Retouching Tips On: Getting Into It

Time, Patience and Practice

High-end retouching requires time, patience and a lot of practice. Keep that in mind, because it's very important. There's a big difference between an image retouched by a professional photographer and an image retouched by a professional retoucher. Photographers often don't have the time to professionally retouch an image; so they don't spend more than half an hour on editing and retouching on a single image, or they hire a professional retoucher to do the retouching for them. Professional retouchers on the other hand won't spend less than an hour on an image, usually 6-8 hours, more or less. Some of the best work is at pixel level, that's one reason why it may take a lot of time. So as we can see, time is a key factor here.

Apply yourself & Be Patient

You have to apply yourself and be patient when learning anything. Remember, professionals were once amateurs.
Learn, learn, and learn some more

You will not be a professional retoucher overnight! There are a lot of aspects involved in retouching. You have to learn about Photoshop, Color, Lighting and the business aspect of it if you want to be a professional retoucher. There are a lot of free resources on the internet, you'll be amazed on how much information you will find. If you don't ask for it, you will never get it. Remember, Google is your best friend.

Learn Master Photoshop

Mastering Photoshop's tools, masks, layers, blending modes and adjustment layers is very important. It will make the process much easier. And it will help you be more creative with the work. I cannot stress that enough... master Photoshop.

Learn about Lighting, Colors and Digital Painting

These three aspects are very important when it comes to retouching. We will go into more details with futures blog posts.

PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT

Keep saying that until you believe it. Practice, practice, practice, and then practice some more.

Ask for Critique

I cannot tell you how much critiquing will enormously help you to become a better retoucher. You will learn a lot, and sometimes the hard way, but that is totally fine if it'll eventually benefit you. However, learn to separate constructive criticism from unnecessary criticism. For example, if someone critiques your image and says: "I like the before better." You cannot take them seriously.. Sure, their critique says that something is wrong with the image, but they didn't give you a reason why they disliked it, or a solution/technique to fix the problem. They're amateurs and it's best to ignore them.

Ask Yourself Questions

When retouching an image, you have to ask yourself questions like:

Who am I retouching?
You do not want to change characteristic features of public figures/celebrities. Everyone knows how they look like, retouching these features will only look ridiculous and it will make the retouching obvious, which you must avoid. On the other hand, if you're retouching a random model to sell a product, the chances of most people knowing how she really looks like are slim, so in this case, you can work on the things that will help sell the product. In this kind of retouching you have the most flexibility. Create something beautiful for the eyes to look at.

Is the retouching obvious?
As I just mentioned, you do not want to make the retouching obvious, otherwise, you've done a poor job.  Believe it or not, but the best retouched work out there is that that doesn't look retouched. Of course we all know that the images on magazines are retouched. But the retouching job on them isn't distracting. They're selling something for people to look at, and people like to look at beautiful things.

Is it realistic?
Here's a formula to keep in mind:
Skin - Texture = Plastic Skin
Plastic Skin ≠ Attractive
Having skin with no texture is unrealistic and screams "I'm retouched". That's why you should avoid blurring the skin using Surface Blur, or Gaussian Blur filter in Photoshop, especially if you're working on a beauty shot. Here's a simple rule of thumb to keep in mind when retouching, if it's not there in two weeks, then getting rid of it is safe.

Goal of Retouching

The ultimate goal of retouching is beautification by the removal of distractions, you do not want to over-retouch an image to an extent that the retouching is actually distracting. Retouching isn't about taking 3 pounds out of someone because they're overweight, reconstructing someone's nose just because they have a bump, or making lips bigger because they're small. These stuff are over-done by amateurs, that's why there's a negative message associated with retouching. High-end retouching is about the process of beautification, unnoticeably.