If you have ever looked a pictures in a magazine you will have no doubt noticed how smooth the models skin looks. Well this is by some sort of genetic accident, it has undoubtedly been photo manipulated to look that way. In this tutorial I will show you one way to achieve that effect.

 If you are following the whole series I will be using this same photograph on the right through out the series. Clicking on this image will take you to the full size picture that I got from www.sxc.hu.

 As you can see it is a good looking portrait in its one right, but never one you’d see in a magazine or as a head shot of an actor. I am sure if we could see the before being photo-shopped pictures or models in magazine we wouldn’t take for granted all the work that a graphic artist puts into making these pictures awesome.

 So let’s get started….

• First thing first, open the image you want to soften the skin on in photoshop. Now double click on the background layer. When the Layer dialog appears name it background and click OK

• Now we are going to make the skin perfect by removing all the blemishes. Use the Zoom tool to enlarge the face so it fills your entire work area.
• Next select the Spot Healing Brush . Change the mode to lighten(next to the brush size). In some cases lighten just won’t do it so you may have to change the mode back to normal. Set the brush size to be slightly larger than the blemish you are fixing, hover over the blemish and click. In my experience this method fixes about 95% of the blemishes I have run in too. No make sure your clean up the acne, scratches on the skin, and if you want the moles and birth marks.



• Now we need to make some duplicates of this layer. Type Ctrl+J 3 time to make three copies. Then turn off the visibility of your layers except the background copy 2 layer by clicking on the eye next to it. Your layers palette will look similar to the one below.
 


• Make your background copy 2 layer active by clicking on it. In the Layers palette switch the Blend mode from Normal to Darken. Then go to Filter < Blur < Gaussian Blur and apply a 40 pixel blur to the picture. Then hide this layer by clicking on the eye to the left of it.


 
 
 


• Now click the box to the left of background copy 3 to turn it back on and make this layer active. Change the Blend Mode to Lighten. Now again use the Gaussian Blur filter but this time to a 60 pixel blur.
• Turn on the layer Background copy 2 and lower its opacity to 40%. Then turn on your background copy layer. Now at this stage it really doesn’t look like much, but we are almost done.



 



• Make sure you have the layer background copy 3 active. Press Ctrl+E to merge this layer with background copy 2. Now click on the Layer Mask button at the bottom of the layers palette.
• Press D on your keyboard and then X to make your foreground color black. Then using the Fill Tool click somewhere on the image. You see the whole image become unblurred. This because by filling with black we essentially masked out all of our blur effects.
• Now its time to bring back the blur over the areas of the skin where we want it. Press X to make your foreground color white. Now select the brush tool .Choose a soft brush that covers the area of skin you want to soften and paint in the softness. Be sure to leave detailed areas like the eyes,eye brows, lips, hair, and any other area you don’t want softened. Don’t worry if you see color blur around the edges where her clothing meets her skin. We’ll fix that in the next step.


 
 

 
 
 

 
 

• Now that you have your mask painted in over all the places of skin you want soften lower the Opacity of this layer to somewhere between 60 and 70% depending on your what you feel looks good. You can really see the effect the skin softening has on the image below.

 

 

 

Follow the entire glamour photo series by clicking on the links below:

1. The Eyes
2. The Teeth and Smile
3. The Hair
4. The Skin

Back to the Glamour Photo Tutorial

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 If your a woman you already know this, but listen up guys. Women spend a lot of time making themselves attractive and one of the things they do is shape their eyebrows by plucking or waxing. Well in the first part of this tutorial on eyes for a sexy glamour photo I am going to show you how to use Adobe Photo Shop to shape eyebrows.

 I will be using the photo on the right for this entire glamour series. I found this image on www.sxc.hu. As you can see as a basic portrait it is a good picture. However through out this glamour tutorial series we will change it in to a sexy glamour portrait.

 In this tutorial we will shape her eyebrows and we will enhance and brighten her eyes.So lets begin by shaping the eyebrows, and I promise you it will be painless.

• It is always a good idea to make a duplicate of your image in case you mess something up so bad you have to start fresh. Press Ctrl+J to duplicate your background layer. Then turn off your background layer by clicking the eye to the left of it.
• Use the Zoom Tool and zoom into to her eyebrows. Then press Q to enter quick mask mode. Press D to reset your foreground and background colors.
• Make sure Black is set as your foreground color. Now select the Brush tool . After selecting an appropriate size soft brush paint black over the parts of the eyebrows you want to keep. A graphics tablet comes in real handy for this. If you paint the mask in where you don’t want it simple switch to white and paint over the areas of the mask you do not want there.




• Press Alt+Ctrl+D to bring up the feather dialog. Enter a value around 4. Now select the Clone Stamp Too . Now determine if you are going to work on the top edge of the eyebrows or the bottom edge. In my case I have no eyebrow to remove some I am going to work on the bottom.Choose a soft edge brush and holding done the Alt key click on a clean area of skin beneath the eyebrow. Now clone the skin over the portion of eyebrow you don’t want. Don’t worry about going over the masked are as the clone tool will only clone up to it.


 


• Once you are happy with the shape of the eyebrows press Ctrl+D to deselect the area. Now we are going to move on to enhancing the eyes. In this photo you can see our model has a bit of Red Eye. Its a simple matter with photo shop to clear this up. Under the spot healing brush you’ll find the Red Eye Tool . Select this tool, place the cross hairs in the center of the pupil and as if by magic the red eye disappears.
• Copy your working layer by pressing Ctrl+J. Now select the Brush Tool and pick a small hard edged brush. Press Q to enter quick mask mode. With your foreground color set to black paint over the eyes, just the eyes. To do this I used a really small hard brush to outline the edge of the eye and then a larger brush to fill in the center.



• Now press Shift+Ctrl+I to inverse your selection so you will actually be working with the eyes. Now go to Filter < Sharpen < Unsharp Mask. Use the same settings as I used below.

 

 

• Now if the eyes still do not appear bright and crisp you can run the UnSharp Mask filter again. But be careful if you run it too many times the eyes really become creepy looking.

 

 

 

 There you have it, reshaped eyebrows and enhanced eyes.

Follow the entire glamour photo series by clicking on the links below:

1. The Eyes
2. The Teeth and Smile
3. The Hair
4. The Skin

Back to the Glamour Photo Tutorial

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