Part III: Smoothening and Enhancing Skin

Smoothening the Skin with the Blur Effect

Another trick you can use to enhance a portrait without having to do too much touch up work is to apply the Blur enhancement to selected parts of the photo. In this case, we want to apply the Blur effect to the entire photo, but preserve the details in the eyes, the mouth, and some of the hair.

Step One:

The first step is to select the parts of the subject where we want to retain the detail. To do this, choose the Lasso Tool. On the Attribute Toolbar, clear the Smart lasso option. Click the "+" icon on the Attribute Toolbar so that you can make multiple selections, and then set the Soft edge to a high value so that the blur effect blends in well to the areas where the detail remains. Start clicking around the eyes and nose to create lines and nodes around it, then double-click to enclose the area. Since the selection will have a very soft edge, we don't have to worry about making the shape very accurate. After you are done clicking around the area, click Finish on the Attribute Toolbar to turn it into a selection. Then, use the same process to select the other areas.

Using the Lasso Tool to make a selection area

Step Two:

When you have finished making your selection areas, right-click and choose Invert Selection from the pop-up menu. Now, you have basically selected areas where the Blur enhancement will be applied.

Multiple selection areas created (left), and inverting the selection areas (right)

Step Three:

Next, select Photo: Blur - Blur, and choose one of the presets. The selected Blur preset is then applied to your selection area, and the selection area automatically becomes an object.

Step Four:

As a final step, right-click and select Merge to merge the object with the original image.

After applying the Blur effect