Skin Smoothing Made Easy In Photoshop
As a person who works in Photoshop daily doing a wide variety of retouching I seem to get asked a lot on how to “smooth” or “fix” skin. That being said, there is hundreds of ways. Every person who works in this field has many tried and trusted styles they use. So I write this blog to help answer some of those questions. Think of it is a short, not to lengthy tutorial without it actually being a tutorial. First and foremost, are you familiar with Photoshop? If yes, keep reading.
Things You Will Need To Use
Clone Stamp Tool
Healing Brush Tool
You are probably thinking: What the heck? I already know how to use those tools and it’s true, they are very handy for doing skin. If you have any flaws you want cleaned up, I suggest using either of these to remove acne, or wrinkles. Hopefully you know how to use these already as I am not going into detail on what they do.
Make a duplicate copy of the original image (this can be done by hitting CTRL+J on PC or Command + J on a Mac). Once you have a duplicate layer name it “Flaws” and begin cleaning up the acne by going over the spots you need fixed and removed. Alternate between the two brushes until you have the acne and wrinkles cleaned up. Remember it doesn’t need to be 100% perfectly spotless, there are a few more steps that will help make the skin more perfect looking.
Next, make a duplicate of the layer you just corrected with the clone and healing brush tools. Name that layer “Smooth” or something similar. Next you’ll want to go up to filters>blur>surface blur. After you are there adjust the threshold and radius, you will want to see some details of the face, but the image to still be blurry. Looks pretty…unfinished right?
I know. Don’t touch this layer; you’ll need to go back down to your “Flaws” layer and duplicate that one again, once you do that drag the new layer up and over your “Smooth” layer. Now name it “Details”. Now go back to filters>other>high pass. Adjust the high pass settings until you start to see the desired details on the face you wish to see then apply it.
Go and set the blending mode to hard light. Next select both the “Smooth” and “Detail” layer by holding CTRL and clicking the layers, then hit CTRL + G to group them. You can rename them to whatever, but I normally name it “Skin Smoothing.” Next you will want to add an inverted layer. This can be done by holding ALT and clicking the new layer button down at the bottom right section. Make sure your foreground color is white, if it’s not just change it to white, next I suggest using a soft brush with opacity of 25%. You’ll want to paint on the inverted mask (the black part) and paint over the spots you want “smoothed” you can paint over it as much or little as you want.
After those SIMPLE steps the skin should be drastically better. Now this is quick, for full retouching, you will of course want to do other stuff to your image, such as dodge and burn to add highlights and shadows, or to lighten the eyes and darken the lashes, ect.
Hopefully this helps you tackle some basic skin-how-to’s in Photoshop and you find it useful! If you have any questions or need more help, leave a comment on my Feedback page found under the about me Tab or leave a comment on this blog and I will answer your questions or try to help you as best as I can.
