Virtual Makeover: Unwanted freckles, spot & marks

Virtual Makeover: Unwanted freckles, spot & marks

This tutorial will teach you how you can easily remove unwanted freckles, spot or marks. For this tutorial, I am using the below picture of Keira Knightley that I found while searching on Google. Click on the below picture
for the large size the same as the one I used for this tutorial

Step 1: Click on the current layer where the picture is then right click and select DUPLICATE LAYER.


It is always good to work with duplicate layer that way you have the original copy to compare with if needed. Actually, I would definately advise doing so that way you see the perfection better and if any corrections are needed, you can always go back to original layer and copy elements of the body or face. Not only when doing photo retouching but for any kind of photoshoping job, it helps greatly.

Step 2: Right click on the “Spot Healing Brush” tool and select the “Healing Brush Tool” which would be the second tool listed there.

Step 3: Here is the most easiest of the step where most people will tend to make mistakes. You want to make sure that your Healing Brush size is slightly bigger than the actual spot that you are removing. As you can see on the below picture my circle (Healing Brush) is slightly bigger than the spot right above it that I’ll remove.



To adjust the brush size, simply right click anywhere on the picture and you will land with the brush size tool.



For my example, I started with brush size 15 px and spacing at 25%. Normally, you would leave the brush spacing at around that size that way its well spaced for this task.

Step 4: Now we are ready to sample the skin where there are no marks, acne or freckles. Move your mouse to a similar spot, I would suggest very close to the unwanted spot that has exactly the same skin tone. Press the ALT (in windows system) key down and you will notice that your mouse cursor has changed. Now click on a clean spot right next to the unwanted spot that has similar color tone.

Now let go off the ALT key and you are ready to heal the skin. With your mouse, simply click over the spot you want to remove and magically they will disappear. For larger spot, adjust your brush size slightly larger than of the unwanted spot.
Here, I removed the spot on the nose which you can see on the picture at Step 3.



For the other part of the face, here is another closeup: