How to remove lip hair from beauty shot?

[davidpz888]

Hi all,

What is the best way to remove tiny lip hair from the attached beauty shot? As you can see, it is only apparent on the left side. I also want to match the pores on the other side so to keep it realistic.

I've tried the healing brush to clone the other side. The results were ok, but not as realistic as I would like.

Any better methods?

Thanks

[KR1156]

try a combination of slight dust & scratches to break it up a bit, then dodge & burn to clean it up. add some MINOR noise on top of your overall digital images.

[L33t]

Ok I just do this quickly, and image was croped so it was little bit harder. But I think I manage to do it quite well, it could be done better but just for example.

[BagLady]

For a realistic look, I wouldn't remove the lip hair on the left side... It's quite natural to see some facial hair with stronger light on one side. The "problem" is the contrast between the facial hair and the skin. If you use the D&B method to lighten the darker areas and slightly darken some of the lighter spots, the lip hair will be less visible but very natural.

[leuallen]

Is this Ok. The process is little more complicated - dodging and burning through an especially created mask which emphasizes the contrast between the hairs and skin.

Larry

[L33t]

thats looks awesome

[BagLady]

Leuallen has posted a nice example of the technique that I was speaking of.

[filthy]

How u make mask, leuallen?

[leuallen]

You must have a little experience in masking to use this technique, ie, what the mask should look like. It is a little too long to fully describe here but here is the short version.

1. Create a luminosity mask as per Tony Kuyper instructions at

http://www.goodlight.us/writing/lumi...tymasks-1.html

2. Use the light lights mask as it gives the best contrast in the desired area.

3. Use levels and dodge and burn to further increase the contrast.

4. Add the mask to a 50% gray D/B layer. With a black brush, opacity 100%, flow 10%, go over the light hairs/areas. The mask has a smooth gradation and will allow darkening of the light areas only. It will blend well due to the gradation of the mask.

5. New D/B layer. Add the same mask but invert. Use a white brush and go over the darker areas next to the light until you get a nice blend.

6. Another D/B layer for global corrections and other clean up.

7. Place D/B layers in a group and reduce opacity till it look good. this brings back some of the original texture and cures the tendency to over retouch.

Attached is the light lights mask and the final mask derived from it.

Larry

[davidpz888]

Thanks everyone for their quick suggestions!

BagLady: thanks for informing me that it is normal to see some hair on the fill light side of the face. I thought the model had not shaved properly or something lol. Then I would agree D&B would be the way to go. Originally I had wanted a method that would clone in the pores, but that would be less natural and unnecessary.

leuallen: thank you very much for your detailed D&B method. I have not heard of the creating a light mask method before, but it seems to be better than the method that I am using, which is just using a 50% grey fill w/o any masks for both dodge and burn. I think separating the dodging and burning as well as the global D&B would be a superior method. I've attached a rough fix.

One request though, would you mind clarifying step 3: "Use levels and dodge and burn to further increase the contrast."? I assume you are talking about increasing the contrast of the light lights layer mask. But how do you D&B the layer mask?

Also, I assume this light/dark mask D&B method could be used for other skin problems as well? Do you have any other recommendations on using these light masks for people photography? The site you pointed to only went into landscape photography.

Cheers

[leuallen]

davidpz888

Step 3. Dodge and burn. Referring to the tools here, not the layer. Use the dodge tool set to highlights and about 30% to lighten the light areas without effecting the dark areas very much. The burn tool set to shadows about 30% to increase the blacks without effecting the highlights. This will increase the contrast. Don't overdo it. This is on the final mask after levels. Use a fairly large soft brush, this is not detail work but more global. This step is often optional.

I use a similar technique for burned out shine spots on the skin. I might go up one luminous mask level for the lights, you have to create them and look at them to determine the best. The mask should show only the hot areas of the skin in a light gray and the burned out specular highlights as white. Use the stamp tool through the mask to build up density or use a fill of a light skin color on a blank layer with the mask.

This adds density to those areas so that burning will have an effect. Burning has no or very little effect on very bright areas. This brings it within range. Only the white brush is used, black with inverted mask is not used. You will run into saturation and color issues which must be handled separately by other means.

Stamping or filling through the mask still requires some burning (mask or not). Don't try to achieve the final result with this, keep it under the desired final result and finish with burning.

Larry

[leuallen]

Another example of using a mask with the D/B layer. Two different masks were used because a good density/contrast in one area was not good in another.

Masks used for the shine in the eye socket, highlight on the nose, and eyebrow hair at top of nose.

Larry

[davidpz888]

Larry, thanks for all the great advice!

But just to clarify step 3; the contrast of the layer mask (not the 50% grey layer itself) should be increased so to make it more efficient? And one should use the white brush on the layer mask to make sure all the hotspots are true white?

And great result with the last example. I assume you didnt need to pixel burn and used a large brush instead for those shine areas because you pretty much already pixel burned and fine tuned your layer mask? Please let my know if my assumption is correct or not.

Thanks,
David

[leuallen]

davidpz888

Yes, just the contrast of the layer mask is increased. It is an by eye sort of thing. Just enough to increase the contrast but not loose the gradation. The contrast should be adjusted with the mask attached to the D/B layer. Do not alter the original mask as you may need it for other areas which may require a different contrast adjustment.

No, do not use global brushing. Each highlight area is brushed individually with a very small brush. It is still tedious but you don't have to be as precise or worry as much about dark halos around the light areas and you can use a higher opacity brush so that it goes faster. Not all light areas are of the same density so that they require different amounts of burning to even out. If some of the highlight areas are pure white, they will not burn down. If you need to take them down, use a blank layer with the mask attached and use the stamp tool on those areas to give some density. Finish off these areas with the D/
B layer/mask above the stamped layer. The burning will now have an effect.

Note that it works as well with dodging as shown by the removal of the dark eyebrow hairs at the top of the nose. The mask is is inverted for this.

For quick work that is not so demanding you could globally brush. The results are ok but not as good as per pixel.

Larry

[transoptic]

Originally Posted by leuallen

Another example of using a mask with the D/B layer. Two different masks were used because a good density/contrast in one area was not good in another.

Masks used for the shine in the eye socket, highlight on the nose, and eyebrow hair at top of nose.

Larry

WOW.

I could have used that technique on a fashion gig two weeks ago
Cheers.

[Cyberek]

leuallen -> what You write is quite interesting. Is there any possibility, that You could do some screencapture stuff, and put Your's workflow on Youtube (even speedy one)? It could give some more details on how aproach a sample photo (im most interested in rebuilding teksture on burned out spots on skin).

[leuallen]

No video, don't have the equipment or skill for such. But I have made a PDF with screen shots that goes through the whole process. Will send you the PDF via email if you email me at leuallen at mchsi.com and request.

Note: Using luminosity masks is not the only type of mask that can be used. I use them often for skin because I have an action that makes a set of four brights and one of them is usually close to what I need. Other times I create the mask using calculations.

This technique is useful for anytime you have a fairly high contrast situation with small areas of bright against dark or vice versa.

Larry