retouch no blur or healing brush

[igot2pman]

Kayem,

Its hard to see emotions with type... No harm...Anyway, I like a good challange.

-Keven

[neumanns]

D&B is the way to go from my trials...Done right it is wonderful. It would be easy to see how someone thinks it gives poor result's though.

D&B is not for the faint of heart or the non committed. If you like high opacity large brushes and fast results D&B sucks. But if your willing to use 2% opacity and 2 pixal brushes at 400% view for hours on end the result is like no other.

I do not work professionally and I will freely admit...D&B is not for me. I do not have the comittment required to make it look good.

So the question is not does D&B suck...The question is do you have the fortitude to make it work.

I also don't think it takes an artist but rather a practicioner. Anyone can get the results with a little understanding of the method and how to apply it.

[Cuervo79]

Seems to me like Milena has not to tried it for herself first, Or is looking for a 3 minute shortcut for natural looking results.

Depending on what type of look you're interested in sometimes you need to mix techniques in order to get the look you want.
What you also have to take in and what has been mentioned, is that the images you see in magazines not only have the retouch but the work of a group to get the best shot in camera. Good lighting, good model, good MUA, good stylist, Etc. All this makes a great image and retouch is only part of the whole.

[JavierT]

I agree with many posters. You don´t have to forget the correct way to take your pictures, or the photographer. Our work will be easier if all together works well. I hate people saying: Don´t worry, we can retouch it and they no consider that with little extra minutes working, you can save hours of work.

And yes, I think you need and extra motivation to do D&B. Since I use it, my pictures looks better and with practice, pacience and trying to performance in every steps of the process, I will be faster. If you no pain, ..........

D&B=poor results? What?

Probably the problem is tha we are always in a hurry, cause our clients (and their budget).

[perrush]

Nobody mentioned 'portraiture'. It's a quick and easy way to improve skin texture. I have an example of it on my glamour tutorial p7

http://www.perrush.be/ps_glamour_retouching_07.html

[HuBBa]

The reason we didn't mention it is that it in no way whatsoever improve skin texture. It's a combined blur & degrunge filter which looks about as good as any other blurring / degrunging technique. Only thing portraiture has for it is that it saves a few steps if you have no need for the high quality "fashion/beauty" skin but rather just want everything smooth and plastic.

[ashphotoart]

I was gotten lot of confusion about D & B in the past time. and Now I can say that D & B is very great tool to smooth the skin.

I'm not in oppose of Clone and Heal and Blur. Using all tools together smartly can produce very very good result. I'm attaching a D & B layer I worked today on an face. It is 50% Gray layer on Softlight Mode.

very Important when using D & B :-

1. D & B first pixtel by Pixel
2. Than globally. on whole picture.

Actually It can not be done by one Click. Lots of time, patience and creative eye needs.


Ash

[Cuervo79]

I haven't done D&B at the pixel level to much, but I have done it on a broader scale. When I'm doing it like that it helps allot to switch between zooms (normally I go from 100% to 50% to 25%) and then do the D&B.
Mostly what I've used D&B is to take care of cellulite, wrinkles in clothing, eye bags, shadows on the face, and wrinkles. Haven't had the patience to do pores yet.

[albatrosss]

John,

Liked your method. Works great and very fast

[mileeeeeeenaaaa]

i havent seen much dodge and burn but from what i have heard and seen, i dont like it very much. it might just be because the person doing it didnt take enough time to do it properly or whatever, but i really didnt like it.

and no, i am not looking for an easy 2 minute quick fix, all i am wanting to achieve is the 'magazine make up ad' look (which from what i am reading is begining to look very difficult)

can anyone show me how the 'pore by pore' method is done?

[jam1212]

It's a bit tough to show the method short of a video tutorial (which I believe is floating around here somewhere) but I can describe the steps:

1. Zoom in far enough to be able to see the pores in detail. (I usually don't go above 100%, as I work on fairly hi-res pictures and if I zoom in past that I tend to lose the forest for the trees so to speak)

2. You'll see that a pore is essentially made up of a dark side and a light side. This is from the light hitting one side (the light side) and casting a shadow on the other side (the dark side)

3. On your dodge and burn layer (50% gray soft light or dual curves method, either one works. I tend to use the soft light layer, so that's what I'll describe here) with a very small very low opacity brush, paint black on the light spots to darken them until they match the surrounding skin. Paint white on the dark spots until they match the surrounding skin. Repeat this for all the pores. (This takes forever at first, but tends to go faster after practice.)

4. Sometimes, dodging and burning can introduce color shifts. One solution for this is to use a curves layer to match that color to the surrounding skin color, invert the mask and paint back in with white where needed.

5. At this point, you should have pretty smooth skin if done correctly.


Like I mentioned before, for large blemishes, there's nothing wrong with using the clone stamp before you do any dodging and burning. If done carefully, you can get great results and save yourself a lot of work down the line. Let me know if anything needs clarification.

P.S.

Chris Tarantino has some excellent information about D&B on his blog. The entry can be found here:

http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/blo...confusion.html

[HuBBa]

A good trick is to add a strong contrast curve layer above the D&B layer(s) to make the luminance difference stand out more. This works well with even luminance though, dark shadows and bright highlights will blow out and be harder to spot, but for the rest of the skin it works very well.

This curve layer is then obviously thrown away/turned off once you are done with the D&B.

As for colorshifts either use a curve layer like mentioned, or use a color layer and paint with the surrounding skin color. Trick here is to paint very softly with low opacity since the color shift may be stronger since you have already changed the luminosity with the d&b

[Eric J]

Do I need to wait until I purchase a tablet to start learning D&B or can I start with my lowly mouse?

[Cuervo79]

@Eric J
why don't you practice D&B with bigger stuff instead of skin? Clothing wrinkles is something basic you can try. The general process is the same, and since most clothing wrinkles are bigger you don't need to work as much. It will help you to get into the technique and start looking at stuff more objectively.

@Milena the D&B technique is not hard its a technique that takes allot of time.
Have you checked the "de-grunge" technique http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=213
You can try to mix techniques to get results like the links you posted earlier, try working with it and then post your results, most here would be glad to give you pointers as what to do. As with any skill you need to practice in order to get better at it.

Cheers

[igot2pman]

Eric J,

I’m still learning D&B and have been getting much better over the past months. I use a mouse, a Logitech G5 to be exact. What I found was that slowing your mouse speed will give you a lot more control. This is one of the pluses of the G5; it has speed buttons on the mouse to raise and lower speed. That’s not to say go out and buy one, the mouse costs half a small tablet. But the point is that D&B is not better with a tablet, it just has more control. All the steps and techniques are the same.

I agree with Cuervo79, start with the cloths. Then work your way up to filling in shadows. Learn about light fall off and how to make 2D look 3D, bright center and shadowed outer.

Below is where I am at right now; I would say its intermediate level. It's slow coming but practice makes perfect, the more you try the better you will become. The little marks were done by blowing it up to 1000%.

-Keven

[skauskas]

Originally Posted by mileeeeeeenaaaa

i havent seen much dodge and burn but from what i have heard and seen, i dont like it very much. it might just be because the person doing it didnt take enough time to do it properly or whatever, but i really didnt like it.

and no, i am not looking for an easy 2 minute quick fix, all i am wanting to achieve is the 'magazine make up ad' look (which from what i am reading is begining to look very difficult)

can anyone show me how the 'pore by pore' method is done?

mileeeeeeeenaaaa.
this one of the examples of D&D on the skin. Of course it's not ideal and if you look long enough on the retouched skin you will always find something to correct. But it worth practising. Just try it and you would not be able to switch to anything else.

[Eric J]

Originally Posted by Cuervo79

@Eric J
why don't you practice D&B with bigger stuff instead of skin? Clothing wrinkles is something basic you can try. The general process is the same, and since most clothing wrinkles are bigger you don't need to work as much. It will help you to get into the technique and start looking at stuff more objectively.

@Milena the D&B technique is not hard its a technique that takes allot of time.
Have you checked the "de-grunge" technique http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=213
You can try to mix techniques to get results like the links you posted earlier, try working with it and then post your results, most here would be glad to give you pointers as what to do. As with any skill you need to practice in order to get better at it.

Cheers

Thank you. I hadn't thought of that.

[mileeeeeeenaaaa]

how to overcome these problems:
- when burning highlights, it gets saturated
- when dodging and burning freckles the area goes grey
- how to remove tiny white hairs from face?

anyone know how?

[ontwolf]

hubba has an excellent tutorial here:

http://imaginara.tumblr.com/post/559...l-about-how-to

quite lenghty but in my opinion the best tutorial on dodge and burn out there

I am newby and I found it very straight forward and understanding.

[JavierT]

Hi mileeeeeeenaaaa:

You can find answers for your questións in this threads:

- First one: Chris Tarantino has an article in his blog explaining D&B técnique and how to fix some problems that this tecnique can generate. Very interesting and you only have to spend few minutes. You can find this blog in RetouchPro home page, blogs, Chris Tarantino.

- The second:

http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/pho...cast-face.html

In this thread, post 3, Leuallen posted a video explaining how to correct oversaturated areas and correct variations in color. IMO, very interesting.

Anyway, yo can find many diferent ways to fix desaturated areas and color shifts in this forum.

Hope it helps.

[st.james]

50%grey vs not?

First of all, hello I am new here :-)

Has 50% grey an advantage over just a clear layer to D&B on? Often, its nice to use the eraser tool on different opacities if I've gone too far. On the 50%grey this makes a hole trough the grey. I know I could probably paint with 50%grey, but its just so damn cool to flip the pen and use the eraser side of it.

[JavierT]

Originally Posted by st.james

50%grey vs not?

First of all, hello I am new here :-)

Has 50% grey an advantage over just a clear layer to D&B on? Often, its nice to use the eraser tool on different opacities if I've gone too far. On the 50%grey this makes a hole trough the grey. I know I could probably paint with 50%grey, but its just so damn cool to flip the pen and use the eraser side of it.

better painting with 50%grey, is like you are coming back to the start point.

[Cuervo79]

I don't use the 50% gray specifically because of that, I use two solid color layers one black and one white both set to soft light. If you set your background and foreground colors correctly you can erase on the mask of the solid color layers or just paint it with the opposite color to diminish the effect of the mask.

[Eric J]

Originally Posted by igot2pman

Eric J,

I’m still learning D&B and have been getting much better over the past months. I use a mouse, a Logitech G5 to be exact. What I found was that slowing your mouse speed will give you a lot more control. This is one of the pluses of the G5; it has speed buttons on the mouse to raise and lower speed. That’s not to say go out and buy one, the mouse costs half a small tablet. But the point is that D&B is not better with a tablet, it just has more control. All the steps and techniques are the same.

I agree with Cuervo79, start with the cloths. Then work your way up to filling in shadows. Learn about light fall off and how to make 2D look 3D, bright center and shadowed outer.

Below is where I am at right now; I would say its intermediate level. It's slow coming but practice makes perfect, the more you try the better you will become. The little marks were done by blowing it up to 1000%.

-Keven

I'll change the speed of the mouse in Windows. I think my cheap mouse will do until I can afford a tablet. Thanks for the tips. I have a lot to learn.

[Moejoe]

DnB with dual curves usually gets good results, clone tool set to low opacity and lighten mode also good for small blemishes.

[JayDavis]

Here is a recipe someone gave me and I've used it regularly for about a year and get really good results with it. Hope someone else can use it.

1. make a blank layer above the background document. Select the healing brush and make sure that the "sample all layers" box is checked. On the blank layer start doing your spot healing of blemishes. Take your samples from a clear area of skin with similar tone. Make sure the brush is maximum soft (ie 0% hardness)

2. when you're done that, create another new layer above that. With that layer active press ctrl/alt/shift+E . This will merge the background and blemish layers together onto the new layer (note this keeps your original intact). This will be your new working layer.

3. In your approach you then add a new layer and blur it. The problem with that is that you introduce dark tones into the overall blur that can bleed into the skin that. Do this instead: go to menu item:Select/ Color Range/ Sampled Colors. set the "add to sample" option and with a low fuzziness setting (around 25) begin selecting the model's skin area. Play around with sampling and different fuzziness settings until you have the skin almost all selected and none of the dark areas around the skin. Choose OK and now you will have a pretty thorough selection of the skin tones.

4. copy this to its own layer (ctrl-J)

5. Apply Median Noise to this layer only. You have to choose the amount to use. Adjust it up until skin detail just disappears and then a bit more. At this point the picture will look hideous.

Monochromatic noise can be added by selecting your skin layer, go up to filters and choose noise, there is a check box for monochromatic, set a low number (should look a little like faint pores) and then apply/ok. If it is too much then you can go under Edit (if I remember right) and choose Fade to fade the last filtered effect.

6. Now ... add a layer mask while pressing the Alt key ... this will add a Black layer mask and everything will then return to "normal"

7. Here's the part when you retouch the skin: Using a soft-edged paintbrush and white paint selected, choose an opacity of 20% or less and a brush size that's workable, start painting white on the layer mask just in the areas of the skin gradually reducing it's opacity until the skin is the way you like it.

That's it.

If you're going really heavy on the glamour, you'll want to add some monochromatic noise into the blurred areas to add skin "pores" back into the picture.

[Quantum3Studio]

the example in the link seems quite blurred. I think it was edited using the very fast technique!