How To Edit a Photo Skin Retouching Color Grading tutorial

photographer running sweat and I’ll show you the best way to edit and color grade your photos in this tutorial covering photo editing in both Capture One and Photoshop we'll primarily use Capture One as the raw processing software for the initial stage of color grading and we'll also perform skin retouching in Photoshop later on and if I told you I’ve downloaded this image just check the links in the description —you can download it and follow along as you edit this exact photo so in order to Import the image into Capture One then simply select the image you want to edit right -click and choose Open With you can either use Open With or simply proceed directly Drag and drop the image into Capture One or open Capture One and simply import the image so I'll just import it from wherever location I'm currently in I want to import it from here so for this case I'm just going to select the image I've opened up in Capture one and I'll simply drag and drop the image into Capture One and you can see the image is being imported o be imported in this case so select the image and import just that one image Now we have imported the image into Capture One and the next thing we want to do is correcting the lighting and contrast issues and later performing color grading during capture the first step will simply be adjusting the image to fix the highlights you can see that we've lost detail in the brightest areas of this image so we're just going to come right here to our highlights and bring them down and we'll do the same for e whites to recover information within the sky area and after doing that we're simply going to come in and add some contrast to the image because as I'm shooting photos I tend to pull out all the e contrast within the camera so I prefer to add it during post-production so I'll jus come and add blacks to the image then open up the shadows just in this specific image so I'll come adjust the shadows to my levels and pull in the blacks slightly and also bring in the whites a bit and that's going to s going to add some contrast to the image so whatever we do will first and foremost be about enhancing that contrast andling the colors in the image so to begin with you'll first need to focus on the background itself—let's go ahead and create one new field adjustment layer so just go to where you see layers in Capture One right-click and select Add New Field Adjustment Layer What this will do is create a layer that It's going to apply all the colors or it's going to apply a global color grade across the image so we're going to scroll down here to where you see the Color Editor and beneath the Color Editor We're starting with the greens first because we want them to stand out a bit more in the background so come to where you see hue and shift the greens toward the aquas by moving it to the right side and we'll also adjust the yellows and simply experiment with the shades of yellow so I'm just going to shift the yellows toward e greens will stand out vidly so we'll also address the blues here enhancing them slightly or increasing their saturation because You want the sky to pop and have that subtle pop in the sky area and also going to come and play around with the hue slightly to around negative four—I feel like that’s okay so to add some life to the image I'm just going to reduce the intensity of the blues slightly so as to intensify the blues or the blue hue in the sky you're aiming for you see advanced in capture one and they're simply going to come and get the color picker tool so Select the color picker tool right here click on the sky area and you'll see that this section is displaying the selected shade of blue we'll now adjust the saturation as well of the blues' advance and simply absorb the saturation just like that simply by doing this you can see that the blues are somewhat enhanced in this case and you can also experiment w e lightness and simply by doing this you can see that the blues are looking even better now blues are rising and the subject is likewise enhanced by the blues in the background so After I've worked on the blues you can always come back and make one more selection if you feel like it and you can even increase the saturation even further if you'd like we're enhancing the blues just a bit so right now we've made the blues pop and next we're just going to work on the skin tone so I'm going to go through the layers once more and create another new adjustment layer—just going to undo that very slightly So press Ctrl+Z to undo then I'll just come and create another new field adjustment layer—simply right-click here on the plus icon and create a new one or go to add new field adjustment layer o add that layer we're going to scroll down once more and reach the color editor then simply select skin tone click the color picker tool and it will create a uniform shade skin tones for our model so click on an area that you want the rest of the skin to resemble In this case we'll just sample that area then scroll down to where you see uniformity and begin adjusting the uniformity slider as well as the saturation slider under uniformity just like that and you can see by simply doing this we've been able to create even uniform skin tones for our subject so when you feel the skin tones are leaning more toward the magentas you'll reach the point where you see the amount in this case and you're going to play around with the hue so if the skin tends toward reds at all you can adjust or shift this away from the reds and add more greens to the skin tone by moving the hue slider and adjust the amount just above uniformity—simply move the hue slider higher just like that toward the greens and this will reduce the magenta in the image or the skin once you've done this you can see it's also affecting e model's outfit in this case what we want to do is simply mask out the outf from being affected by the color grading so if at all I'll show you the quick before and after —this is the before after before the outfit has been altered by the color grading because the e outfit's color was initially almost matching the skin tone so this is what we'll be doing In Capture One you'll simply get the eraser tool or you can press E on the keyboard and get the eraser tool then simply zoom in by pressing Ctrl plus on the keyboard or use Command plus and with the eraser tool selected just move in and start masking out so you can as Press M on the keyboard M will display the areas you're going to mask so just use the eraser tool to mask out and the very first thing you need to do is select the edges since this can be a bit tricky when masking first select the outline or edges of the outfit and simply doing so allows you to see that we've selected the edges first then move to the lower section and adjust accordingly reduce the brush size and we can use the box pocket keys just like we do when it comes to To increase the eraser tool's size in Photoshop simply adjust it again and then paint over the outfit to reveal the original color without affecting it with the color grading I'm just going to paint directly on her outfit like this and you can see the effect in real time as we restore the original color of her outfit so I'm just going to paint over that area so if I accidentally paint on a specific spo obtain the brush key by pressing B on the keyboard and you can repaint the original color to restore the The lipstick color also changes so we'll simply mask it out by pressing E on the keyboard once more then erase the effect from the lipstick or any makeup—press M again to do so Hide the mask so control minus and this is what we have right now—so you can see the before and after Just after and before after before after we're done with color grading this image and next We'll be handling the skin retouching so to get that done just head over to iuc edit the image in Photoshop and select the version you want to use I prefer to keep the format as TIFF 16-bit uncompressed and a resolution of 300 pixels per inch The scale is fixed and I don't crop the image so I simply go to edit variants and it automatically opens the photo in Photoshop for the next adjustments like the skin are retouching so right now the image is going to be opened in Photoshop and here we are in Photoshop so in comes Photoshop—what we want to do first is first Duplicate the background layer by pressing Ctrl+J then press Ctrl+J again and simply rename the middle layer to Low Frequency and the top layer to High frequency and after that select the color layer or the low-frequency layer and hide it simply go to Filter then to Blur then to Gaussian Blur click on the skin area and adjust accordingly e radius all the way down and start blurring out the details in the skin area so I'll just take this up just like that and stop at the point where the details are just beginning to fade from this very image so at around three pixels—that's when I'm just starting to close out on the skin textures—I'll click OK select the high-frequency layer and now activate it So I'll just go to Image remember we're editing a 16-bit image go to Apply Image layer select low frequency layer blending must be added with scale 2 offset 0 opacity 100 percent preserve transparency and mask then simply turn on the invert option and when you do that you You can see the textures appearing on this layer—just click OK go to blend mode and change it from normal all the way down to Linear light then after that select both layers by pressing Ctrl or Command followed by pressing Ctrl+G or Command+G to group them then open up the group for the frequency separation select the low-frequency layer then hide the high-frequency layer then simply select the mixer brush tool e mixer brush tool under the brushes appears set its hardness to zero ensure the clean brush option is selected and confirm the setting that says "clean brush after each" is enabled The stroke is selected with a 9 percent load weight 75 mix at 90 and flat 100 percent Make sure the "sample all layers" option is turned off and zoom out using Ctrl and the minus key or you can use the zoom out tool command minus to zoom out so it's time to brush on the skin to blend the skin tones so you ca Reduce the brush size using the bracket keys or the box bracket keys on the keyboard and to blend simply left-click and hold down to mix just like that colors that are looking a bit uneven I like to create a little more harmony between them so they blend smoothly or even better use a very small brush and follow the direction carefully e shape or the hand you're working on in this case so I'm going to be doing this for e rest of her skin so when dealing with a small area reduce the size and use a very Use a small brush to blend those colors in that small area—left-click and hold then drag after mixing a section release the left mouse button and blend again by left-clicking on a new area to blend it in I'm just going to keep doing this to reduce the contras adjust the brush size and blend just like that and you can see that by simply doing this we're achieving nice even skin tones and the skin looks smoother than it did at firs before so I'm just going to focus on the lower part of the body which is her thighs and also Take a small brush and keep working on all these tiny areas just like that and you can see the skin is going to be smooth and look better than where we started so you always have to follow the contours or the shape of a given area in order to maintain continuity and eep the originality and you can see I'm making adjustments from a distance because I don't wa o spend a long time trying to retouch and I want to see the uneven skin tone transition so after doing that come and turn on the texture or high-frequency layer and you can see the before and after ow that the skin has smoothed out and appears even it's time to make the final adjustments across the entire image—simply go to the high frequency layer and proceed Select it so that if I mention any pimples or blemishes you can zoom in and check for those Look for blemishes or imperfections before and after and try to eliminate them by using the clone stamp tool to zoom in and pinpoint those pimples or blemishes so as to These spots ensure you've selected the clone stamp tool or are passing at 100 percent flat Sample the current layer and remove blemishes by holding down the Option key and left-clicking to copy clean skin then left-clicking over the blemish using the Spot Healing Tool to replace it e blemish or pimple with clean skin select the option left-click to copy clean skin then release the option key on the keyboard or the alternate key and left-click aga once again cover the pimple or blemish by replacing it with smooth clear skin in this way e blemish will be cleared or covered with smooth healthy skin effectively removing it from your subjective appearance now that we've finished retouching the skin let me show you the before and after before after before after the skin looks smoother than it was initially before so next what we want to do is simply enhance the skin tone so just come and create a press Shift+Option+Command+E on Mac or Shift+Alt+Control+E on Windows to create a visible stamp layer then go to Filter and select o the Camaro filter so when it comes to the Camaro filter we simply want to enhance the skin tones by going to our color mixer panel adjusting luminous and slightly darkening the skin tones by darkening the oranges and moving the slider to the left remember that luminosity is the brightness of a given color and can also affect saturation and intensity e blues if you want to by increasing the saturation but don't overdo it as it will introduce a slight fringing effect along the edges of the background areas so you might as well go ahead and adjust the shade changing the blue to whatever color you prefer so I'm jus adding a touch of aqua to the blues and you can see the before and after before and after so we are going to reopen the image in Photoshop so we can make the final adjustments so come and create a selective color adjustment layer then target the blacks and adjust the black slider Add three or any value that suits you and introduce a touch of science to the blacks then come and brighten the eyes—just come and create a human saturation adjustment layer go to image saturation ensure the master channel is selected and desaturate the image around -76 then press Ctrl+I or use the Command+I keyboard shortcut to invert the effect come and ge e normal brush tool ensure hardness is set all the way to zero and a soft round brush has been selected the mode is set to normal at a flat hundred percent—make sure you have black selected and white on these two color swatches and if you have any other random color you can press Press D on the keyboard or simply left-click on the tiny color swatches to reset to black and white with white as the foreground color you can zoom into the image by using Control plus on the keyboard use the bracket keys on the keyboard to reduce the brush size then simply paint on the white area of the eyes paint on what you feel should be white in the white part of the eye and if I told you to make a Oops switch the brush back to black using the X key on the keyboard and you can erase the effect a given area so after editing the next step will be saving the image so it doesn' change in color when you post it or when you print it out so simply go to File then Export and come to export as and it's going to open up the export as dialog box right here in Photoshop make sure the format is set to JPEG and set the quality to maximum which is 7 in this case and go to where you see resample making sure the sample is set to bicubic sharper because we wa a sharp image that will be saved transferred to color space and ensure you have verified these settings wo options: convert to sRGB and embed color profile then click export and it will be ready Open the location where you want to save the image then simply click save—once you do this window will automatically close making it easy to edit a photo in If you enjoyed this video don't forget to subscribe to this channel keep practicing and continue creating