Wednesday 9 May 2007

How to Remove Skin Imperfections Using Photoshop

Hi, welcome to my blog. This is my first tutorial, so I hope you guys enjoy it!

I'll be showing you a method to remove imperfections such as freckles, pimples or just skin blemishes.

This method is fairly simple and I personally think the outcome is great.

Lets Begin:

Step one is to find an image. I went searching around and found an image of a girl with freckles




















I want to add before we continue that I think this girl looks perfectly fine the way she is, but for the purposes of the tutorial she will be the subject.

Load your image into Photoshop.

Step Two is using the Healing Brush Tool



This is a very important process, take your time with this one. You can think of this as giving the skin a wash. Remove all the obvious imperfections and marks.

I used a brush size 10, with a hardness of 65%

After about 5 mins of touching around, I came up with this




















Be patient with this step as its very crucial for the final result.

Step three now the next step is simple and all you have to do is apply some filters to your image.

Firstly Duplicate your layer, then go to Filter > Noise > Dust and Scratches.

Set the radius to 5 Pixels.
And Threshold to 0.

Change this to match the photo your working with.

This is what I got:




















Now we need add some blurring, go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur.

Set the radius to 2 pixels.




















Now the last filter to add. Filter >Noise >Add Noise. Set this to an amount of around 0.5 to 1 depending on your photo.
This part is to add a realistic tone to the human skin. Not using this can leave a wax doll effect which looks very unrealistic.

Step four
is the final step of this tutorial. With the duplicate layer selected set the blend mode to Screen



















This will blend both of the layers together and give the wanted effect. We're not quite done.

I'm sure you would have noticed that the image is very bright. Simply adjust this by going to Image > Adjustments >Curves and experimenting which curve gives you the best lighting.

Every photo gives a different result so you'll have to take extra care with the initial stages.

And finally here is my result













I hope you enjoyed, please leave comments on any points I could improve etc.

M-Kay