The Invisible Touch wrote:
Don't blur please, the best approach for this is to clone/heal on darken mode and then D&B to even everything out.

Don't tell someone not to blur without being specific. Blur, after all, is just a tool. It's how you use it that makes it a blessing or a curse. Yes, blur by ITSELF is not the answer. The blurring on a separate layer that "I" mentioned is just to unify the tone/shading of the area, and then "blend if" to target the hairs via the light side or dark side. Now this still needs clean up after the fact, however it gets the OP halfway there in terms of time/value.

And make sure to reference the photo the OP has so graciously supplied in the first post. In this case one wouldn't clone/heal on darken mode, but on lighten mode. Darken would be if the hairs were lighter than the skin which they are not in this case.

My approach when dealing with arm/facial hair of the female variety is to do what I mentioned, and then clone/heal on the corresponding mode of the "skin-to-hair" contrast. And then, if needed, some texture grafting. But that's beyond the scope of this post as I'd have to make a tutorial.

Chroma Hue wrote:
Don't tell someone not to blur without being specific. Blur, after all, is just a tool. It's how you use it that makes it a blessing or a curse. Yes, blur by ITSELF is not the answer. The blurring on a separate layer that "I" mentioned is just to unify the tone/shading of the area, and then "blend if" to target the hairs via the light side or dark side. Now this still needs clean up after the fact, however it gets the OP halfway there in terms of time/value.

And make sure to reference the photo the OP has so graciously supplied in the first post. In this case one wouldn't clone/heal on darken mode, but on lighten mode. Darken would be if the hairs were lighter than the skin which they are not in this case.

My approach when dealing with arm/facial hair of the female variety is to do what I mentioned, and then clone/heal on the corresponding mode of the "skin-to-hair" contrast. And then, if needed, some texture grafting. But that's beyond the scope of this post as I'd have to make a tutorial.

You are right, my mistake... I meant Lighten instead of darkening... why not blurrying?? Because you get rid of transitions and texture on skin regardless if you use blend if option. I wasn't attacking or criticising you personally so don't get so defensive.. :-)

I would love you to work on the OP image and show me your results please... with your blur and your noise.

Chroma Hue wrote:
Make a duplicate of the areas you want to affect

This just makes the file bigger when there is no need

Chroma Hue wrote:
Blur the layer until you can't make out the heirs individually

This is destroying texture and transitions when your job as a retoucher is not to damage rather preserve.

Chroma Hue wrote:
Create a 50% grey layer set to soft light and add noise to it (1-2%)

This would be a way to recreate texture again? Bad way tho, when you can actually use the existing texture instead of blurring it.

As I said, would be very interested on seeing you work on this image with this technique or even seen this video that you are on about. :-)

The Invisible Touch wrote:
As I said, would be very interested on seeing you work on this image with this technique or even seen this video that you are on about. :-)

I'm actually trying to get permission from a photog so I can make the video. It won't be for profit though.

Chroma Hue wrote:
But for an arm that's probably going to account for less than 10% of the image, I don't see an issue.

Well, let me tell you that in the real retouching world (professional) photographers/clients/agencies look for every single detail. To you might be a tiny thing and might not be an issue but to professionals, trust it is huge as you have lost focus on the arm and when printing for instance, this won't look as good as the rest. Can you not see that the skin doesn't have the same definition anymore? The shadows where there was no hair on the before, now look really soft and blur.

Regarding the size of the document, you are not correct, you have created Frequency separation which is two new stamp layers plus the duplicates you have done also increase big time your file... otherwise check the before image size, saved as PS and then your file with all the layers in it save as PS.. you will see the difference.. if you keep doing stamps in your workflow you will eventually end up with a huge file, when there is really no need. Also if you merge layers once you are done, is not Non destructive any more.. you should work in a way that everything is available for changes any time.. that's non destructive.

The Invisible Touch wrote:
Regarding the size of the document, you are not correct, you have created Frequency separation which is two new stamp layers plus the duplicates you have done also increase big time your file... otherwise check the before image size, saved as PS and then your file with all the layers in it save as PS.. you will see the difference.. if you keep doing stamps in your workflow you will eventually end up with a huge file, when there is really no need. Also if you merge layers once you are done, is not Non destructive any more.. you should work in a way that everything is available for changes any time.. that's non destructive.

While I don't want to take over the OP's posting, I can tell you that I do it all the time and it doesn't increase my file size big time. I'm also not stamping all throughout my document. My workflow is about 90% non-destructive with that last 10% being things like liquify and cloning/healing (which also add to file size).

I spent < 5min, you spent more time.

I can see where you cloned/healed on lighten as those areas are darker and softer. And to be honest most ads that I see (Vogue, W, etc) look like they obliterate all texture form the arms and legs and compensate with noise. I'm not saying that's what you nor, and I'm not saying it's right...but an observation I've seen throughout the years.

OVERALL I'm not saying you or your technique is wrong. I'm saying there there are many ways to skin a cat.

But again...let us not take over the OP's post. Please PM me if you want to talk more.

paulkris wrote:
There are photographers out there who don't afford to pay more than $3 or $5 to pay per photo, so probably Croma's  method would be suitable for some low cost jobs.

Mind you that that's not my 100% method as it was 5min and not an actual job. But I made another post where I actually spent time and made a slight correction to my method.

Chroma Hue wrote:
Oh and seems I forgot a step with my example. I was supposed to set that whole group to "Lighten" mode so it only targeted the hairs and not the shadows or natural transitions.

So in this example I took exactly what I'd already done, set the group to "Lighten", Merged the group which only targets the arm, and then D&B the transition changes. You've now forced me to spend more then 5min for a simple demo with an additional 20min of D&B, however:



Skin texture preserved. Skin transitions smoothed. Detail everywhere.

I would like to see a video also. In your first post of the example i thought it looked blurred also but after your adjustsments to the group it came out nice

Chroma Hue wrote:
Oh and seems I forgot a step with my example. I was supposed to set that whole group to "Lighten" mode so it only targeted the hairs and not the shadows or natural transitions.

So in this example I took exactly what I'd already done, set the group to "Lighten", Merged the group which only targets the arm, and then D&B the transition changes. You've now forced me to spend more then 5min for a simple demo with an additional 20min of D&B, however:





Skin texture preserved. Skin transitions smoothed. Detail everywhere.

This looks great...

Abdel Kebdani wrote:
I understand the point of The invisible Touch, and I agree with it! I also like traditional retouching ways, when I'm paid well.
But the question of Oana were more about time/prices, and not about the correct way. for clients who pay me $20 for an image, I'm not gonna spend two hours dealing with an arm !
I can see that Chroma did great job in 5min ! I'm also interested in seeing his video !

With that approach you won't go too far in this industry trust me.. is not about Time vs money is about quality

The Invisible Touch wrote:
With that approach you won't go too far in this industry trust me.. is not about Time vs money is about quality

I can't agree more Invisible, and I'm aware of this, quality is the top of everything!
But while you're working with clients that doesn't care about it, nor will have a sensitivity about the quality you provided, I would prefer not to provide them quality work and spend lots of time in their ( bad ) images. I've learnt to keep quality for quality clients and normal work ( which is not very good ) for normal clients. at the end everything has a price. But for a portfolio, quality work is a must ! I hope you got my idea.

The Invisible Touch wrote:
With that approach you won't go too far in this industry trust me.. is not about Time vs money is about quality

I understand your point of view, but if the client won't wanna pay too much for your work, what are the benefits if you work few hours on the image at low price? So there is not about quality, but about price.

T Oana wrote:
I understand your point of view, but if the client don't wanna pay too much for your work, what are the benefits if you work few hours on the image at low price? So there is not about quality, but about price.

It is really simple, if the client doesn't want to pay too much for your work is due to two option..

1. your work isn't good enough
2. your client isn't good enough

To all of those who are aspiring to become professional freelancers/retouchers. Always give your best on everything you do as this represents you and your professionalism, if you go about with the attitude "they don't pay enough therefore I won't give them a great result" you will never make it. What you forget is that at the beginning you have to work your arse off for little money, but I can guarantee that if you provide professional results and meet deadlines your work will spread and eventually you will get bigger clients.

David Kilper wrote:
Regardless of any mistakes you made in your quote to them, you should never sacrifice quality.  That's just disrespectful and irresponsible.

Exactly!!