i am having trouble improving double chins on photos.does anyone have any good techniques?thanx

Actually, I did this with a friend of mine. as soon as I get to work and ask her permission, I will post it on here.

Every face is different, so what I did may not work for that particular subject:

What I had done was slect where her second chin and copy it onto a different layer (named chin).
I took the chin layer and raised it to where her regular chin is, and since there wasn't much of a difference between the to, I used that. I then used a mild blurring and cloning to cover up the second chin in the original.

I also scuplted the face to make her look a bit thinner. I accomplished this on 5.5, but what I did was simply clone over some of the background and "shaved" the sides of her face. (only a bit at a time)

Now, the reasoning behind this is because she had lost a considerable amount of weight and had a few more pounds to go and wanted to see what her final result would be.
needless to say, she was incredibly pleased.

Rick

Just a guess here but I would think you would have to remove the crease between chins maybe by using the dodge tool to lighten the shadow or clone tool so it looks like one smooth chin instead of two and then try using the liquify if you have ver 6 if not you will have to clone in to slim the neck a bit. An example would help in assesing the specific problem but that's the best I can think of. Maybe others have a better way to tackle this one.
DJ

If you have or can get your hands on Katrin Eismann's book, Photoshop Restoration and Retouching (I would consider it a Must Have..you can find it at Amazon thru the link here in the Review section), Chapter 10 will give you some other good tips besides.... good luck Tom

I'd like to share a before and after picture of someones wrinkly chin that I transformed using a technique I discovered in Photoshop User magazine(Nov/Dec2001-p25 "Retouching a Jowl")
The technique is basically:
1.Making a selection from a "good" part of the jaw and putting it on its own layer
2.Using the transform tool to stretch and rotate the new jaw in position
3.Load the new chin layer as a selection and add a layer mask with a soft airbrush(used with variable opacities) to blend in the new chin line
4.Clone if necessary to get it looking natural
5.Add contrast with burn tool if necessary

The photo in question I took as a quick snapshot with a digital camera at a holiday party.What I'm finding interesting is that the subject has never asked me if I "did anything" to the picture.She just thinks she looks good in the picture.

Wow, big difference. You reduced alot of the age lines too. Sure looks more youthful. Good job.
DJ

Paulette! You've found the fountain of youth!! Quick! Where is it?? :D Looks great!

Ed

thanks everyone.quick response to my first posting. we had a couple over for new years eve...i took some pictures...i just like touching them up a bit...but my friend took one look and said...boy am i ugly...looking at her double chin...)( sort of the opposite of what paulette found )..so i think i need to do a little bit more retouching....will try paulettes technique and looking forward to rick's sculpting...Don

paulette,
what a nice job. your story made me smile (oops, better not do that, makes wrinkles). retouchers have the power to make people look like what they think they look like. that's a lot of power, imho.

Well, At the time that I did this, I really didn't have PS6, though I would imagine it would have definitely been easier.

We were all still pleased with the results.

Rick

Nice job on the chin. My big thing down here is 1.wrinkles (wrinkles on the neck I find much harder to eliminate than those on the face and unfortunately no one wears turtlenecks here in Fl.)2.ruddy(from the sun) skin and 3. droopy eyes( a little of the liquify tool works miracles there!)
Personally enjoy creating photos that make
people feel happy about looking at themself. I've come to realize that although my friends know that I "do photography" on my computer, they really have no concept of digital alteration. Or if they do it's perhaps along the lines of" don't ask,don't tell". By the way, it's worthwhile taking a look at some of the plastic surgery sites on the web to get an idea of how people want to look.Living not too far from Palm Beach(which seems to have more than its share of plastic surgeons) there are always before and after ads in the local paper.
Changing the subject slightly, did anyone see that new painting of the Queen of England that was done by some supposedly famous artist? I really can't image anyone making someone look so bad although my husband suggested that perhaps that's how she really looks now. Anyway, I thought artists who painted royalty tried to make them look better than they really look.
PC

rick,

you did good. i bet that spurred her on to her goal, too.

whenever i have tried to do this, i always get confused about where the shadows should go. gonna have to open back up the ones i've tried and try all yall's suggestions.

Rick
Excellent job on the chin. Really makes her look younger.

Paulette
Good suggestion about checking into the plastic surgery sites. Know what you mean about the neck being a problem.
DJ

here is the chin i was trying to retouch. i will post my retouches when done. done

That's going to be a tough pic to work with to be perfectly honest with you. The angle and type of picture are critical when it comes to doing something like that.

I'm very anxious to see the results, though. Definitely do a before and after and I'll study the pic and see if I there is someway to do it, though.

Best of luck and let us know please. :)


Rick

I don't know if this helps but when I did retouching for my Mom's 25th wedding ann. pics I did a few double chin fix ups....she was sooooo happy. It helped with the way her face was facing to just basically carve out a chin (side viewish) but for the hard shot like you just posted I used the smudge tool sparingly and played around with the different settings, mostly just to pull from the background into the chin, it did help....moved up the collar a bit to cover and darkened the sides of the face slightly and bottom of chin....also lighted the crease mark. Blur a little....In the end I didn't create a new person but made her much happier! Hope this makes sense and helps some.

here are the before and after...i was trying not destroy the skin texture..i ended up doing mostly sculpting..i also cloned away wrinkles a la paulette..on the right side i both eliminated and added some facial lines and softened the light directly under the shadow of the chin line, on the right i shaped the neck and adjusted the blinds and the sweater. your thoughts and ideas would be appreciated. i hope these pictures come through....don


oops..lost my image and don't know how to get it back...see later post for image...

don,

that is a vast improvement. i think you did great. but i wonder if , since she is wearing what appears to be a loosish turtleneck if you couldn't go ahead and bring the turtleneck all the way up to that first chin line. it wouldn't be an uncommon way to wear it and would completely disguise the problem. unless you want to keep her at least a little humble. ;)

or you could come in with sweater on the left side of her neck/chin kind of like ) that shape, make what we know is really chin look more like neck. i tried to download but it came out too tiny to work on.

Excellent job Don. Looks like you figured it out on your own and did a fantastic job doing it. It's not easy reworking facial features. Especially when the original bone structures are hidden. Good going. Like how you brought the collar up as well and just left a hint of neck beneath the chin. Maybe we should be asking you for lessons here. :D
DJ

That is great! Looks so very natural and probably what she really looks like when she isn't making that face! I know, I make that same face :) I bet she loves it!

i keep trying to load a larger image but am having trouble...trying again....don

this is bigger..i am going to try to delete the smaller image and redownload on my original message...but leave this here just in case....

Well, I must say I'm impressed. This turned out very well. And not just for Don.

kathleen,

i tried your approach by just raising the sweater...it worked and it was much quicker...but a little humbleness isn't bad....don

Don,
Bravo!
:bigthmb:

that REALLY turned out terrific. Did a much better job than I would have.

I didn't think about your technique on the sweater. I need to try that myself in case something like that crosses my desk.

Rick

Nice idea about raising the sweater.What a difference!Something else that I did once when I was working on a picture of someone who was having a bad neck day( no not HRH) was clone on some jewelry. I located a website which was selling jewelry and selected a large pearl choker for my subject to wear. It worked so well that I went back to the site and made up a little jewelry collection for further needs.
PC

Ack, I didn't see the second page to this thread until I'd done my version. I thought my approach of raising the neckline was unique! :) Lightening the shadow of the chin also helped.

Anyway I'll still post for comments.

DonB,

How's this? I used WinImages "remove feature" operator and it's localized geometric pinch operator. About five minutes work. You'd take longer for a serious attempt, but I think this shows the general approach pretty well - see attachment.

PHI,

looks good. i think i'll try to play around with the "pinch" type operaters and see what i can do with them. thanks for the thought. don

Don, yep that's a bad chin and Rick is right about angle etc. Her chin wouldn't be so bad except fot the lighting and that dingdong sweater thing. I was off work today because of an ice storm so I played with your chin, Don, sorry. Here are my quick solutions for an 8X10 max print.

Carrie
Loved your 3 phase restoration examples. Really shows the different approaches. Great job.

Don Jean and Walt, excellent jobs as well. I think we are fostering alot of digital plastic surgeons on this site. :)
DJ

Thank you, DJ.
I, like JeanB, neglected to read the whole thread before doing my retouch, oops. But since I retouch for a living I'm programed to grab the image and get it done FAST. When done I have to log in how many minutes it took; chin.jpg = 20 + $

The electricity at the Lab is STILL knocked out today,
no work....boohoo.

Carrie

Don't worry about that. It's still good to see the different approaches even if they are the same there are still some differences and each person has their own style of doing things.

Yeah, I loved those power outages when at work. Sure was nice to have an unplanned break sometimes. Sounds like you live in California or Florida where electricity is subject to change without notice. :)
DJ

Unfortunately not DJ, I recently moved to Kansas City, the power is out due to an ICE storm, but happily not at my house-smile.

DJ "digital plastic surgeons " indeed! I've just been doing some work on shots of a plus-sized model. The irony is the agent wanted the model sculpted to look "more acceptable". This desire for perfection is lunacy! Anyway, I didn't tell her that of course...:o

The difficulty with this sort of stuff is getting it to look realistic rather than freaky. Paulette, your work was an inspiration!

Here's what I did with the jawline, basically through transforming a selection of the original chinline, cloning & airbrushing, building up shadows of different depths.

Stuart
You did a great job making it look natural. I like how the sweater doesn't cling tight to her neck.
I agree with your assesment on our struggle for perfection. It's a difficult fact to deal with at times and far worse for women than men for some reason. It hurts to see young girls starving to themselves to look like a super model not realizing that the supermodel was digitally sculpted to look that way. It would seem we are creating people that can not possibly exist when even the skinniest model is slimmed down to a size of 6 feet tall but only 85 pounds. No matter what we say to the contrary, looks do matter. It's a fact of life that isn't about to change any time soon unfortunately.
DJ

Stuart
Really liked the way you did the chin. I think that what makes it work is the shadow. Technically it is excellent work.Now however that we are able to do these things, the question is should we. Or, more importantly how will our subjects feel about our digital plastic surgery.Picking up on what DJ wrote about this quest for perfection, I am struck by the the almost robotic look of many of the models who appear in print ads.They all look like they just had their monthy bo-tox injection. I don't know why this trend came into being but so many of them look unreal. Actually it's starting to bother me that when I see a photo of myself now that will be viewed by others I can't leave it alone anymore. Or for that matter, I can't even take a picture of a cat anymore without fussing around with it! But I'm proud of one recent piece of chinwork I did for an almost 90 year old lady. She just loves the picture and thinks that it's one of the best pictures she's had taken of her in recent years! See below. Viva digital restoration.
PC

I like that, Paulette. It's very subtle.

I agree with Sharon. Excellent work Paulette.
DJ

Paulette
Your chin work looked really natural & I think the subtlety was the key here. Good stuff.
What you are asking about the moral issues surrounding what we do...well, that's a whole can of worms!
My view is that painters & photographers have been doing this stuff for a long time, partly to express themselves creatively & partly to satisfy the vanity of the subjects. The sad truth with fashion models is they are often incidental to the shot, whether that is the clothes or the scene. They are almost reduced to decorative props. I have sat with agents that talk about the models in the most unbelievable ways...she's this, she's that, those will have to go etc. It's a harsh business that cares little if at all for the people.
As for family photos, right at the start of this thread Rick commented that the reason for the sculpting was to act as an incentive. Can't think of a more wonderful way of being able to help someone!

HI Jak
Welcome to Retouch Pro. Yes it is a great site for info and great people.
I think you did a great job on the chin. You also gave the collar a bit of a hang instead of tight to her chin which I think gives it more realism. I think you have solved a problem area you had by the looks of this image. Good job. Look forward to more forum posts by you in the future.
DJ

Don, this is exactly the retouch problem I'm dealing with right now. Will look forward to seeing your progress. My client's photo offers a slightly better angle but it's still very time consuming work.

Hey, guys!

Take a look :-) I tried and I think something came out of it

here

Originally posted by Rick
That's going to be a tough pic to work with to be perfectly honest with you. The angle and type of picture are critical when it comes to doing something like that.

I'm very anxious to see the results, though. Definitely do a before and after and I'll study the pic and see if I there is someway to do it, though.

Best of luck and let us know please. :)


Rick

Over on the Zuga forum, Clay Blackmore (an amazing portrait photographer) displayed a picture of a woman who's double chin was "fixed" using the liquify/warp filter in photoshop. Katrin Eismann has a blurb about this in her book as well...

Having once had a double chin, we call it chin chin, sounds so much nicer...

I used the patch and the clone brushes for this...

:)

Hi everyone, I am not sure if I am posting this in the right place as I am new here.
Here is a pic of my next door neighbour and the retouched version of it. I did not completely remove the double-chin as it would have looked odd, so I reduced it somewhat. Would be pleased to hear comments (good or bad)
All the best,
Brian.

Hi everyone, I just had a quick bash at working on your image, I hope you don't mind. I worked more on the neck and slightly reshaped the jaw line.

All the best,
Brian.

Hi everyone, I am not sure if I am posting this in the right place as I am new here.
Here is a pic of my next door neighbour and the retouched version of it. I did not completely remove the double-chin as it would have looked odd, so I reduced it somewhat. Would be pleased to hear comments (good or bad)
All the best,
Brian.


that looks great! what did you use to lessen the chin?