Photoshop: Virtual Makeover / Photo Retouching

Today we are going to explore doing a virtual makeover.  In a previous assignment we took a face with scratches or pimples and retouched it to make it look a little more natural.  Today we are going to go a little further by beautifying someone.  In short, we are going to take a photo of someones face and smooth wrinkles, remove blemishes, adjust colors, brighten teeth and eyes, etc.  We can even try some "virtual makeup".  


Remember that we aren't trying to make anybody into a super model, we're simply trying to bring out their natural beauty.


You can search for "no makeup" on Google Images for some examples.  Click here to see a few: [LINK] or [LINK].


Here are some celebrities [mostly] without makeup: http://www.funzug.com/index.php/celebrities/celebs-without-makeup-portraits.html


Here are some examples of Virtual Makeovers:

If you would like to follow along with a video tutorial, you can check these out:

A Sample Image

Photoshop: Breakout Image

Breakout images are used throughout advertising to demonstrate action.  If you've seen pictures of a baseball player jumping out of a picture, an animal flying out of a picture, etc., you've seen a "breakout image".  Sometimes the breakouts are out of all sides (see image on right) and sometimes they are just leaving one or two sides of an image (like the example below).

In this example I used a marble texture as a background and warped the corner of the picture to give it a bit of an upturned look.

Step By Step Instructions:

Step 1: Find a picture that will work well with a breakout.

Step 2: Select the area of the background you want to preserve, then SELECT > INVERSE and erase everything except the breakout subject of the picture.

Step 3: Add a background such as wood or marble or dirt.

Step 4: Add a new layer (behind your subject) and draw a rectangular marquee which you will fill with white to give the impression of a photo border.  Then select the subject layer (in this case, the whale) and go to LAYER > MERGE DOWN (or CTRL+E).

Step 5: Add a Layer Style (such as drop shadow or bevel).  Then do FREE TRANSFORM and PERSPECTIVE to give it a bit of perspective.  You can also do a WARP (in Free Transform) if you want to adjust a corner or the whole picture.