Pixiq

Camouflaging Unwanted Facial Hair / Jane Conner-ziser

Good portrait retouching has more to do with backgrounds, bodies, clothing, hair and enhancements than smoothing skin and removing wrinkles. As people age, they know what their faces and bodies look like. They might not like what they see, but they know. A good retouching artist knows what human beings collectively like and don’t like about the way they look and address those issues before actually working on skin texture, character and lines. A beautiful portrait needs to FEEL good as much as look good.

So, on this woman, we’ve started by studying her face and body, creating a retouching plan of action, accomplished some body and hair work and removed small spots on her skin that have nothing to do with her character or expression. Now we’re going to address the facial hair. This is so common and women hate it! In fact, when I photographed this subject I didn’t realize she had a little beard, and I’ve known her for years! When I looked at the files, I was surprised. The hair is prominent in all close ups.

Retouching artists have a short list of options when working on undesirable objects in images. They can crop it out, tone it down (make it closer in value and color to the surrounding area), camouflage it (hide it with bushes or something else appropriate for the area), turn it into something else (a bucket can become a potted plant), or remove it completely. The best choice is the one that looks the best and can be accomplished in the least amount of time.

The facial hair is not in a prominent area of the face. It’s back by the ear, hidden partially in the shaded side of the face and does not require a definitive edge –in fact, it requires a softly diffused edge in order to look subdued and natural. Camouflage will be our best choice. We will hide the hair behind delicate layers of smooth skin. Now we need to consider the lighting. The cheek and neck are approximately the same color and value though the neck gets slightly darker just under the jawline up next to the ear. Do you see the slight reflected light at the edge of the jawline? That lighter value is what separates the jaw from the neck and brings the face forward and the neck behind. When we do this artwork, we will have to be careful to use three colors and values in order to recreate natural lighting and bone structure while we are hiding the hair.

We will be working on a New Empty Layer that we create just above the Background Copy. You can make this layer either by tapping on the New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers Window, or by choosing Layer / New / Layer from Photoshop’s main menu bar.

We will be using the Clone Stamp Tool – an old one in Photoshop; one of the original tools, and it’s very good for just this type of job.

Set the options for the Clone Stamp Tool for Normal Mode, Opacity 10%, Flow 100%, Aligned is checked, Sample All Layers is selected. Use a brush that is set to have no shape dynamics and set the brush size to be fairly large. To begin with, I’m using a brush that is size 35, and I will be working on the cheek.

Hold down the Option (Alt) key and tap on the skin tone just next to the ear. Transfer the icon over the hair and begin to tap and move over the hair on the cheek. Stop when the texture of the cheek begins to look natural when you compare it to the adjacent skin further towards the left. Stop.

Make another New Layer. Change the brush size so that the edge of it will create a natural softness for the edge of the jaw; I used a size 15. Select the darker color of the shaded side and tap over the lighter hair. Re select the source color frequently and gradually build up an even shaded side.

Then, make a third layer, use the same brush, sample the lighter color of the reflected light and work along the edge of the jaw to recreate the reflected light while you are camouflaging the texture of the hair. When you are finished, the jawline and layers will look something like this:

Fine tune the artwork on each layer as needed, remembering that the cheek color is on layer 1, the shaded side on layer 2 and the reflected light is on layer 3. Zoom out and verify that you have done enough, but not too much.

The artwork will be easy to edit since each color is on a separate layer. If you’ve gone too far with one or more of the colors and the skin looks too smooth, just reduce the Layer Opacity of that layer; you don’t have to start over again. If, on the other hand, you have totally gone off track, delete the layer, make a new one and try again. You can even use a Layer Mask or the Eraser Tool to spot correct.

When you are finished, the artwork will look something like this. Remember that we are just starting the real retouching on this subject so completely finishing one particular part is not the goal. The face needs to evolve as a single unit even though we are working on individual sections, so we can always go back and touch up here and there as needed. Adding more artwork is a lot faster and easier than trying to repair an area that is overdone.

Some helpful hints if you are using CS5 or greater:

Clone Stamp: Turn off the option to see the clone overlay; it’s annoying when you are working on skin. Window / Clone Source / uncheck show overlay.

Eyedropper Tool: Set the option to sample 5x5 Average for retouching photos, Sample / all layers, and turn off the option to Show Sampling Ring.

OK – onward and upward! Next up, the most prominent lines attract our attention first when we are viewing portraits. Sometimes these lines are very important elements of the subject’s character. In this portrait, the strongest lines are on the subject’s neck. In the next session I will show you how to soften, shorten and reshape creases in the skin.

Happy Retouching!

Jane

Jane Conner-ziser is one of the world’s top retouching artists and instructors with over 35 years of professional experience. She is an innovator in digital retouching and fine arts whose techniques of facial retouching and enhancement are emulated by artists, trainers and photographers throughout the world through her live, online and dvd training. When she is not teaching (schedule online at janeconner-ziser.com) you will find her exploring, photographing and learning about the incredible world we live in.

If you would like to work along with Jane on this progressive project, you have two options: email jane at janecz@mac.com for an original file you can use with this series of articles, or purchase Jane’s DVD, Digital MakeUp to get the file and movie sessions you can pause, stop, fast forward and rewind as you work along with Jane at your own pace. Grazie!