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Photoshop plugins for portraits

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
For what purpose, Rachel? To get the color right or get rid of pimples and smooth the skin? Are you trying to reshape the face, perhaps?

Asher
 

Rachel Foster

New member
Just moderate airbrushing, Asher. Smoothing the complexion, whitening the teeth, that sort of thing. I can do some blemish stuff with the healing brush but getting that creamy skin-thing is likely to be time consuming even after I learn how to do it right. Blur with history brush works for very minimal smoothing, but I'd like something that gives better results than I'm getting and does it faster.

Reshaping faces is not something I'm inclined toward.
 

Kathy Rappaport

pro member
Portrait Professional

I am buying Portrait Professional next - I have seen the results many times.

Currently I am using Nik Filters Dynamic Skin - which I like and I also use Corel Paint Shop Pro which has very similar menus to PS but has a special healing brush and skin processing. I also use lightroom and it's negative clairity
 
I have a plug-in called Portraiture that I sometimes use. Just as with Photoshop, I only use a very small portion of its capabilities but it works pretty good at what you are talking about.
 

Rachel Foster

New member
I have Portrait Professional, actually. I was wondering if that was the best for my uses. PP can easily "over-process' unless you remember to set the levels on low. Also, it can be tough to get it right for 3/4 profiles.
 
I like the Digital GEM Airbrush plugin from Applied Science Fiction (now Kodak):
http://asf.com/products/plugins/airpro/pluginAIRPRO/
I'm biased because I helped write the code for it (I had nothing to do with the name of it though!), but it does a very nice job of automatically smoothing out the skin without losing all the character of a face. Even though it doesn't remove wrinkles, pimples etc. it does give you a nice starting point for cloning out or de-emphasizing blemishes. It has the added benefit of being able to iron shirts (it doesn't just work on skin tones).

The same folks that developed the technology for that plug-in also have two more - "Pearly Whites" and "Shine off" at their new company's site:
http://www.imagetrendsinc.com/index.asp

I haven't tried those, but if you like what you see in the free trial I do have a discount code for 50% off that's good until the end of May.
 

Rachel Foster

New member
I'll check into that, thanks.

I just upgraded portrait pro and it seems a lot easier to use, but still leans toward over-processing.
 

David Thomasson

New member
I've been using Imagenomics Portraiture for a year or so and am very happy with it. Quite a sophisticated tool -- creates masks that separate skin tones from everything else. You can download it for a free trial. Highly recommended.
 

Dylan White

New member
Please...... Don't use filters. Doing it by hand can really change your photos into YOUR own style. Filters just make you another brick in the wall.
 

Bernhard Rees

New member
I like the Digital GEM Airbrush plugin from Applied Science Fiction (now Kodak) ...
Not from the software developer's view but primarily from the user's view sitting in front of his computer working on his portrait picture I fully agree! This plug-in does an amazing job as Colleen explained already in detail. It can be operated with full control on the effects applied and last but not least you can save a lot of time in your postprocessing.

Have a try and decide whether the offerings are good enough to spent money on this plug-in.

Bernhard
 
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