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How to create flawlessly retouched skin with dodge & burn

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Retouching skin with dodge and burn is one of the most valuable skill a photographer can learn. It can have such a dramatic effect on your image, but it does it completely non-destructively. While dodging and burning has been around since the darkroom days, the precision of a digital workflow gives us so much more control. It’s an incredibly powerful tool.

In this video, photographer and retoucher Zoë Noble talks us through her process. You’ll want to clean up the skin first to remove major blemishes, which Zoë also covers in this video. But then, let the dodging and burning commence!

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This is everything you ever needed to know about Photoshop’s Liquify Tool

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The Liquify Tool in Photoshop is one of its most controversial and misunderstood features. Many see it as a response when client asks “can you make me skinny?”, but it is so much more than that. While modifying the way people look is almost certainly its most common use, it also offers up some cool creative options.

This video from photographer Nemanja Sekulic shows us the ins and outs of the Liquify tool. Nemanja goes through all of the different settings of the Liquify tool, as well as the new Face Aware Liquify options.

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How to retouch perfect natural looking skin using the clone stamp tool

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There’s a lot of fuss about the overuse of Photoshop and retouching these days. But sometimes it needs to be done, or you just want to. Perhaps you have to clean up a little makeup or get rid of a stray hair or two. Maybe a temporary blemish like a zit or a cut. There’s many different ways to do it, but here’s one I typically tend to avoid. And that’s the clone stamp tool.

I have a love hate relationship with the clone stamp tool. I tend to prefer using the healing brush tool, and only use the clone stamp when I absolutely have to. Mostly because I can never get the clone stamp tool to do exactly what I want. This video tutorial, though, is starting to change my mind. It comes courtesy of photographer and retoucher Zoë Noble, and it’s extremely good.

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Conceptual photographer takes us behind the scenes on the moon’s ever changing cycle

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Swedish Photographer and retoucher Erik Johansson goes all out for his creations. They take so much work that, according to his website, Johansson aims to create only six to eight new images per year. Some of you might remember his mirrored lake project from last year. A fantastic feat of both photography and digital illustration work. Now he’s back with something equally as impressive.

Full Moon Service shows a crew in operation swapping out the moon for one showing a different phase. It’s a very cute idea, and the execution of it is absolutely superb. The project started in Summer 2016, but it’s a lot of work. There’s a lot of planning and preparation before the shoot, and a lot of post work afterwards. Johannson also released a behind the scenes video to show how it was made.

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The Ten Commandments of Retouching

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There are some things in life that are just universal rules we should all follow. Things like not cheating on your wife, not killing anyone, and not stealing. Easy enough, right? These are just a few of the Ten Commandments. So if life has Ten Commandments that are just some simple things to not do, then retouching should have them as well, right? Here’s what I see as the 10 Commandments of Retouching.

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The mental sweet spot for progression

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There is a problem we all face as creatives in one way or another, and that is either being too hard on ourselves, or too happy about our own work that we take critique very personally. Both of these sides are toxic and they aren’t the essential zone we need to be in to promote and nurture growth with our work and our lives.

Over the last eight years, I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know photographers who I have seen become very successful. I met them on their journey and they asked for my help in improving their retouching through one on one consultations. I noticed a trend among those that made it during our time spent together, and it wasn’t just the relentless drive they had in order to succeed, but the exceptional balance of knowing their worth while also being aware that they had room to grow.

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Want better portraits? Rotate your canvas while retouching.

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Once, the idea of rotating my canvas when retouching was jarring to me. I knew it was something my peers were doing but I just couldn’t be bothered to try it myself.

After a few one on one lessons where I was “forced” to do it by David Neilands, I actually found a surprising improvement in not only the end result but also in identifying problems quicker with fewer revisions.

Rotating the canvas is actually a technique that was popularised by Pratik Naik of Solstice Retouch. The guy knows his stuff, he won retoucher of the year last year!

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Five different and easy ways to clean up skin blemishes with Photoshop

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No matter who we are, our skin isn’t perfect. It’s just a fact of life. The odd zit here and there, a little scratch, perhaps a single stray hair. There’s always something. So, for portraits, temporary blemishes usually need a quick touch up. Fortunately, such issues are easy to fix in Photoshop. Or, more accurately, Photoshop offers us several easy fixes.

In this video, Nathaniel Dodson from Tutvid shows us five different ways to get rid of them. Each of the techniques shown has its advantages as well as its down sides. Nathan talks through make the most of them and overcome the potential problems. He also explains how these techniques can be used on other images besides portraits, such as landscapes.

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