Replacing skin texture or... ?

[psoiree]

Hello Ladies and Gents!

It's my first post on this forum because for the last couple of years I thought my retouching techniques suits me well but then I took this photo and the nightmare has started. The picture below shows the skin condition AFTER the healing brush and frequency separation so as You can see the problem exists in skin texture. It's hard to re-create it because there's literally no single point to clone it from.

I've tried to find some tutorials on replacing the whole skin texture but with no luck. Also I've searched this forum but most of the questions are about smoothing single parts of the skin where You can find a good parts of it somewhere in the photo.

What do you suggest? What's the way to create a nice texture on FS's "high" layer?

http://i.imgur.com/iVhLM3S.jpg

Regards,
Paul

[skoobey]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

You've made it really soft, and I don't think skin was that problematic. Maybe, you should try DNBing patchiness, and only clone and heal texture? You've tried to do all with one tool, it seems.

There is no real way to "create" texture, you can only sharpen what's there (well technically you can micro paint or do million patches from another similarly lit image, but it'll take for ever, and for that budget you might just as well reshoot).

[psoiree]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

You've made it really soft, and I don't think skin was that problematic. Maybe, you should try DNBing patchiness, and only clone and heal texture? You've tried to do all with one tool, it seems.

There is no real way to "create" texture, you can only sharpen what's there (well technically you can micro paint or do million patches from another similarly lit image, but it'll take for ever, and for that budget you might just as well reshoot).

Skoobey, thank You for the reply. The problem is that the only thing I did here is smoothing the "low" layer of Frequency Separation so there's not much done to the skin texture. I can use some skin brushes on "high" layer but I want to get rid of this nightmare on the forehead.

Here's the original file: http://i.imgur.com/EPehERz.jpg

[klev]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

Skoobey, thank You for the reply. The problem is that the only thing I did here is smoothing the "low" layer of Frequency Separation so there's not much done to the skin texture.

It still impacts the look of it. FS is in no way a lossless decomposition of texture and a broader layer. The top layer is blended with respect to the first, so your concern should be the results, not whether you did anything to the top layer.

Also skoobey is right on this one. The skin isn't bad at all. Starting from the original a darken clone on a few spots and a small amount of DB to fix the patchy look would yield a better result. You just have to be careful not to overdo it. I recommend frequently checking your work for signs of this.

[Tulack]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

Skin is looking good. Regular D&B will do the job. If you want it fast, just create your own texture and replace it. Took me 30 seconds.

https://scontent-lax3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/t31.0-8/q81/s960x960/13418555_10156993035200153_3653339665104792355_o.jpg

[skoobey]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

Start by removing distractions like hairs and pimples. Then make texture uniform by cloning nad healing on high layer(notice, this is a close up, so you can't just take a huge section and clone, we do see every pore, so you have to clone every pore that is distracting, but leave those that are not), then you DNB to get rid of blotchiness.

[psoiree]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

[...]Also skoobey is right on this one. The skin isn't bad at all. Starting from the original a darken clone on a few spots and a small amount of DB to fix the patchy look would yield a better result. You just have to be careful not to overdo it. I recommend frequently checking your work for signs of this.

Klev, would You be so kind and drop a link to the darken cloning tutorial? I searched the internet but the only thing I can find is this tutorial on dark cloning the hair. It's suppose to have the same impact on skin retouching but I can't find it useful.

Skin is looking good. Regular D&B will do the job. If you want it fast, just create your own texture and replace it. Took me 30 seconds.

https://scontent-lax3-1.xx.fbcdn.net...04792355_o.jpg

This is the desired effect I want to achieve! How did u do that? I tried to find skin textures and also stumbled upon this degrunge tutorial http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=213 but it seems that I'm still missing something...

Start by removing distractions like hairs and pimples. Then make texture uniform by cloning nad healing on high layer(notice, this is a close up, so you can't just take a huge section and clone, we do see every pore, so you have to clone every pore that is distracting, but leave those that are not), then you DNB to get rid of blotchiness.

This is what bothers me - do You guys use DnB also for retouching the skin pores? I've seen many DnB tutorials for the last couple of years (like this one: http://www.dmd-digital-retouching.co...burn-tutorial/ or the Charles'es Lucima one) but I thought it's for overall retouching like building the light/shaping the face and never tried to use it for healing parts of the skin. This guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZd6w8bYbJY is doing some magic with the DnB but there's no explanation. Also I use one of the methods from here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeEXY2kIpVo (Michael Wołoszynowicz), Curves one to be exact, but still - all of the photographs in those tutorials are presenting models with almost perfect skin condition so there's not much over just healing and cloning to be done on them.

[skoobey]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

DNB is basically painting with light, you can paint as tiny or as huge as you want as long as it looks good in the end. I use it for everything. Forget the second link, the results are terrible, doesn't matter what they use.

P.S. Yes, you can clone anything with darken or lighten, there is no "hair, or watch, or purse", it's all pixels.

[psoiree]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

DNB is basically painting with light, you can paint as tiny or as huge as you want as long as it looks good in the end. I use it for everything. Forget the second link, the results are terrible, doesn't matter what they use.

P.S. Yes, you can clone anything with darken or lighten, there is no "hair, or watch, or purse", it's all pixels.

I think I may have found what suits me best at the moment Skoobey, and it's thank to You guys.

I don't know if it's correct approach but my workflow looks like this now:

1. Use the healing brush/patch/stamp tool on the copy of the original layer for the minor skin problems;

2. Frequency Separation where I try to soften the shadows and overall colour shifts (layer: Smoothing);

3. Use the healing brush/patch/stamp tool on "high" frequency layer if it's possible to copy good parts of the pores to the bad ones (layer: high);

4. Use the microDnB (Curves version with Luminosity blending mode and "Blend if" layer option) on pores the are still bothering You - I finally understood how to use DnB! (layer: RT_Curves);

5. Add Your own skin texture (Smart Layer with Emboss and Gaussian Blur) to the parts where it's smoothed out because of the light (layer: Skin texture);

6. DnB the whole shape and light of the face (layer: Curves_ALL);

This particular photograph still needs some work to be done but I'm quite happy with the results since I don't want it to look like beauty retouch:

http://imgur.com/cmxpkDc (its before sharpening)

[skoobey]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

2. and 5. are unnecessary and 6. is optional and requires an advanced skill set, that even most professional retouchers lack

[Tulack]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

This is the desired effect I want to achieve! How did u do that? I tried to find skin textures and also stumbled upon this degrunge tutorial http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=213 but it seems that I'm still missing something...

Just 3 different size of noise layers. Merged and clipped to High layer. Then curves or Blend if.

[klev]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

4. Use the microDnB (Curves version with Luminosity blending mode and "Blend if" layer option) on pores the are still bothering You - I finally understood how to use DnB! (layer: RT_Curves);

What do you mean by micro? I would caution against zooming in too far. It might seem like using 2 px brushes at really high zoom ratios would improve things. I think you would obtain better results if you avoid zooming in past 100% most of the time and choose your brush sizes accordingly. I can suggest a couple exercises that will help you gain proficiency in working that way if you like. They're similar to what people do when they're learning to draw. The point is just to have maximal control over your tools.

Klev, would You be so kind and drop a link to the darken cloning tutorial? I searched the internet but the only thing I can find is this tutorial on dark cloning the hair. It's suppose to have the same impact on skin retouching but I can't find it useful.

I worded it poorly. I meant that I would use the clone tool with mode set to darken to take out a couple of those facial hairs and the bright dots that look like small pimples. I would probably use mostly DB for the rest. I would not use fs + smoothing. It impacts your details, because the impact of the high frequency layer is relative to the result of the low frequency layer.

[Aladdin]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

Skin is looking good. Regular D&B will do the job. If you want it fast, just create your own texture and replace it. Took me 30 seconds.

https://scontent-lax3-1.xx.fbcdn.net...04792355_o.jpg

He is asking how to replace texture, to tell him that it took you 30 seconds to do without showing him "how", is not the answer he or anyone expects!

[psoiree]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

2. and 5. are unnecessary and 6. is optional and requires an advanced skill set, that even most professional retouchers lack

Could You please explain it a little further, skoobey?

As far as I understand, as Klev is also saying, You guys don't use FS at all? So You smooth the shadows only by DnB?

What do you mean by micro? I would caution against zooming in too far. It might seem like using 2 px brushes at really high zoom ratios would improve things. I think you would obtain better results if you avoid zooming in past 100% most of the time and choose your brush sizes accordingly. I can suggest a couple exercises that will help you gain proficiency in working that way if you like. They're similar to what people do when they're learning to draw. The point is just to have maximal control over your tools.

I worded it poorly. I meant that I would use the clone tool with mode set to darken to take out a couple of those facial hairs and the bright dots that look like small pimples. I would probably use mostly DB for the rest. I would not use fs + smoothing. It impacts your details, because the impact of the high frequency layer is relative to the result of the low frequency layer.

You understood me perfectly Klev, because by microDnB I meant zooming in as far as it suits me and then darkening the white spots and lightening the dark spots. I realised it's far much powerful than trying to clone good parts of the skin on the High layer of FS to the bad parts. This was my method for the forehead of this girl in the photo I posted at first. Btw. I watched this video https://vimeo.com/25667413 and tried it but it doesn't work. I created a totally new layer with all of the results of my previous work by Cmd+Option+Shift+E, then created a new empty layer with Darken mode, and then tried to clone any part of the photo with Cloning tool set to Darken but it seems somethings wrong because I can't see the results although they're visible if I set the layer to normal mode (tried sampling Current&Below and All layers, no luck): http://imgur.com/bzc5R1y Ok, I tried to clone the light pixels... Numbmnut...

I still can't imagine DnB'ing on 100% zoom but will try it.

I may seem a bit overwhelmed with all of those advices and approach to retouching guys but for the most part of my photography career I've been happy with the results that FS gave me, even though these results were not good enough from technical point of view, so I'm very sorry for theses lame questions I just decided I MUST master the retouching techniques and want to know how the pros are doing it. I'm just this kind of guy who need to get to know everything about wash machines before buying one haha.

He is asking how to replace texture, to tell him that it took you 30 seconds to do without showing him "how", is not the answer he or anyone expects!

Hehe good one! But found it in the end, still feeling thankful for seeing that it's possible on this particular photograph

[skoobey]

Re: Replacing skin texture or... ?

Of course. You can use the FS thing for specific problems but not huge portions of the image like an entire arm or entire cheekbone or whatever.

Like I said before, if it's looking real, it is real.