Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

[Renato Gonçalve]

It's been a while.

I've been doing some fashion retouchs lately and things are going quite easy with everything but retouching fabric. They are starting to give me some headache. Patterns, whool and so are just hellish to retouch and I always keep loosing either texture or color in the process.

So I would like to know if you guys use some kind of technique or take special care with something or some tips when dealing with fabric.

thanks everyone!

[Tulack]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

Just cut out frequencies you don't need. It's standard for catalog retouching.

[klev]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

The question is a little too broad. In my own experience fabric problems aren't just one thing. You could have a very detailed print where the retouching work becomes problematic. You could have a fabric that lacks print where texture isn't very pronounced in the original image, making it easy to mess things up.

Do you have any examples of cases where you have run into problems? Can you give any details about how you attempted this and what you were trying to do, such as remove wrinkles from something?

Lastly fabric has a lot of folds. If you're talking about deep creases which show little to no detail when lightened, you will never solve that problem. Your only option would be to rebuild and shade the area when those creases really do need to go and decide which ones are actually problematic.

[skoobey]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

There are so many issues, and 1000 solutions. Removing a radius/painting on new layer between the low and high is a fast way to reduce wrinkles, but then there are also folds, bumps on the edges, which I clone out, straightening the collar, revolving buttons, etc etc. And all of that is even more complicated when you have pronounced directional texture, or a precise print, or both. Yes, retouching professionally is hard work that requires a lot of thinking.

[Renato Gonçalve]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

Sorry for the lack of answer. It's been some crazy couple of weeks.

The main problem right now seems to be matching textures and patterns when there's a lot of it. Things like denim come out pretty easily for the lack of directional texture and for being a too fine detail. But things like whool, or knitting end up with a lot of wrinkles with movement and dodging usually make it looks a little odd. And cloning usually ends up mismatching the fabric direction.

This screenshot is just an vague example.

The folding messes up the texture and the shading. Reshading makes it odd for the lack of texture. Cloning won't match the texture (or at least not in a reasonable time the way i do it)

Sometimes it seems the way i do it (cloning, dodge and burning and working on frequencies) is not the better and taking i'm to long or adressing it in a not-so-smart way.

[Tulack]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

https://scontent-dft4-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/12472511_10157212075895153_7302316750154243764_n.jpg?oh=661451c410200e82159049a3027c6dc1&oe=58186CFF

[skoobey]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

Let's start with the situation in which you'll be in a position to retouch something like your sample?

If it's a lookbook/web/interview, client or stylist will probably make sure their clothes look good from the start. It's very unlikely to have a client that wishes perfect fitting clothes, yet the model was wearing an ill-fitting garment. Of course it'll take hours and could look suspicious if everything is left up to a retoucher. Either that, or you have a low paying client that doesn't really know the difference either-or(if they did they would fix things on the set). I would say move on. Imagine if you had 100looks to finish this week, and no clothes were tailored properly? Same thing. Charge by how much time it takes you to complete a task.

[Shoku]

Re: Good ways to retouch a maintain fabric texture

We've seen this problem from all types of clients - mom & pop stores to global corporations. If you see this a lot educate the client regarding styling on the photo end, and ask them to state specifically what they will accept - for each image if necessary, then charge accordingly. The more issues, the more your fee should go up.