Bad Retouching Techniques (examples Included)

This won't be news to a lot of you, but it may be eye opening for some. Sometimes to get a better idea of what direction to go in, it helps to know what not to do. I thought I'd take a minute to celebrate (lament) the garish eyesores that some "experts" recommend others produce when retouching.

While there is subjectivity in art, a retoucher's job is more constrained, and there is a standard as it applies to commercial work. I'm getting a handle on those standards myself reading books and watching tutorials by people like Scott Kelby, Matt Kloskowski, Julia Kuzmenko McKim, and Michael Woloszynowicz. My background as an Illustration major turned Graphic Designer helped me have an idea, but photography has its own standards. If you're retouching or compositing for someone other than yourself, they generally need you to enhance their work, not leave signs of your influence there. There's a reason only a handful of people are entrusted to do retouch jobs that many photographers don't have the time for. Subtlety is key, and non-destructive workflow is essential. Now stepping off my soapbox, on with the show.

This visual belly flop, while obviously not commercial, was used to advertise someone's custom brushes at DeviantArt, and meant to imply the good effects of their use.





I'm reminded of that armchair Rembrandt who showcased her skills on that Ecce Homo fresco when I look at this. The hair detail was crudely smudged into oblivion with indelicate childlike strokes, and the white point clipping quickly got rid of any evidence there was human skin .This is stating the obvious to anyone with a cursory understanding of image treatment standards, but rarely is using the contrast slider considered a job well done. Even in the most liberal definition of artistic license, deliberately overexposing an image in post, and blowing out the details with white isn't a good idea. I'm afraid of hue and contrast that isn't used minimally, and most people should be. It's a highly destructive way of retouching, as you're generally adding information that isn't there, or taking away information that is, but to an extreme degree. This may look good to someone whose life entails solely playing RPG games, but not in the commercial world.

This next one hurts me even more, because it was used in a tutorial. The thought that it may contribute to an army of people who think they're helping the world by doing things the wrong way makes my last meal move north. I won't name names (fortunately it wasn't here) but this image was supposed to demonstrae techniques for how to make skin look better in Photoshop.



This is what happens when you try to retouch someone's face without using frequency separation layers. It's also what happens when you look at someone while under the influence of mushrooms, but that's anther topic. Making someone look like they needed a skin retoucher so bad that they got a t-shirt airbrusher from the mall to render them inhuman isn't saying the best about your skills. I've seen countless variations of similar tutorials on Photoshop, often to high praise from an unwitting audience. But listening to professional retouchers, photographers and digital artists, they seem to be painfully aware of this phenomenon, and the bad habits it cultivates. If this area is of interest to you, I highly recommend looking up frequency adjustment+skin tutorials, preferably with "high-end" or "professional" somewhere in the title.

This last one is just redundant, but I thought I would include it to show just how pervasive bad Photoshop tips are, as this was on a quasi-professional site, titled to demonstrate skin retouching techniques.



This is bad for all of the aforementioned reasons, but I just hope the follow up tutorial is about how to find clues as to what exactly is in the images that have undergone these techniques. Now if you'll all excuse me, I have to go get some sunglasses. There's a lot of tutorials out here.