step By step No more personality flaws

it’s easy to apply polish to a portrait using just a couple of tools to transform it in a few minutes

01 Lift skin tones

Import retouch_before.dng into Lightroom’s Library. Head to the Develop module. In the Basic panel set Exposure +0.15, Contrast +24, Blacks -17, Vibrance +15. Go down to the HSL panel. Click Luminance and set Red +22, Orange +20, Yellow +50 to lift the skin.

02 enhance the eyes

Grab the Zoom tool from the toolbar and crop slightly tighter into the face. Select the Adjustment Brush, and in the Brush settings, on the right, choose Effect: Iris Enhance. Zoom in to the eyes and paint over both irises. Hit O to toggle a view of the mask overlay.

03 soften the skin

Click New in the Adjustment Brush settings, set Effect: Sharpen, and paint over the lashes. Click New again, choose Soften Skin, then paint over the lighter areas of skin on the face and arms. Click New again, painting the lips with Contrast +25, Saturation +15.

04 Remove marks

Grab the Spot Removal tool from the Toolbar. Set Spot Edit: Heal, Feather 20 (If you don’t have the Feather slider, go to Help>check for Updates). Paint over the scar on the forearm then, if necessary, drag the source area to a clean part of the arm.

05 soften the bags

Continue painting with the Spot Removal tool to remove marks. Set the tool to Spot Edit: Clone, Opacity 30%, Feather 100 and paint over the dark area under each eye. Drag the source point to a clean area of skin, and repeat, if needed, to soften the area.

06 clone out marks

Bring the Opacity up to 100% then zoom in close to the distracting black line on the left of the frame. Paint precisely to clone it out, using the light background as a source. Finally, go to the Tone Curve panel and edit the Point Curve by plotting a shallow S-shaped line.