STEP BY STEP RAW PORTRAIT IMAGE TIPS

Learn essential Raw edits for your portraits, then finish off with a stylish colour treatment

01 BOOST THE TONES

Open your Raw portrait in Affinity Photo. The Develop Persona opens automatically (you can also edit jpegs by clicking the hexagonal persona icon, top-left). Start in the Basic panel on the right. Tweak exposure, boost contrast and fine-tune the black point as shown.

02 FIX THE COLOURS

Grab the White Balance tool and click over a neutral point – like the wall – to fix the colour cast. Next boost Vibrance. This strengthens less-saturated colours and excludes those that are already strong. Try reducing Saturation, too, to give the image a more muted feel.

03 MAKE AN S-CURVE

Go to the Curves panel in the Tones tab. Drag one point upwards near the top of the diagonal curve line – this sets highlights. Drag a second point downwards near the bottom – this deepens the shadows. A third point in the centre lets you control the midtones.

04 ENHANCE DETAILS

The Details panel enables you to sharpen the image. Zoom in close to the face then try increasing Radius and Amount in tandem to apply sharpening. A fairly high radius is usually better for portraits, as they tend to have less high-frequency fine details.

05 BOOST EYES

Use Brush Overlay to paint areas to isolate them, then use tonal sliders to boost them. Click the brush icon to make an new overlay. Paint the irises, then increase Saturation, Contrast and Exposure. Click the brush again, paint the eye whites and increase Exposure.

06 ADD A RETRO TONE

Open the Split Toning panel and use the sliders to add yellow to the highlights and blue to the shadows. Go to the Curves panel. Drag the top-right corner down slightly to fade the highlights, and drag the bottom-left point up to open the shadows for a matte finish.