Written by Steve Patterson. In this Photoshop tutorial, well learn an easy way to soften and smooth someones skin in a photo without blurring out important image details, such as the persons eyes and mouth. The technique well be looking at is actually a slight variation on a method normally used for advanced image sharpening, which serves as a great example of why its much more important to understand what youre doing rather than simply memorizing a bunch of steps or "recipes". The more you understand what youre doing in Photoshop and why, the more your mind will open to new ideas and new possibilities.
Heres the image Ill be working with in this tutorial. Since this is a tutorial on skin softening and smoothing, Ive cropped away most of the image so we can focus on the young womans face:
The original image.
Its a nice photo on its own, but it would probably look even better if we softened her skin a little. Heres what shell look like when were done:
The final result showing the womans skin now smoother and softer looking.
Lets get started!
Step 1: Duplicate The Background Layer
With my image newly opened in Photoshop, I can see in my Layers palette that I currently have one layer, the Background layer, which contains my original image:
The Layers palette in Photoshop showing the original image on the Background layer.
I know I say this in every tutorial, but it cant be stressed enough how important it is to leave the original image information untouched. If we lose it and we make a mistake, we have nothing to fall back on. Thats why the first thing we should always do before doing anything else is make a copy of the Background layer. To do that, either go up to the Layer menu at the top of the screen, choose New, and then choose Layer via Copy, or simply use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+J (Win) / Command+J (Mac). Either way tells Photoshop to make a copy of the Background layer, and if I look again in my Layers palette, I can see that I now have the copy, which Photoshop has automatically named Layer 1, above the original Background layer:
The Layers palette in Photoshop now showing a copy of the Background layer, named Layer 1, above the original.
Step 2: Change The Blend Mode Of "Layer 1" to "Overlay"
With "Layer 1" selected in the Layers palette (the currently selected layer is highlighted in blue), go up to the layer blend mode option in the top left corner of the Layers palette. Its the drop-down box thats currently set to Normal. Click on the small down-pointing arrow to the right of the word Normal, which brings up a list of all the different layer blend modes we have to choose from, and select Overlay from the list:
Change the blend mode of Layer 1 from Normal to Overlay.
As soon as you change the blend mode to Overlay, youll see a big increase in contrast and color saturation in your image:
The image now appears with increased contrast and color saturation after changing the blend mode of Layer 1 to Overlay.
This increased contrast and color saturation can make for an interesting effect on its own, depending on the image youre using, but its not the effect were going for here. The only reason weve changed the blend mode to Overlay is so we can see what were doing in the next step.
Step 3: Apply The "High Pass" Filter To "Layer 1"
To smooth and soften the womans skin, were going to use Photoshops High Pass filter. If youre familiar with the High Pass filter, its most likely because youve used it before as an advanced way of sharpening images. I say advanced not because its somehow difficult or complicated to use but because it usually gives you better sharpening results than youd get by using Photoshops classic Unsharp Mask filter. Check out our Sharpen Images With The High Pass Filter tutorial for more information.
One of the reasons why learning Photoshop can seem nearly impossible sometimes is because we tend to get stuck on the names of things rather than focusing on what they do. For example, if you had never used the High Pass filter before and someone asked you what it does, what would you tell them? "Well, its a filter that passes high over the image." That may sound technically impressive (sort of, I think), but what does it mean? I sure wouldnt know.
So rather than worry about the name Adobe has given to something, lets look at what it does, which is all that really matters. Before we do that though, lets bring the filter up on the screen. To access the High Pass filter, make sure you still have "Layer 1" selected, then go up to the Filter menu at the top of the screen, choose Other down near the bottom of the list, and then select High Pass:
Go to Filter > Other > High Pass.
This brings up the High Pass filters dialog box, which is made up of a large preview area and a single option, Radius, down at the bottom. The High Pass filter looks for details in an image, such as the edges around people, objects, and so on. The reason why its so effective at image sharpening is because it allows us to sharpen only the edges in an image while leaving everything else untouched. If my goal was to sharpen the image Im using in this tutorial, the High Pass filter would do a great job of sharpening the womans eyes, mouth, hair, etc., without sharpening her skin. What I want, though, is sort of the opposite of what I just described. I want to use the filter to find the edges not so I can sharpen them, but so I can smooth and soften everything except the edges.
To do that, begin dragging the slider at the bottom of the dialog box to the right until you have your Radius value set to somewhere around 6 pixels. If youre using a high resolution image, try a higher setting somewhere around 9-10 pixels. As you drag the slider towards the right, if you keep an eye on the preview area in the dialog box, youll see more and more areas of the image become affected by the filter, starting with only the finest details and then gradually expanding to include more and more of the photo. If we were sharpening the image, we would want to stick to a very low Radius value to target only the edges themselves, but for our softening effect, we need to go a bit higher:
Increase the Radius value of the High Pass filter to around 6 pixels, or try 9-10 pixels for a high resolution image.
Click OK when youre done to exit out of the dialog box. If I look at my image now in the document window, it looks like Ive gone way too far with my image sharpening:
The image now appears overly sharpened in the document window.
You may be wondering why the image in the preview window of the High Pass filters dialog box looked gray while the image in the document window didnt (and still doesnt). The reason is because in Step 2, we changed the blend mode of Layer 1 to Overlay, and in Overlay mode, any part of the layer that is 50% gray (meaning the shade of gray you get half-way between pure black and pure white) is hidden from view. Areas that are either lighter or darker than 50% gray are blended in with the layer(s) below the layer were working on, affecting the contrast and color saturation of the image. That may sound complicated, but dont worry if you dont fully understand how the Overlay blend mode works. We have an entire tutorial coming up on blend modes in Photoshop, so for now, all we need to know is that we changed the blend mode to Overlay in Step 2 so that we could see what we were doing with the High Pass filter in Step 3.
Our image isnt looking all that great after applying the High Pass filter, but were going to fix that in the next couple of steps.
Step 4: Invert Layer 1
So far, weve used the High Pass filter to sharpen all the edge details in the image, but what we really want to do is smooth and soften everything that is not an edge detail, like the womans skin. In other words, we want the opposite of what we currently have. We want to soften all the non-detail areas while leaving the edges alone. To do that, all we need to do is invert the layer!
With Layer 1 still selected, go up to the Image menu at the top of the screen, choose Adjustments, and then choose Invert, or for a faster way, use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+I (Win) / Command+I (Mac):
Go to Image > Adjustments > Invert, or press Ctrl+I (Win) / Command+I (Mac) to invert the layer.
Once youve inverted "Layer 1", take a look at your image in the document window. A moment ago, the image was suffering from an extreme amount of sharpening, but now everything appears soft and blurred-out. That is, everything except the important details in the image. The womans eyes and mouth are slightly blurred out, but nowhere near the extent of her skin:
All the non-detail areas in the image now appear blurry while the important details have barely been affected.
Step 5: Lower The Opacity Of "Layer 1" To Fine-Tune The Amount Of Skin Softening
Weve definitely succeeded in smoothing and softening her skin, but we need to take the effect down a few notches to keep things looking realistic. For that, all we need to do is lower the opacity of "Layer 1". Go up to the Opacity option in the top right corner of the Layers palette (directly across from the blend mode option). Youll see the word Opacity and that its currently set to a full 100%. Click on the right-pointing arrow, which brings up a small slider bar, and simply lower the opacity of Layer 1 until the smoothing looks more natural. Theres no set amount to lower it to since it will depend on your image, so just keep an eye on your image in the document window as you drag the slider. Im going to lower my opacity down to about 60%. Again, your value may be different:
Lower the opacity of Layer 1 until the smoothing and softening appears more natural.
With my opacity lowered, the softening now looks much better:
The skin softening now looks more natural after lowering the opacity of Layer 1.
Notice how the minor amount of softening over her eyes and mouth has become almost completely unnoticeable at this point, while her skin is nice and smooth. If "almost completely unnoticeable" isnt quite good enough for you and you want to make absolutely certain there is no softening at all over those areas, continue on to the next step.
Also, throughout this tutorial Ive been referring to this technique as a way to smooth and soften skin. At the moment, were actually softening the entire photo. We havent done anything yet to limit the softening to only the persons skin. You may very well like the effect of having the entire photo softened, and if thats the case, theres no need to remove the effect from the rest of the image. If you do want to limit the softening to just the skin, continue on.
Step 6: Add A Layer Mask To "Layer 1"
To completely remove any softening from the important details in the womans face, Ill need to use a layer mask. To add a layer mask, again make sure "Layer 1" is selected and then click on the Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette:
Click on the Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette.
Nothing happens to the image in the document window, but we can see in the Layers palette that we now have a layer mask thumbnail added to Layer 1:
The Layers palette in Photoshop showing the layer mask thumbnail.
Step 7: Select The Brush Tool
Were going to paint on the layer mask, and for that, we need the Brush Tool, so either grab it from the Tools palette or press the letter B on your keyboard to select it with the keyboard shortcut:
Selecting Photoshops Brush Tool from the Tools palette.
Step 8: Set Your Foreground Color To Black
Since we need to paint with black, well need to set our Foreground color to black, since the Brush Tool paints with whichever color we have our Foreground color currently set to. By default, whenever we have a layer mask selected (which we currently do), Photoshop sets the Foreground color to white, while setting the Background color to black. We can easily swap them by pressing the letter X on the keyboard. As we can see in the Foreground and Background color swatches near the bottom of the Tools palette, we now have black as our Foreground color (the top left square) and white has become our Background color (bottom right square):
The Foreground and Background color swatches in the Tools palette.
Step 9: Paint Over The Details In The Face To Hide The Softening Effect
With our Brush Tool selected and black as our Foreground color, we can now paint away the softening effect over any areas where we dont want it. Painting with black on the layer mask doesnt actually "remove" the effect, it simply hides it from view. If we change our minds later and want to bring the effect back in areas where weve hidden it, all wed need to do is paint with white over those areas to reveal the effect once again.
If you need more information about layer masks, be sure to check out our Understanding Layer Masks tutorial in the Photoshop Basics section of the website.
Using a small, soft-edged brush, Ill paint over the womans eyes and mouth to completely hide the softening effect from those areas. You can change the size of your brush at any time by pressing the left bracket key on your keyboard to make the brush smaller or the right bracket key to make it larger. Also, you can control how soft or hard the edge of the brush is with your keyboard. Hold down your Shift key and press the left bracket key to make the brush edges softer, and hold down Shift and press the right bracket key to make the edges harder. Here, Im painting over the womans eyes with my brush:
Paint with black over the face details to completely remove the softening effect from those areas if needed.
Ill continue painting away any softening effect over her mouth, especially her teeth since we dont want them to appear soft, and maybe over the bottom of her nose and her eyebrows as well. If we look at the layer mask thumbnail, we can see all the areas where Ive painted with black:
The layer mask thumbnail showing the areas that have been painted with black on the layer mask.
And heres what my image now looks like. The areas Ive painted over are now completely free of any softening, even though it was very subtle to begin with:
The womans eyes, mouth, bottom of her nose and eyebrows now no longer have any softening applied to them.
Step 10: Paint Away The Effect From The Rest Of The Image
As I mentioned a moment ago, you dont have to limit the softening effect to only the skin if you like how the effect looks when applied to the entire photo. But if you do want to limit the softening and smoothing to just the persons skin, simply use your Brush Tool and with black still as your Foreground color, paint over everything in the photo except for the persons skin.
In my case, my photo is cropped tightly around the womans face so there isnt much else in the photo for me to paint over, but Ill go ahead anyway and paint with black around the rest of the photo. We can see by looking again at the layer mask thumbnail in the Layers palette that Ive now painted with black all around her face, removing the softening effect from everywhere except her skin:
The layer mask thumbnail once again, this time showing black around everything except the womans face, limiting the softening effect to only her skin.
And here, with the softening and smoothing effect now being applied only to the womans skin, is my final result:
The final result.
And there we have it! Thats how to easily smooth and soften skin with Photoshop! Check out our Photo Retouching section for more great image retouching and editing tutorials, or see below for tutorials you may be interested in!
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