This isn't my original work but a summary of several articles.

"SMOOTHING FACE

Save as. Keep saving.

Duplicate background and call it "Work".

Quick Mask on eyes, lips, eyebrows & jewellery. Feather 2 pixels. Save selection, call it "detail". Ctrl-C, Ctrl-V. Name layer "detail". Selection deselects itself. Detail remains the top layer. Can be edited later if not accurate (from Background). Make sure it's lined up with "Work". Opacity can be adjusted at finish. Don't need layer masks now. (Layer mask technique in bracks)

Click "Work" layer.

With magnetic lasso select all the skin you want to smooth. Face, neck, hands if near face. ? hide selection edges.

Copy Work layer and use Healing brush for wrinkles. Align unticked. Dodge tool <50% to lighten areas, eg red nose. Reduce opacity of this Work Copy layer to show slight wrinkles. Merge down.

Feather 2 pixels.

Save selection, call it "face", Deselect.

Ctrl click on RGB channel

Work layer on Layer palette

Ctrl-C

Ctrl-V

Filter, Noise, Despeckle.

Load inverted "face" selection. Press Delete. Deselect.

(Layer mask and paint with black airbrush (soft 50%): eyes, lips, eyebrows, jewellery.) Merge down.

Ctrl click on RGB channel

Work layer on Layer palette

Ctrl-C

Ctrl-V

Filter, blur, Gaussian blur, radius 5. Normal or Screen mode. Set History brush to this state.

Load inverted "face" selection. Press Delete. Deselect.

(Layer mask and paint with black airbrush (soft 50%): eyes, lips, eyebrows, jewellery.)

Reduce opacity to 30 - 50%.

Below will increase the blur so don't overdo the blur in previous paragraph.

Copy this layer, mode Overlay (Colour Burn if Overlay is too light), % slider.

Can try Inner/ Outer Glow on Layer 1

Save as .PSD

Flatten, duplicate layer. Unshapen mask, % slider maybe. Layer mask maybe. Flatten.

Save for Web"

Brian

"Nony Buz" wrote in message

I have been playing with photoshop for a while now, but never had to do any serious touch up work. I have an image of a mohter and daughter. The mothers skin looks nice and smooth, after using the healing brush and cloning stamp tool I have removed all the acne, but the daughters skin still looks like it is sort of bumpy. How do I smooth it out?

Fred Zafran

Replied in the following topics

cleaning up a models face