ASHLEE GRAY EXPLAINS HER WORKFLOW ON THIS
IMAGE SHOT BY FRANKLIN THOMPSON“Some of the most common fixes are
eyelashes not being stuck on
properly, hair coming across the
eyes, and uneven lipstick,” says
beauty retoucher Charn S. Bedi
(www.thebeautyretoucher.com).
“When retouching macro lip shots,
spit on the gums can be annoying as
the light reflects off it, causing a
shine. I have a library of eyelashes
taken and neatened up from previous
work to aid me if I ever have to
re-create them. The trickiest thing to
retouch in beauty is hair as it is so
fine. I zoom in very close for hair
retouching to remove strands of hair
that go against the natural flow of the
hair style. This helps to refine the hair
to make it look neater. This then
enables me to fill in dark areas to
make it look more full bodied and
healthy. I use various amounts of
layers and clone brushes with
different blend modes to get to the
final result, finishing off with a dodge
and burn to create contouring and a
nice shine.”- A MODEL JOB
06. LIPSTICK AND SPIT
01
A MODEL JOB
Once I open an image, I start by creating a
blank layer and begin drawing notes all over the
image with a bright-coloured brush. This helps me
visualise what I want to accomplish before I start
working on the specific areas.02
LUSTROUS LOCKS
From there, I’d like to say I always start at
the same place, but usually it’s with the things I find
the most distracting. It’s often hard to look past big
blemishes, hairs going through the eyes, or even
areas that need colour correction. In this case, the
skin has been cleaned, all flyaways and cross hairs
have been removed, and additional hair has been
added to the right side.03
BURNING BONE STRUCTURE
This is now complete with dodging and
burning to bring out bone structure and shine to the
hair, with colour and toning added. Finally, a High
Pass with a layer mask was used to sharpen the hair
in some areas, and a small amount of grain added.© Photographer: Max Oppenheim. Make up: Nikki Wolff© Stefan Bourson© Sergey Moshkov© Photographer: Max Oppenheim. Make up: Nikki WolffEvery blocked pore
For Daniel Meadows, much of the retoucher’s job is bridging the gap between what
the naked eye sees, and what the increasingly sophisticated camera does. “With
modern lenses we can achieve very sharp images,” he says, “and unfortunately with
that comes a detailed record of every hair and blocked pore, every irregular eyelash.
The eye doesn’t tend to pick up on these tiny details in real life, but with close, sharp
beauty shots we tend to even these out before print for the benefit of the shot.”- ACHIEVING SYMMETRY
Even eyes
“Another one of those things the naked eye doesn’t tend to pick up on but the lens
notices is the symmetry of the eyes. My own left eye is slightly higher than my right.
No-one would ever pick up on it but you can tell if I point it out on my driver’s
license! At the other end of my workflow, I usually leave sharpening and colour
treatments until the last steps. It’s important not to oversharpen your working file at
the start or you’re giving yourself a lot more work.”Dipping a fashion toe
“Quite often I’ll receive a sidecar XMP file with RAWs if the photographer knows the
look they’re going for, but some of the most fun projects are those where I’m
encouraged to experiment with colour treatments. I’ve frequently got my head in a
fashion magazine, so there are always a few styles I’m looking to try something
new with for the right shot.”Glowing skin
“With beauty work, skin is probably the most time-consuming part of the process,
as texture must be retained. In advertising and editorial at the high end, each part of
the skin is carefully dodged and burned to even out texture and maintain realism. I
usually start with compositional adjustments. Sometimes a hand, for example, will
be better positioned in an outtake from the set, so occasionally there’s some
compositing required.”
© Tim JohnsonPHOTO EDITING