Pixiq

Portrait Retouching / Shaping Bodies With Liquify

Jane Conner-ziser

The first step in actual retouching is to prepare the body. Everyone looks at their bodies first in photographs and then to see if their face and expression also looks good. There are two processes in Photoshop that are essential when working with bodies, Liquify and Puppet Warp.

Both allow you to distort the image, but they work in different ways. Liquify is useful for “nipping and tucking” bulging body parts, attractively draping messy clothing and is also great for moving hairstyles into neat perfection. Puppet Warp is better for repositioning the body, like bending the body in a different direction, tilting a head or raising or lowering arms and legs. In this image, we do not need to reposition the body but we can bring more youthfulness into the pose by taking some of the roundness out of the shoulders and thickening the subject’s hair.

We will be using the Liquify Tool.

It is important to know that Photoshop reads all of the pixels entering and leaving Liquify. This means that when you bring an entire file into Liquify, it works more slowly than when you preselect the area of the image you wish to work with. I often work with sections of a file when using Liquify.

I’ve duplicated the Background so the distortion will be applied to the Background Copy. Then I used the Rectangular Marquee Tool to preselect the lower half of this image file.

The Liquify window provides a Vertical Tool Bar on the left side and a palette of Options on the right side.

The top icon in the Vertical Tool Bar is the Forward Warp Tool. It is the one most commonly used for portrait work.

Beneath it is the Reconstruct Tool – think of it as your eraser because if you move something too much you can select this tool and “erase” areas of your work back to the original positioning so you can have another try.

The third icon down is the Twirl Clockwise Tool (counter clockwise if you hold down the Option (Alt) key while working. This tool is nice for adding extra curl to hairstyles; just don’t get carried away because a little bit goes a long way.

Next down are Pucker and Bloat that do exactly what they say they do. Press with the Pucker Tool on your image and the pixels shrink towards center. Press with the Bloat Tool and they expand from the center. These tools are rarely used but can be useful for shrinking in the mid section of a body while using a brush size that encompasses the body from shoulders to hips. Again, just be careful – it’s not my choice for this kind of work because it is difficult to control the final result and often does too much.

The next three tools, Push Left, Mirror and Turbulance are distortion tools that I have not found to be particularly valuable for portrait retouching. Push left is good for creating a new edge based upon the direction you choose (holding down the Option / Alt key while working Pushes Right), and Turbulence isn’t visually much different from Forward Warp in my opinion.

However, the next two tools are extremely important for successful Liquify work, the Freeze Mask Tool and the Thaw Mask Tool. These tools offer you the benefit of “freezing” or locking some pixels in place while you move other pixels nearby.

The last two tools in the Vertical Tool Bar are the Hand Tool and the Zoom Tool. You can use these for navigating the image while you are in Liquify, or you can use the keyboard shortcuts Space Bar for the Hand Tool and Option (Alt) + or – for Zooming in and out.

The Options Window, on the right side of the Liquify Window presents controls for Brush Size, Brush Hardness, and what you see while you are working.

The first buttons allow you to Load or Save Mesh. A Mesh is like a grid that records the distortions you make. If you Save Mesh, you can choose to Load it again on another image and the same distortion will automatically be applied in exactly the same grid areas. Notice that on the right, about ¾ down in the Options Window, there is an icon that you can tap to choose to see or not see the mesh while you are working. Using Mesh is not often used in portrait retouching but there may be other instances when this options is quite helpful, perhaps when identical distortions are needed on different images.

Next down you find Brush Options. Brush Size lets you choose how big the brush will be. Brush Density controls how hard or soft the edge of the brush will be. Brush Pressure and Brush Rate are speed controls. A low Brush Pressure uses pressure to control speed (more pressure equals more effect) and Brush Rate applies the same distortion faster or slower as per set on the slider. Turbulent Jitter is specific for the Turbulence Tool and honestly I haven’t noticed much difference when applied at different settings.

Not all Brush Options are available for every Liquify Tool. The ones that are available for the tool you choose will be bold. The others will be grayed out.

Reconstruct Options can also be chosen. If you find you need to start over again, just select the Reconstruct Option Revert and tap on Restore All. Quick and Easy! There are also other options for Reconstruction styles, Revert, Rigid, Stiff, Smooth and Loose, that offer partial reconstructs – and often other distortions! In practical working circumstances, you either want to start completely over or rework specific areas. My choices for this are Reconstruct/Revert/Restore All to start over or using the Reconstruct Tool (vertical tool bar) to brush over specific areas I would like to try again.

Next down are Mask Options. Again, I don’t need these for the work I do in portrait retouching, but these options allow you to create masks while you work. The icons allow you to add to masks, delete from masks, and invert masks. The icons allow you to quickly select none, all or invert.

Finally there are the View Options. These options let you choose what you see while you are working and how you see it.

View Option 1 should be checked for you to see the image (smile) and this is the location where you can also choose to use or not use Mesh. If you want to create a mesh, once it is selected, there are pull down menus for how large you would like the mesh to be and what color you like.

Next you can choose to show the mask, which is how I usually work because it shows up when I use the Freeze Mask Tool. I choose a color for the mask that is different from the default red when there is a lot of red in my image and I can’t easily define where the mask is and isn’t.

The last option, Show Backdrop, allows you to choose whether or not you want to see where you are coming from (the original) in comparison to where you are going. In addition, you can choose what you want to see as the “original” a layer or the background. This is not an option I use frequently because it’s more important for me to see that what I am doing looks natural. Sometimes I turn it on when I have finished my distortions, prior to tapping OK, just as a preview. If there are areas that need adjusting, I can then use the Reconstruct Tool to back up a bit and redo.

OK, let’s liquefy this image!

First up, I use the Freeze Mask Tool to lock down the facial features. I do not want to move her chin over or squash an eye while I am working! Specifically I lock down the eyes and eyebrows, the nose, the mouth and the chin, linking the mask through the smile lines and the middle of the balls of the cheeks to make sure that I keep her expression intact. On this image I also locked down the entire earring toward camera and the tip of the far earring because I want to lift her jaw slightly without moving the earring toward camera. If the middle of the far earring moves slightly towards the jaw, that’s OK – it will straighten it :-)

Now we can move things around safely! Choose a Brush Size that is appropriate for the job. We are moving large objects on this image so I am using a large brush – 200 pixels. I’ve left the Brush Density at 50 and the Pressure at 100, which are default settings.

FYI – to revert all settings in the Liquify Window, hold down the Option (Alt) key and look under the OK icon. Cancel turns into Reset. Just tap on Reset and all settings restore to factory default.

Placing the center of the brush over the area that needs to move the most, I press and push down on the “hump” of her shoulders. Then I pull the shoulder up slightly to square her posture and adjust the edge of her blouse to look natural. In addition, I thickened the ponytail slightly by lifting the top edge of it.

Using the same brush I gently pushed in and up on her jawline. It’s important not to go too far with this – 50% of the way to tight skin is usually the most you would ever want to do. In addition, on most mature subjects, I also grab the skin on the neck and chest and lift it slightly as well. If you want to check your work, turn the View Option to Show Backdrop on and off. Readjust as needed, then choose OK.

When you choose OK, the distortion will be applied to the Background Copy. From there you can turn that layer visibility off and on (small eyeball icon in the far left of the layer) to check the before and after. Make sure the work is perfect, not too much. This is early in the retouching process and it’s important that the every step is perfect.

Other notes on Liquify: if you are working on an image where there are many small areas to work on individually, like a family portrait, use the Freeze Mask Tool to lock surrounding areas down while you adjust one person, then use the Thaw Mask Tool to erase the mask. Then you can mask another area. Mask and Thaw as often as you need to in order to work comfortably.

See you soon!

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 want to work along with Jane on this project, email her for an original jpg of this image janecz@mac.com