Natural Skin, Character Preserved

High-end retouching

A portrait at a reflective table is evened for tone and light, while the natural skin markings on the subject's forearm are deliberately left alone.

Natural skin
Tone
Studio

Service: High-End Photo Retouching / Post Production

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Retouched portrait with the tone and backdrop evened and the natural skin markings on the forearm kept untouched — Drag anywhere on the image, or focus the handle and use the arrow keys, to compare before and after.

Unedited studio portrait of a model resting on a reflective table, with uneven skin tone and a patchy grey backdrop — Drag anywhere on the image, or focus the handle and use the arrow keys, to compare before and after.

Project overview

Most of the work here is deciding what not to touch. The markings on the forearm are part of the person; removing them would make a different portrait, and an automated skin pass would take them first.

Transformation details

The markings were masked off before any work began, so nothing could reach them by accident.
Uneven tone in the surrounding skin was evened with frequency separation, matched around the markings rather than across them.
Dodge and burn rebuilt the modelling along the arm and the collarbone.
The reflection in the tabletop was cleaned and the grey backdrop evened.