LIGHTROOM 4 PORTRAIT RETOUCHING SKIN

If it is too extreme for your liking, you can always use the white balance adjustment sliders to correct it. Using the eyedropper, Lightroom can often produce some extreme edits that look unnatural.įirst, check and see if using the eyedropper tool will produce a suitable white balance. I usually use the sliders to achieve a more precise adjustment. You can make adjustments to the white balance in Lightroom using the sliders or the eyedropper tool. Step 3: Adjusting the White Balance Sliders I will make adjustments to some of the sliders but not will not often move them all when editing a portrait in Lightroom.

When editing portraits in Lightroom, I typically start at the top of the Basics Panel and work my way down through the adjustment tool sliders. But first, it is more important to make global adjustments to ensure your portrait editing will look natural. You can also use it for a range of other adjustments, usually to fix shadows around the eyes and to whiten teeth. The brush tool can be used as a spot removal tool for portraits to remove blemishes. Then you can get more specific and use the adjustment brush. After cropping and straightening, the next step is to begin editing portraits using tools that will have some influence over the whole image. This is all done in the Develop Module in Lightroom. Global portrait editing affects every part of the images you are working on. Portrait editing in Lightroom can be done globally or by using the adjustment brush for making local edits to specific areas of a portrait. Making Global Adjustments When Editing Portraits in Lightroom It’s important at the beginning of your portrait editing to get the image straight. Click and drag slowly and slightly to make adjustments to the straightness of your photo. This will then convert the pointer to a curved two-headed arrow. To straighten the image, if it needs to be corrected, hover the mouse pointer near one of the corners of the image. Select the crop tool and then click and drag from any of the handles on either side of the image or at the top and bottom. You will find this under the histogram and just above the Basic Panel. The keyboard shortcut to get there is ‘D’. You can simply use the crop tool in the Develop Module. Thankfully it is easy to remedy when you are editing a portrait in Lightroom. This is the most typical mistake people make when taking portrait photos. It’s also easy to fix while you are editing portraits in Lightroom.ĭon’t leave too much empty space above your portrait subject’s head.

One of the main mistakes many photographers tend to make when taking a portrait is quite simple to avoid. Step 2: Crop and Straighten Your Portrait Photo But no matter how much editing in Lightroom you do, you will never fix an out-of-focus photo.

Edits can be made to enhance slightly soft areas of an image. Don’t kid yourself that you can fix an out-of-focus image during the editing process. If the person is not facing directly into the camera, make sure the eye that is closest to the camera is in focus.

LIGHTROOM 4 PORTRAIT RETOUCHING SKIN

The subject’s skin tones should contain detail and be well exposed.Ĭhoose a portrait to work on where the subject’s eyes are both sharp. Look at the histogram of the image to make sure there is no detail lost in the highlights or shadow areas in parts of the image that are most important. You can edit portraits in Lightroom that are made with a poor exposure setting, but you will encounter limitations. Starting with a well exposed and properly focused photo is best. Step 1: Choose a Well Exposed, in Focus Portrait to Edit They contain more information than jpeg files and are not compressed, so you will end up with a higher-quality image. For the best results when you are editing portraits in Lightroom or any other subject, it’s best to be working on RAW files.

Lightroom 4 portrait retouching