Cleaning and perfecting skin in Photoshop

Alain Perdomo goes through a series of editing methods for fantasy portraits in Photoshop

The process of retouching skin in a photo can achieve a professional result if it’s done with care. The following methods to correct details of the face and skin in a portrait will ensure spectacular results in your photos.

Alain Perdomo (@alainperdomo) is a digital artist, photographer, and editor, focused mainly in cinema and advertising photography for fashion and beauty. In the following video, he shares his methods to retouch and perfect the skin to accomplish a fantasy effect:

When you’ve opened your photo in Adobe Photoshop, start by analyzing the model’s skin type and the lighting in the image. In this case, as a fantasy effect is required, you’ll want to make sure there’s contrast between the light and shadows. Alain uses a frequency separation system for lighting, different from the one used for color, which you might be more familiar with.

You’ll want to create a more dramatic effect for the contrast of shades, so not much cleanup work will be necessary for those areas.