then what it looks like after I let go:

11.) Now... continue brushing over the wrinkle (every now and then "copying" a new little area to copy) and finish this eye. Then you move to the other eye (or another wrinkle area) and "copy" an area near that eye and do the same thing. Continue these steps until you are happy with the overall result. Here's what mine looks like after fixing both eyes and a couple of other little spots I wasn't thrilled with. (ok... maybe a few other spots... but if YOU can't tell... then why should I? hahahaah!)

12.) Now... as you can see... I'm still sporting the sort of darkness on the inside of my eye that we are ALL so blessed with. hehe. That is easily fixed using your dodge tool. So, choose your Dodge Tool from your tools palette.

13.) The size of your brush will depend on the size of the area you are wanting to brighten up. Set your hardness to somewhere in the middle and set your Exposure to around 35% or so, so that your result per click will be subtle.

Now simply click on the area you want to brighten up. If it's not bright enough on your first click... just click it again. Keep clicking until you're happy with the result. Here's where I placed my Dodge tool:

And here's how it looks after a couple (ok... a few) clicks. :)

14.) Now... since we already have our Dodge tool activated... let's move onto teeth. Make your brush smaller and place your cursor over the teeth in the photo. Begin clicking on the teeth in your photo, being careful that you don't "brush" the gums or the lips. (Be SURE you don't make them too light or bright... you don't want it to look like you have a black light shining on them. ) Here's mine as I start to "brush" over them as well as what it looks like after I'm done:

15.) OK... last, but certainly not least. The eyes. Now, I wish my eyes were more open in this photo, but we will work with what we have. We will be using several tools for this. Our dodge and burn tools, as well as our sharpen tool. Let's start with our sharpen tool.... choose that from your tools palette:


16.) Look to the top of your screen for your settings. I set mine at a smaller round brush with 0% hardness and 50% Strength.

17.) Now, place your brush over the iris and pupil of the eye and click a couple of times... just to give the variations some definitioin.

18.) Now... choose your Dodge Tool again with a very small brush... maybe 10 or 15... Range is Midtones and Exposure at 35%. Place your cursor right outside the pupil and trace around it once or twice to lighten it. This will result in a subtly light area right outside the pupil. KEEP IT SUBLTE! If you lighten it too much your subject will begin looking a little like an alien. eeek!) Here's mine after these 2 steps:

19.) Now... keeping your dodge tool activated, click a time or two on the whites of the eyes. Again... keep it subtle. Here's mine after dodging the whites:

20.) Last step... choose your burn tool from your tools palette:

21.) Now we want to run the Burn Tool right along the edge of the iris, being careful not to burn the whites of the eyes. (OH... and sorry... but it bears repeating one more time... keep it subtle. hehehe).

Now... let's look at the before and after to get the real impact of the difference. :)

Now... just throw some FABULOUS effect and crop on your photo and pop it on a layout!! (On mine, i just simply duplicated my photo layer once, changed the Blending Mode to Overlay and reduced the opacity to about 60%. To see more about blending, see all of my blending tutorials!) Again... here's our completed layout:

I would LOVE to know what you think of this tutorial. Feel free to leave comments! If you have any questions regarding this tutorial, you can certainly email me at taylormade8330@yahoo.com.

***I would also love to hear what type of tutorials YOU would like to see! While your here, scroll up and take a vote on what tutorial you would like to see NEXT week! I have a few in mind, but wanted to see what YOU want!!

You can find a PRINTABLE version of this tutorial (and all of my others) in the Tutorial Section at Oscraps!