Portrait Retouching

PORTRAITURE

*see the slideshows in the dropbox folder for some inspiration

Portraiture can mean many things. Environmental portraits of people show someone's surroundings and close up portraits can be more about a personal's expression or emotion. Stories are told in different ways.

environmental portrait by Joel Sternfeld

close-up portrait of Picasso by Richard Avedon (notice the side lighting)

Lens Choice:
Lens Length Impacts Portraiture!
In taking pictures of people choosing a longer lens (like above 50mm) is generally more flattering. Try standing farther away from your subject and zooming in if you have a zoom lens.

Image on left is a wide angle (like a 18mm lens). Image on right is a longer lens (like 85mm) Image credit here.

My favorite lens for portraits is the 50mm f1.8. You can find it at B&H here. You generally want to use a 50mm or longer lens when shooting a portrait (I'd say 50-100mm. Some say 80mm is the best.)

It's not very wide, so you will want a zoom lens as well. The more expensive ones that go to f2.8 are the nicest and assure that blurry background. Something like one of these.

I also have a fixed 28mm f2.8 lens I love. They say prime lenses (those that don't zoom" are a bit sharper. This is a bit too wide for a portrait, but great for group shots.

PHOTOSHOP TOOLS for portrait retouching:

QUICK SUMMARY: Retouching a portrait:
Process the RAW file and open it in Photoshop.
-Layer 1 (bottom of stack) = Background
-Layer 2 = Background Duplicate (Duplicate the background, call it "retouching" or "patch and clone stamp". Fix skin here) You may also like to use the Healing Brush Tool for skin.
-Layer 3 (top of stack) = Curves "brighten layer" for brightening under eyes, whites of eyes, teeth, etc:

THE DETAILS: Basic Portrait Retouching **be sure to zoom in to 100% or 200%

We work from the bottom layer up. Each time you add a new layer, it should get added to the top of the layer stack. It's important to work in this order and add new layers to the top of the layers stack as you move along. 

1.) Retouching Layer/Blemishes: Duplicate background layer by dragging it down to the little icon at the bottom of the layers palette that looks like a page with the corner folded. This duplicate layer is where you should do your blemish and spot removal. Using a combination of the following tools, Clone Tool, Healing Brush Tool, Spot Healing Brush Tool, Patch Tool and filling with content aware to rid of all blemishes and stray hairs. Turn brush hardness all the way off, to 0% so that your brushes are soft. Experiment with the opacity of each tool as well.  (Clone & Healing brush tools also work on empty layers if you choose “sample all layers” from the bar at the top.)

2.) To Add Slimming (optional) : FILTER > LIQUIFY. Add this to the above retouching layer, or if you think you may want to "turn it off" later, do it on a separate layer by Duplicating the “retouching” layer and call it “Liquify”.  Liquify minimizes double chins, chubby cheeks, odd facial angles, crooked bangs,  bunched up clothing, etc. Set Brush Pressure and Brush density to “17”- this is a good starting point. Use a fairly large brush.

3.) Decreasing Wrinkles: Make a new empty layer (click icon at the bottom of the layers palette that looks like a page with the corner folded). Using the healing brush, option click a "good" source area and heal over the wrinkles. Or try the spot healing brush. Make sure "all layers" is selected from the drop down menu at the top (otherwise it won't work to heal on an empty layer). The advantage of healing on an empty layer is that it won't increase your files size too much. The advantage to working on wrinkles on a separate layer is that you can decrease the layer opacity without affecting other retouches.

4.) Decrease Redness: You may need to selectively decrease redness in certain parts of the face. To do this, make a new "Hue/Saturation" adjustment layer from your adjustments palette. Change "Master" to "Reds" and move the slider to the left on the Properties panel. Invert the mask that has been created for you on the layers palette (command i for a Mac/ control i -PC). Paint with a big, soft white brush (B) on the mask to reveal the change (and decrease reds in certain areas).

5.) Brightening with Curves. This is great for brightening under eyes, brightening shadow areas and adding highlights to hair. Make a new curves layer, push the curve slightly from the middle to the top left corner (see below), invert (command i) the mask and paint with a soft white brush on the areas you want to become brighter. You can always decrease the opacity of the layer if the effect is too strong.

6.) Teeth: you can take some yellow-ness out of teeth and brighten them up a little using a Hue Saturation layer. See step #4, except change "Master" to "Yellows". And move the "Lightness" slider to the right to make the teeth brighter. (*note: you can select the teeth first using the lasso tool, or you can simply paint over the teeth on the mask)

Here's an overview of the final layers palette incorporating all the steps I mentioned above:

image source: Lynda.com 

WHEN DONE....Save as TIFF of PSD to maintain layers. Save another copy as a JPG to be able to email it, make a print, upload it, etc. The TIFF/PSD is your Master File and if you want to make any edits layer, you'll go back to the TIFF/PSD.

Sharpening

There are several different methods to sharpen an image. I recommend Smart Sharpen. You can sharpen certain areas of an image during retouching if you make a mask (like the eyes, or the hair, or the flower, or whatever you want to be the center of attention). Before you print, it's a good idea to sharpen the whole image just a little ("output sharpening"), as making a print can reduce the sharpness of an image just a bit. But be careful not to oversharpen!

*Remember that all sharpening needs to be done on a new merged layer on top of the layers stack, ideally after you are done with all other retouching. To make this new merged layer, go to Select > All, Edit > Copy Merged,  Edit > Paste. (Or the shortcut is Command/Shift/Option/E all at the same time.)

Smart Sharpen: 

1. First, make a background copy or make a new merged layer on top of the stack (see above).

2. Go to FILTER > SHARPEN > SMART SHARPEN. Depending on your file, you will likely want an "amount" of 100 to 200, and a "radius" of 1-3. 

If you want to do selective sharpening, you can make a mask, invert the mask (command i) and then paint with a soft white brush on the areas you want to be sharpened.

Be sure to save as a .TIFF or .PSD file to maintain your layers.

Choosing the Right Lens

Prime Lenses: Don't zoom, they are fixed in one position. Advantage: generally cheaper and produce more sharpness/crispness/clarity. Disadvantage: you have to switch lenses often or move around! And you may have to buy several prime lenses to cover your bases, instead of one zoom lens.

Zoom Lenses:
Advantage: you don't have to move as much to get the shot you want, and don't have to switch lenses often. Disadvantage: more expensive, heavier, less sharpness.


What's the Difference between Fast and Slow Lenses?

"Fast" Lenses = you can shoot in lower light (fast lenses go to a low F-stop number, like F1.8 or F2.8)

"Slow" lenses = not great in low-light (slow lenses don't generally go to an F-stop number lower than F4 or F5.6)


Lenses are measured in length, by Millimeters (mm):

-Wide Angle (16mm, 24mm, 35mm...): show more of the scene
-Long (100mm, 200mm, 300mm...): Shoot things farther away (like a telephoto lens)
-Mid-range "normal" lenses are somewhere in between (40mm to 80mm? although it depends on the size of your sensor because lenses on full frame cameras will appear wider...see below).


Longer Lenses Condense the Background. See example image below (image credit: Lynda.com):

Image on left: 100mm lens.  Image on right: 24mm lens. (The photographer shot with a zoom lens and walked closer to the subject when taking the the wide angle shot on the right to be able to crop it the same.)

See how the background looks more condensed and closer in the image on the left? This can also be more flattering when taking portraits, as it doesn't spread the features as much (image credit here.)

Image on left: wide angle lens (24mm?). Image on right: longer lens (100mm?).

How does your sensor affect your lens? 

Cameras with a full frame sensor will make lenses seem wider. (These are generally more expensive or professional cameras so may not affect you). If you upgrade your DSLR to a full frame sensor camera, you may notice your lenses suddenly seem wider. (Some lenses may not be compatible when you upgrade).

In addition to an offered aperture (like F2.8) and length (like 50mm), lenses also contributes to the overall Color, Contrast and Sharpness of your image. Whereas these elements can be added later in Photoshop, it can often be to your advantage if it's done in the camera and offer a unique creative style.

Adjustment Layers

Here's a great intro video: link here.

But basically, you can use adjustment layers to alter your images without making permanent change. That is, you can go back later and "turn off" the change if you want. Think of it as throwing a filter on top of your images.

The main advantage of the adjustment layer is that it automatically comes with a mask. This means you can add the change (or "filter") just to a certain part of the image, instead of the whole image. You do this by painting with either black or white. See this curves demo to understand what I mean.

*rule of thumb with masking: White reveals the change and Black conceals the change.

CURVES:

You can use a Curves adjustment layer to brighten (dodge) or darken (burn) selective areas of an image.

For example, in the image below, I added one Dodge layer to brighten select areas. The result is an image that looks more dynamic and less flat:

In your adjustments palette, choose the Curves icon. Drag from the middle up for brightening, or down for darkening:

This automatically makes a mask for you. Invert the mask (command i) and then paint with a WHITE SOFT BRUSH on the mask, just on the areas where you want to see the change.

Remember, on a mask: White reveals, Black conceals. Above, I have painted with white JUST where I want the change to show through.

HUE SATURATION:
(to boost individual colors)
In the image below of the pomegranates, I used a hie saturation adjustment layer to isolate and boost just the reddish tones in the picture by moving the "saturation" slider to the right:
(Be sure to choose "reds" instead of "RGB" in the menu I've circled here -->)

This is what the adjustment layer looks like on your layers palette:

Because the adjustment layer's mask is white, the change is visible.
Remember, WHITE REVEALS, BLACK CONCEALS.

Similarly, you can reduce the red by moving the slider to the left.

Night Photography

Suggested Homework Due April 20th, 2016: Shoot a series of images outdoors at night. Here are some past student assignment examples: Below is a selection of images shot by students for the Night Landscape assignment.  Some fun things to try:

• Try using a High ISO (as high as your camera will go) and no tripod (remember to keep your shutterspeed at 60 or above so it's not blurry). This will create a lot of graininess.
• Try using a tripod and a lower ISO (like 200 or 400), but a very long exposure (perhaps a couple seconds).
• Try having some motion in the shot for a long exposure (like this flashlight motion around the tree, below)
• Try a long exposure combined with a flash (perhaps having the flash light up a person in the dark while the long exposure shows detail in the dark background). Try having the person run through the frame and the flash will "freeze" them.

Long exposure shows motion. Photo by Joel Stuckey

These 2 photos by one of my students, Gary Prideaux, perfectly illustrate the difference between a long exposure night shot and a high ISO night shot. A high ISO often produces graininess, but doesn't require a tripod:

Short Exposure, High ISO- grainy! Photo by Gary Prideaux

Long Exposure, low ISO, more clarity. Photo by Gary Prideaux

This long exposure shot by Mira Zaslove shows some motion on the water,
but the architecture is crisp since she used a tripod.

Here are a couple fun photos by another student using a long exposure, tripod and a flashlight:

The 2 photos below are by my student Chuck Thompson, taken in Palo Alto at Bowden Park. His Shutter Speed was 1/5 sec (which allowed for the motion of the cars). The aperture was f/8.0. The ISO was 1600, which is somewhat high and added a bit of graininess in the darker areas like the tree trunk and the roof of the train station.

Graininess is common in night photos (because of the high ISO). If you want to avoid graininess you can use a lower ISO (like 400) and a longer exposure (maybe like a half second, with a tripod), and perhaps a lower number F-stop (wider aperture), something like F 2.8.

Photoshop Tools & Object Removal

Once you process your image in Adobe Camera Raw (the raw window with the sliders), you can then open it up into the "regular" Photoshop interface. In this interface there are different tools to do more localized edits to small areas of the image. Here is an overview of the tools:

Also, this is sort of a fun "visual dictionary" for Photoshop terms.


PHOTOSHOP TOOLS for OBJECT REMOVAL:

• Clone
• Patch
• Healing and Spot Healing
• Fill with Content Aware

Usually the quickest/easiest is to use the Lasso Tool (L) to circle the object you want to remove (like below) and then go to EDIT > FILL WITH CONTENT AWARE. It magically erases the object!

Be sure you do the object removal on a duplicate layer of the background:

Here's a demo video of "Fill with Content Aware"/ object removal:
https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/how-to/photoshop-fill-content-aware.html

Intro to Camera Raw & Photoshop

There are 3 main Adobe interfaces I work in. I start in Bridge to organize and star favorites, then I process my favorite RAW files in Camera Raw, then I retouch them in Photoshop. Each interface looks a bit different and we'll go over the basics of each together. (Camera Raw is part of the Photoshop application- Raw files automatically open up into it. Bridge is a separate application for organizing.)

WORKFLOW

Intro to Bridge:
When starting with a large group of images I've just shot, I begin by previewing them all in Bridge, Filmstrip view. I delete ones I don't want to keep, rename all the files, apply my copyright metadata, star my favorites, sort them, then open up into Camera Raw.

To open and process lots of images at once, highlight them, then hit Return/Enter and they should open up automatically into Adobe Camera Raw. Looks like this (see all the images stacked up on the left):

Some basic info about the sliders in Camera Raw:

When opening up a RAW file into Photoshop, it will initially open into the Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) window. It looks like this:

Be sure to click the blue text at the bottom to set your resolution to 300. Leave everything on "DEFAULT" so you can control the quality of all aspects of the image. When you move each slider, the adjustments are saved into a "Sidecar" .xmp file that is stored in the same folder as your RAW file. If you toss this .xmp file, your image will go back to how it was when you had just downloaded it off your camera.

The main adjustments you want to make for most images are Temperature, Exposure, Highlights and Shadows. In the image below, I made it a bit warmer by moving the temperature slider to the right, and I brought out detail in the shadows by moving the shadows slider to the right. Notice it's a bit grainy because it was dark and I was at ISO 800.

After processing a large group of images, you usually hit "DONE" or "SAVE IMAGES". I generally save as JPGs, which creates a new folder.  I then photoshop/retouch the hi-res JPGs.

For a single image, when you hit "OPEN IMAGE" in the lower right hand corner, it opens up into "Regular" Photoshop, and looks like this, with a layers palatte:

Description of Tools: