In this Photoshop tutorial, we'll learn an easy way to soften and smooth someone's skin in a photo without blurring out important image details, such as the person's eyes and mouth.
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The technique we'll 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 it's much more important to understand what you're doing rather than simply memorizing a bunch of steps or 'recipes'. The more you understand what you're doing in Photoshop and why, the more your mind will open to new ideas and new possibilities.
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This version of the tutorial is for Photoshop CS5 or earlier. Using Photoshop CS6 or CC? You'll want to check out our fully updated version.
Here's the image I'll be working with in this tutorial. Since this is a tutorial on skin softening and smoothing, I've cropped away most of the image so we can focus on the young woman's face:
The original image.
It's a nice photo on its own, but it would probably look even better if we softened her skin a little. Here's what she'll look like when we're done:
The final result showing the woman's skin now smoother and softer looking.
This tutorial is part of our Portrait Retouching collection. Let's 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 can't 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. That's 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. It's the drop-down box that's 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, you'll 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 you're using, but it's not the effect we're going for here. The only reason we've changed the blend mode to Overlay is so we can see what we're doing in the next step.
Step 3: Apply The 'High Pass' Filter To 'Layer 1'
To smooth and soften the woman's skin, we're going to use Photoshop's High Pass filter. If you're familiar with the High Pass filter, it's most likely because you've used it before as an advanced way of sharpening images. I say 'advanced' not because it's somehow difficult or complicated to use but because it usually gives you better sharpening results than you'd get by using Photoshop's 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, it's a filter that passes high over the image.' That may sound technically impressive (sort of, I think), but what does it mean? I sure wouldn't know.
So rather than worry about the name Adobe has given to something, let's look at what it does, which is all that really matters. Before we do that though, let's 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:
This brings up the High Pass filter's 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 it's 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 I'm using in this tutorial, the High Pass filter would do a great job of sharpening the woman's 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 you're 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, you'll 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 you're done to exit out of the dialog box. If I look at my image now in the document window, it looks like I've 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 filter's dialog box looked gray while the image in the document window didn't (and still doesn't). 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 we're working on, affecting the contrast and color saturation of the image. That may sound complicated, but don't worry if you don't 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 isn't looking all that great after applying the High Pass filter, but we're going to fix that in the next couple of steps.
Step 4: Invert 'Layer 1'
So far, we've 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 woman's 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 you've 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 woman's 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
We've 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). You'll see the word 'Opacity' and that it's 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. There's 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. I'm 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' isn't 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 I've been referring to this technique as a way to smooth and soften skin. At the moment, we're actually softening the entire photo. We haven't done anything yet to limit the softening to only the person's skin. You may very well like the effect of having the entire photo softened, and if that's the case, there's 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 woman's face, I'll 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
We're 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 Photoshop's Brush Tool from the Tools palette.
Step 8: Set Your Foreground Color To Black
Since we need to paint with black, we'll 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 don't want it. Painting with black on the layer mask doesn't 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 we've hidden it, all we'd 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, I'll paint over the woman's 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, I'm painting over the woman's eyes with my brush:
Paint with black over the face details to completely remove the softening effect from those areas if needed.
I'll continue painting away any softening effect over her mouth, especially her teeth since we don't 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 I've painted with black:
The layer mask thumbnail showing the areas that have been painted with black on the layer mask.
And here's what my image now looks like. The areas I've painted over are now completely free of any softening, even though it was very subtle to begin with:
The woman's 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 don't 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 person's skin, simply use your Brush Tool and with black still as your Foreground color, paint over everything in the photo except for the person's skin.
In my case, my photo is cropped tightly around the woman's face so there isn't much else in the photo for me to paint over, but I'll 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 I've 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 woman's face, limiting the softening effect to only her skin.
And here, with the softening and smoothing effect now being applied only to the woman's skin, is my final result:
And there we have it! That's how to easily smooth and soften skin with Photoshop! Check out our Photo Retouching section for more Photoshop image editing tutorials!
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In this tutorial, I'll show you how to improve your portraits by giving your subject beautifully smooth skin with Photoshop! We'll start by learning how to remove pimples and other minor skin blemishes using Photoshop's Spot Healing Brush. Then, after the initial clean-up, we'll learn step-by-step how to smooth and soften skin without blurring important details, like the person's eyes, hair and so on, and while keeping as much good skin texture as possible.
To follow along, you can use any portrait photo. I'll use this image that I downloaded from Adobe Stock:
The original image. Photo credit: Adobe Stock.
Here's a close-up of what the young woman's skin looks like initially:
And here's what she'll look like after smoothing and softening her skin:
The final skin-softened result.
Let's get started!
How To Smooth Skin In Photoshop
I'm using Photoshop CC but this tutorial is fully compatible with Photoshop CS6 and earlier.
Step 1: Make A Copy Of The Image
With the image newly-opened in Photoshop, the Layers panel shows the photo on the Background layer. Before smoothing the skin, start by removing any unwanted blemishes. To protect the original image, you'll want to work on a separate layer. Make a copy of the Background layer by pressing and holding the Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key on your keyboard, clicking on the Background layer, and dragging it down onto the New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel:
In the Duplicate Layer dialog box, name the layer 'Spot Healing' and then click OK:
Naming the layer 'Spot Healing'.
A copy of the image appears on a new layer named 'Spot Healing' above the original:
The initial skin cleanup will now be done on a separate layer.
Step 2: Select The Spot Healing Brush
Select the Spot Healing Brush from the Toolbar:
Step 3: Set The Spot Healing Brush To 'Content-Aware'
Make sure the Type option in the Options Bar is set to Content-Aware:
Content-Aware should be selected by default.
Step 4: Click On The Skin Blemishes To Remove Them
Click on any unwanted skin blemishes with the Spot Healing Brush to remove them. Photoshop will instantly 'heal' the blemishes by replacing the problem texture with good skin texture from the surrounding area. For best results, make your brush slightly larger than the blemish. To change your brush size, press the right bracket key ( ] ) on your keyboard to make the brush larger or the left bracket key ( [ ) to make it smaller. If the blemish hasn't completely gone away on the first try, undo your click by pressing Ctrl+Z (Win) / Command+Z (Mac) on your keyboard, then resize your brush if needed and click on the same blemish to try again.
Example: Removing Skin Blemishes With The Spot Healing Brush
If we look at the woman's forehead in my image, we see what looks like a large pimple just to the right of center. I'll position the Spot Healing Brush over it, and I'll make my brush slightly larger than the pimple itself:
Positioning the Spot Healing Brush over a skin blemish.
To remove the blemish, I'll click on it with the Spot Healing Brush. Photoshop analyzes the area I clicked on, finds good skin texture from the area surrounding it, and then blends the good texture in with the problem area's original tone and color. Like magic, the blemish is gone:
I'll do the same thing with another blemish on her forehead, keeping the Spot Healing Brush just a bit larger than the area I need to heal:
Positioning the Spot Healing Brush over a second blemish.
I'll click on the blemish, and once again, Photoshop instantly removes it:
After a few more clicks with the Spot Healing Brush to clean up the remaining blemishes on her forehead, her skin is already looking much smoother:
The blemishes have been removed from her forehead.
Removing Blemishes, Not Features
As you're retouching the skin, keep in mind that while it's okay to remove temporary problems like acne or other minor skin issues, it's usually not okay to remove permanent features like moles or even certain scars, as these are part of what makes someone who they are. After all, the goal of image retouching is to help people look their best, not to make them look like someone else.
Completing The Initial Skin Cleanup
Continue working your way around the person's face to remove any remaining blemishes. Here's a side-by-side comparison of what the woman's skin looked like originally (left) and after some quick retouching with the Spot Healing Brush (right). With most photos, this initial skin cleanup should take no more than a few minutes. I covered the Spot Healing Brush quickly here, but you can learn more about it in my Removing Acne, Skin Blemishes With The Spot Healing Brush tutorial:
A before (left) and after (right) comparison of the initial skin retouching.
Step 5: Make A Copy Of The 'Spot Healing' Layer
With the blemishes removed, we're ready to smooth and soften the skin, and again, it's best to work on a separate layer. Back in the Layers panel, make a copy of the 'Spot Healing' layer by pressing and holding the Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key on your keyboard, clicking on the 'Spot Healing' layer, and dragging it down onto the New Layer icon:
In the Duplicate Layer dialog box, name the layer 'Smooth Skin' and then click OK:
Naming the duplicate layer 'Smooth Skin'.
We now have the original image on the Background layer, the initial skin cleanup on the 'Spot Healing' layer, and a new 'Smooth Skin' layer above them:
The 'Smooth Skin' layer appears above the 'Spot Healing' layer.
Step 6: Apply The High Pass Filter
To smooth the skin, we'll use Photoshop's High Pass filter. Go up to the Filter menu in the Menu Bar, choose Other, and then choose High Pass:
Why The High Pass Filter Is Great For Smoothing Skin
If you're familiar with the High Pass filter, it's most likely because you've used it to sharpen images in Photoshop. Even though we'll be using High Pass to smooth skin, not sharpen it, many of the steps are the same. The High Pass filter looks for edges in the image and highlights them. An edge is an area where there's a big, sudden change in brightness or color between neighboring pixels. With portrait photos, the edges are usually along the person's hair, around the eyes, the mouth, and so on. Skin texture, on the other hand, has relatively low amounts of detail with much smoother transitions. These areas are not considered an edge, so rather than highlighting them, the High Pass filter fills these areas with neutral gray.
If we were sharpening the image, the High Pass filter would allow us to sharpen the edges (the details) without affecting the skin. But for smoothing skin, we use High Pass for the opposite reason. We'll detect the edges not so we can sharpen them but so we can smooth and soften everything except the edges. Let's see how it works.
The Radius Value
The High Pass filter detects edges and highlights them, and the Radius option at the bottom of the High Pass dialog box controls the 'thickness' of the edge highlighting. In other words, once Photoshop has detected an edge, the Radius value tells it how many pixels on either side of it to include as part of the edge. Low Radius values will highlight only the finest details in the image. But to make sure we don't end up softening these important details, we need to highlight the areas around them as well, which means we need a larger Radius value. For a typical portrait shot, a radius of 24 pixels works well:
Setting the Radius value to 24 pixels.
If your subject is further back in the photo, or you're working on a lower resolution image, a smaller Radius value of 18 pixels or even 12 pixels might work better. Why these specific values? It's because it's important for the next step that you choose a Radius value that's easily divisible by 3. For example, 24 divided by 3 is 8, 18 divided by 3 is 6, and 12 divided by 3 is 4. Nice, easy numbers. Again, we'll see why in the next step.
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Click OK to close the High Pass dialog box. Your image will turn mostly gray. Solid areas of gray are the non-edge areas with little to no detail, like the skin, while large, high contrast halos highlight the edges:
Step 7: Apply The Gaussian Blur Filter
We need to blur the High Pass filter effect. It may seem counterintuitive, but the blurring will actually help to bring out more good texture in the skin. Go up to the Filter menu, choose Blur, and then choose Gaussian Blur:
Going to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur.
In the Gaussian Blur dialog box, set the Radius value to exactly one third of the value you used for the High Pass filter. In my case, I set the High Pass radius to 24 pixels, so I'll set the Gaussian Blur radius to one third of that, which is 8 pixels. Click OK to close the dialog box:
Setting the Gaussian Blur radius to one third of the High Pass radius.
With the blurring applied, the High Pass effect now looks softer and less detailed:
The result after applying the Gaussian Blur filter.
Step 8: Change The Layer Blend Mode To Linear Light
In the Layers panel, change the blend mode of the 'Smooth Skin' layer from Normal to Linear Light:
This blends the High Pass result in with the image, creating a high contrast, over-sharpened effect. It may look terrible, but don't worry. It will look even worse in a moment:
The image after changing the Smooth Skin layer's blend mode to Linear Light.
Step 9: Invert The Layer
Go up to the Image menu, choose Adjustments, and then choose Invert:
With the layer inverted, the image goes from being over-sharpened to looking like a weird, blurry mess with big ugly halos around everything:
The result after inverting the 'Smooth Skin' layer.
Step 10: Open The Blending Options
To reduce the halo effect, click the Layer Styles icon at the bottom of the Layers panel:
Choose Blending Options from the top of the list:
Opening the Blending Options.
Step 11: Drag The 'Blend If' Sliders
In the Layer Style dialog box, look for the Blend If sliders at the bottom. There are two sets of sliders, one labeled 'This Layer' and one below it labeled 'Underlying Layer'. We need the top sliders (the ones labeled 'This Layer'):
Notice the slider below each end of the gradient bar. These sliders control how the 'Smooth Skin' layer blends with the image below it based on the brightness levels of the layer. The slider on the left is used to blend the darker areas of the layer and the slider on the right blends the lighter areas:
The dark (left) and light (right) sliders.
Reducing The Light Halos
Start by reducing the lighter halos. Press and hold the Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key on your keyboard, click the slider on the right and begin dragging it towards the left. Holding the Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key tells Photoshop to split the slider in half so that as you're dragging, only the left side of the slider moves while the right side stays in place. Watch your image as you drag the slider and you'll see the lighter halos fading away. Drag the slider almost all the way to the left to reduce them as much as possible:
Dragging the left half of the slider on the right.
Here's the result after dragging the first slider. Most of the lighter halos are now gone, or at least, they're much less noticeable. Only the darker halos remain:
The lighter halos are gone after dragging the slider on the right.
Reducing The Dark Halos
To reduce the darker halos, press and hold your Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key, click the slider on the left and drag the right half of it towards the right. Again, you'll need to drag almost all the way to the right for most of the dark halos to disappear. Click OK when you're done to close the Layer Style dialog box:
Dragging the right half of the slider on the left.
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And here's my image after dragging both sliders. Her skin is looking very smooth, but so is everything else in the image. We'll fix that next:
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The darker halos are gone after dragging the slider on the left.
Step 12: Add A Layer Mask
To limit the smoothing effect to just the skin, add a layer mask. Back in the Layers panel, press and hold the Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key on your keyboard and click the Add Layer Mask icon:
Adding a layer mask while holding Alt (Win) / Option (Mac).
A black-filled layer mask thumbnail appears on the 'Smooth Skin' layer. This hides the smoothing effect from view so we can paint it back in only where we need it:
A black-filled layer mask has been added to the 'Smooth Skin' layer.
Step 13: Select The Brush Tool
Select the Brush Tool from the Toolbar:
Step 14: Set Your Brush Color To White
Make sure your Foreground color (the brush color) is set to white. You can see your current Foreground and Background colors in the color swatches near the bottom of the Toolbar. The swatch in the upper left is the Foreground color. If it's not set to white, press the letter D on your keyboard to quickly reset the colors to their defaults:
The Foreground color (the brush color) should be white.
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Step 15: Paint Over The Skin
Before you begin painting, check your brush options in the Options Bar. Make sure that Mode (short for Blend Mode) is set to Normal, Opacity is at 100% and Flow is also at 100%:
Making sure the Mode, Opacity and Fill options are all set to their defaults.
Then paint over the skin to reveal the smoothing effect. A soft-edge brush will work best. We already know that we can change the brush size from the keyboard using the left and right bracket keys. Add the Shift key to change the brush hardness. Press Shift and the left bracket key to make the brush softer, or Shift and the right bracket key to make the brush harder.
Example: Painting To Reveal The Smooth Skin
I'll start by painting over her forehead. Since we're painting on the layer mask, not on the layer itself, we don't see the brush color as we paint. Instead, we reveal the smoothing effect in the areas where we've painted:
Bringing back the smooth skin in the woman's forehead.
Next, I'll paint over her nose, her cheeks, and around her eyes to reveal the skin smoothing in those areas. Adjust your brush size as you go to avoid painting over details that should remain sharp. If you do slip and paint over the wrong area, press the letter X on your keyboard to set your brush color to black, and then paint over the mistake to hide the smoothing effect. Press X again to set your brush color back to white and continue painting to smooth and soften the skin:
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Revealing more of the smoothing effect, but just over the skin.
Finally, I'll paint around her mouth and over her chin to smooth and soften those areas, while at the same time being careful to avoid her lips:
Revealing the smooth skin in the lower areas of her face.
Viewing The Layer Mask
To see exactly where you've painted, press and hold your Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) key and click on the layer mask thumbnail in the Layers panel:
Holding Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) and clicking the layer mask thumbnail.
This switches your view from the image to the layer mask. The white areas in the mask are where you've painted to restore the skin smoothing. Black areas are when the smoothing effect remains hidden. It looks a bit creepy, but viewing the mask is a great way to make sure you haven't missed any spots, and you can paint directly on the mask if needed. To switch back to your image, once again press and hold Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) and click on the layer mask thumbnail:
Use the mask view to look for any areas you missed.
Step 16: Lower The Layer Opacity
At this point, we've smoothed and softened the skin, but the effect is too intense. To reduce it, lower the opacity of the 'Smooth Skin' layer. In general, an opacity value of between 40% and 60% works best, but it will depend on your image. I'll set mine to 50%:
Lowering the opacity of the skin softening effect to 50%.
And with that, we're done! Here, after lowering the layer opacity, is my final result with her skin now looking great:
And there we have it! That's how to easily smooth and soften skin in Photoshop! For more portrait retouching tutorials, learn how to reduce wrinkles, how to change eye color or how to whiten teeth with Photoshop! Or visit our Photo Retouching section for more tutorials!