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Simple Skin Smoothing Techniques?

  • 15-07-2011 3:04pm
    #1
    Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭


    Hey all,


    Does anyone know of any simple yet somewhat effective skin smoothing techniques, to get smoother looking skin, in a hurry (for when you've loads of photos to process)?


    I used to use a plugin-type-thingy-ma-jiggy for photoshop. I downloaded it, it was called "Airbrush", and it was just a series of actions that ran on the image (with your own input, too, to decide how much smoothing you wanted and on what parts of the image).

    It was handy, but it was a bit of a pain in the ass, and it was hard to tell how heavily it'd soften the face, so you'd sometimes have to run it twice and correct where you went wrong the first time.


    Currently, I just copy the face into a separate layer, cut out the eyes and lips, use the spot healing tool to get rid of any distrations, run a heavy enough gaussian blur on it, and then change the opacity down to 50% or so. It looks okay, but it's quick, which is why I'm liking it.


    just wondering if anyone uses any simpler or quicker methods that give decent results for when you've a fair few images to get through?


Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,131 ✭✭✭oshead


    Imagenomic's Portraiture. A plugin for PS.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,852 ✭✭✭Hugh_C


    oshead wrote: »
    Imagenomic's Portraiture. A plugin for PS.

    Portraiture is expensive but brilliant when used in moderation. Used too much and the subject looks plasticy. Used properly and its unsurpassed. All my beauty stuff has a touch of it on there somewhere.

    there's a demo version which supers a watermark until you buy it. Available as a standalone too.


  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Trying it out now. Flicked through the user guide but couldn't see mention of it, so just thought I'd ask here;

    Is there anyway to smooth the skin but not the rest of the photo? I'm getting nice results with the skin, but it's shocking how much detail it's stealing from the hair in photos. Girl's hair in the photo I'm editing is crystal clear (how I like it) but it looks really soft when you get the skin looking nice.

    Probably not something you'd notice unless you seen the before and after versions, but it's kind of annoying me how soft it's making it look :(


    Any ideas? I can't seem to find a tool to drag that'll let me select different parts of the image or anything. :confused:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 993 ✭✭✭ditpaintball


    I use Guy Gowans Methods, I find them great. It gets good results while looking natural.

    http://guygowan.com/shop/dvd/cosmetic/


  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    I use Guy Gowans Methods, I find them great. It gets good results while looking natural.

    http://guygowan.com/shop/dvd/cosmetic/


    Looks like you could get great results, and I'd love to learn how to add make-up realistically, but it also looks like you'll be spending an hour editing a single photo?


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 993 ✭✭✭ditpaintball


    Nope, not really. You can spend as long as you want but 25mins or so would do most images


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,229 ✭✭✭gloobag


    Here's the way I do it:
    • Duplicate your background layer
    • Set the new layers blend mode to Vivid Light
    • Invert the layer
    • Convert to a Smart Object
    • Open up the High Pass filter and adjust the radius slider until the skin has the desired smoothness (note: the image as a whole will look weird, but just focus on the skin)
    • Open up the Gaussian Blur filter. This will bring back some texture to the skin. Adjust the radius slider until you get the desired amount of natural texture back(you might want to zoom in to judge this properly). It's usually a low enough number for me.
    • The image still looks weird. Double click on your layer to bring up the layer styles. At the bottom of the window you will notice the Blend If section. For the This Layer section, notice the black and white sliders at either end. If you hold down alt and drag, you can split each of these into two seperate sliders.
    • Split and drag the black and white sliders while watching your image to smooth out the transitions of your shadows and highlights. This will smooth out the weird looking edges caused by the filters you applied.
    • Finally, alt click on the mask icon at the bottom of the layers pallette to create a black mask on the layer. Now paint with a white brush at a low opacity (20 -30%) and paint back in the smoothing in the places you want it (because of the brushes low opacity you can build it up gradually). Avoid detail areas such as eyes, eye lashes, eyebrows, hair, lips, edge of the nose etc...
    • That's it. Because it's a smart filter you can go back and tweak everything until suits you. It sounds complicated here but it's really not. You could even create an action to tackle some of it.

    Hope that helps :)


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,131 ✭✭✭oshead


    Trying it out now. Flicked through the user guide but couldn't see mention of it, so just thought I'd ask here;

    Is there anyway to smooth the skin but not the rest of the photo? I'm getting nice results with the skin, but it's shocking how much detail it's stealing from the hair in photos. Girl's hair in the photo I'm editing is crystal clear (how I like it) but it looks really soft when you get the skin looking nice.

    Probably not something you'd notice unless you seen the before and after versions, but it's kind of annoying me how soft it's making it look :(


    Any ideas? I can't seem to find a tool to drag that'll let me select different parts of the image or anything. :confused:

    Just select the option to create on a new layer, or something to that effect. Then on the new layer either use the erasure or create a new mask and paint with a black brush @ 100 to remove the effect from the other parts.

    Another way that I don't think i've tried, at least not in a long time, is to select the area that you want to work on with the lasso tool and run the plug in.


  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 9,047 CMod ✭✭✭✭CabanSail


    Looks like you could get great results, and I'd love to learn how to add make-up realistically, but it also looks like you'll be spending an hour editing a single photo?

    There is a couple of superior skin smoothing tutorials on Guy's website. If you are going to be doing a lot of these images then you write an action and run it on all of the files via a droplet. Then it will only take a few seconds to brush in where it's required and set the strength of the smoothing desired. So maybe half an hour to get the action & droplet written then a minute per image.

    8E285EA883CB48F9952675CCC93C636C-0000318539-0002432560-00800L-25A47CA3207942DB92FFD3CD678FC942.jpg

    On this shot I applied skin smoothing only to her and left his skin alone. No action and it took 3 minutes (probably less)


    167356.jpg

    This is the same shot straight from the camera.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,131 ✭✭✭oshead


    CabanSail wrote: »
    On this shot I applied skin smoothing only to her and left his skin alone. No action and it took 3 minutes (probably less)

    A before and after would be handy...


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  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    CabanSail wrote: »
    There is a couple of superior skin smoothing tutorials on Guy's website. If you are going to be doing a lot of these images then you write an action and run it on all of the files via a droplet. Then it will only take a few seconds to brush in where it's required and set the strength of the smoothing desired. So maybe half an hour to get the action & droplet written then a minute per image.

    8E285EA883CB48F9952675CCC93C636C-0000318539-0002432560-00800L-25A47CA3207942DB92FFD3CD678FC942.jpg

    On this shot I applied skin smoothing only to her and left his skin alone. No action and it took 3 minutes (probably less)


    167356.jpg

    This is the same shot straight from the camera.


    See, it still looks like you lost a lot of detail/sharpness in their hair, though. :( It's efficient, I'll give you that, but there's a good plug in called portraiture that I downloaded before (not the imagenomic one) that was handy for allowing you to selectively apply where you wanted to soften (though it was hard to tell what the end result would be like so it'd often take more than once to get it right).


    I had kinda hoped that with imagenomic's portraiture, I'd be able to use a quick-select tool to highlight skin tones or something. I must try the lasso select thing. If that fails I'll go the multiple-layers route and cut out everything except the parts i want softened and then drop it onto the full photo.


  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Arts Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 9,047 CMod ✭✭✭✭CabanSail


    I've applied a Digital Reflector to the hair. That has nothing to do with skin smoothing, which is only applied to her face. The thing is her skin is very good already but the result is noticable in the print, rather than online versions.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    You can purchase actions and even download some free ones online for photoshop. Deviant art is a good place to start when looking for new actions and ebay. Be wary a lot of the free ones you may find to be slow or not what you need but it is more trial and error.

    When you find an action you like you just automate a batch of shots and let the computer work for you while you put your feet up;)


  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    I used Imagenomic's Portraiture again there a second, and can confirm that you can indeed use the lasso tool to select whatever you want and apply only to that one section (or you can create a layer, cut stuff out, smooth it, and drop it onto the original).

    I'm quite happy now. I just did a quick stopwatch session there, and I managed to remove one noticeable spot, three smaller ones, use portraiture to smooth the skin (and hair :o ) and save the photo in less than 2 minutes. So I'm please with that, actually. Obviously it'll take longer if I start using layers to only soften select parts (which I will do), but it's still somewhat efficient.

    I'm pleased.


    STG; I've used actions for football photos I took before. I had about 100 or so photos and just sharpened and brightened them all. I wouldn't like to do this to a portrait photo as I'd like to smooth the face and sharpen the hair, and because the face would be in a different place in each photo, I don't think bulk actioning would work too well in my favour :o


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    STG; I've used actions for football photos I took before. I had about 100 or so photos and just sharpened and brightened them all. I wouldn't like to do this to a portrait photo as I'd like to smooth the face and sharpen the hair, and because the face would be in a different place in each photo, I don't think bulk actioning would work too well in my favour :o

    Get the right action and it works;) Honestly, I had Dodgykeeper here last week showing him my workflow as he didnt believe me when I told him how much time I spend on a pic, I have brightness, contrast, sharpening, colour enhancement and skin smoothing all done by the computer before I even look at an image, I then have a selection of further actions that may be applied depending on the image along with a few manual tweaks. Yes sometimes I will increase the skin smoothing but very very very rarely.


  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Get the right action and it works;) Honestly, I had Dodgykeeper here last week showing him my workflow as he didnt believe me when I told him how much time I spend on a pic, I have brightness, contrast, sharpening, colour enhancement and skin smoothing all done by the computer before I even look at an image, I then have a selection of further actions that may be applied depending on the image along with a few manual tweaks. Yes sometimes I will increase the skin smoothing but very very very rarely.


    Brightness, contrast, sharpening and colour enhancement would all be done manually by me in Camera RAW. Skin smoothening would be in photoshop itself.

    I'm still new to the portraiture game, so I'm very erratic with my settings, so my exposure does tend to jump a little here and there, so I don't think I'd be ready for running my photos through a series of actions just yet.

    I do know how to do it though, as I say, I did it before with football photographs I took. I'll have to see if I can get imagenomic's Portraiture to work in an action (i'd assume so) and then run that on a load of photos I've already taken to see the before and after.


    ... but then I'm back to my earlier argument of losing detail in the hair...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    As much as I would love to say do this that or the other, I can't, I spent numerous hours manually smoothing skin in photoshop before I started to develop and purchase my numerous actions. Previous to that I used paintshop pro which actually has its very own skin smoothing option which is quite good. Rather than waste time on something that I could not develop myself, i.e. an action that would work around all images I simply outsourced, getting the action elsewhere. It works for me, some people may rather building their own entirely for everything but I was focussing on saving time so this worked for me.

    I thankfully do not loose much sharpness in the hair with the specific action I use now unless the hair colour is extremely similar to the skin colour. I would be happy enough if you wanted to send on an image to me to test the actions I have if you were interested in trying that approach.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,859 ✭✭✭superflyninja


    Well after hearing about smelltheglove's workflow I've started using guy gowans techniques also. The skin smoothing/lightening etc is excellent and I'm using it on all the family shots I take now. The difference is very natural looking.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    I knew after I showed you that you would go get some yourself;) Amazing results!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,859 ✭✭✭superflyninja


    I knew after I showed you that you would go get some yourself;) Amazing results!
    Id heard his name bandied about but wowza there is some good results and the speed of editing now is savage, not just for portraits. Only thing is for his retouching action it tends to blow a few highlights sometimes,but nothing unrecoverable.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    I don't actually use his retouching action though, I have another one which I prefer, but the speed is unreal from start to finish.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,859 ✭✭✭superflyninja


    totally. i actually hadnt used channels before and I had no idea they could be so useful!! Ive not created droplets yet as i dont process family shots THAT often but im gonna...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,503 ✭✭✭smelltheglove


    Droplets don't always work on pc computers. I went through this with them once, really could not find a reason why they would not work on my system, Guy Gowan said himself he could not find the reason either that sometimes it just doesnt happen but if you have mac it will work no hassle.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 993 ✭✭✭ditpaintball


    Just a note on the techniques for toughing up skin. There are many ways of doing it, some better than others. You could have the best method in the world, but unless it is applied right in a manner that does not look fake, it is useless :)

    There are some people out there taking portraits of porcine dolls :)


  • Posts: 14,344 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    There are some people out there taking portraits of porcine dolls :)


    I'm actually trying for that look at the moment, to be honest. It's obviously just a bit of a novelty at the moment, to me, and I'm sure I'll get sick of it and look back on photos thinking "what was I thinking?!" but it's something that looks nice to me at the moment.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,852 ✭✭✭Hugh_C


    Nope, not really. You can spend as long as you want but 25mins or so would do most images


    Bl**dy H*ll, 25 mins! Jaysus, 5 is too much :)


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 993 ✭✭✭ditpaintball


    Hugh_C wrote: »
    Bl**dy H*ll, 25 mins! Jaysus, 5 is too much :)

    It would be great to work with models with perfect skin and fantastic make up artists all the time :)


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