How many times you wish you had that high end camera to shoot your photos perfectly? How hard it is for you to take your photos using that point and shoot cameras without technical know-how? I tell you it is so hard, because I was just like you before!

In the medieval times of photography where 35 mm films and medium format were the only option (not to mention those easy to print polaroids), you cannot guess the outcome of your photos, not unless they were printed or developed.

Nowadays, with the advent of the more sophisticated digicams and the latest softwares and PC innovations, all you have to do is to take a shot and look at the LCD for the outcome. If you doesn't like an image, you simply delete it.

But wait, do not delete those photos yet. Those might be your best. All you need to do is to study the photos, crop and retouch them, Just like how the pros do!

I use Adobe Photoshop CS in most of my photo editing jobs. I'll give you some tips and techniques I acquired through the years of my study. Here's the most common tools I used for editing, retouching, and lay-outing for most promotional materials and model set cards.

ADJUSTMENT MENU)

1. Levels

2. Auto Contrast
3. Photo Filter
4 Selective Color

(for removing blemishes and adjusting skin texture or sharpening/ fixing detailed image such as the eyes and hair highlights)

1. Polygonal Lasso Tool
2. Healing Brush Tool
3. Blur and Gaussian Tool (on the FILTER MENU)
4. Median Tool (on the FILTER MENU)
5. Unsharp Mask (on the FILTER MENU)

1. Crop Tool
2. Duplicate Layer, New Background Color and Fill Layer (on

the FILTER MENU)

3. Text (Marked as "T" icon, font, font color, size and format

are available)

4. Transform (on the EDIT MENU).

Then using LEVELS I adjust the tones to whiten the skin in contrast with the shade and shadows. I further improve the skin tones using SELECTIVE COLOR (Magenta, Red, Blue and Yellow used sparingly).

Next, using POLYGONAL LASSO TOOL, I trace and isolate portions of the skin and use either BLUR or MEDIAN TOOL to soften the skin or remove blemishes and unwanted spots. Leave out the nostrils, eyes and hair, as these must be produced sharp enough. Sharpen more those features using UNSHARP MASK.



I wanted to whiten the skin a bit more but wanted to leave out the hair and lips as is, So I marked again the whole face leaving out the lips and the hair and adjusted SELECTIVE COLOR. I did the same with the arms and the hands.

Next step is to remove and replace the background. Using the POLYGONAL LASSO TOOL, I extract the subject from the background. I literally choose CUT from the EDIT MENU. Then I create a NEW LAYER (from LAYER MENU), and use GRADIENT FILL.

And we're done! We have taken a bold step we never thought possible for what it seems like a hopeless photo. It's just as easy as
"ONE, TWO and THREE!

Thanks to Kaye Anne Pagulayan,
My model in this particular series.