People and Portrait Retouching by Freelance Retoucher John Deaville

I have carried out many portrait retouching projects in my career as a retoucher. Photography of people and portraits is one of the main areas of commercial and editorial photography. I have worked long term for a photographer who has photographed a wide range of people ranging from sporting figures, actors, celebrities and even the UK Royal family.

How I would retouch a portrait depends on the subject. I might employ some retouching techniques similar to beauty retouching, such as cleaning and perfecting skin areas. However, I would define this area of retouching as more ‘raw’ as we would want to retain the realism and character which is the subject.

Also, there is often more scope to play with creative ideas as we want to create a retouched image that generates interest and dynamic as opposed to something that looks ‘perfect’. In the portrait of Buzz Aldrin below, I created a more shallow depth of field along with higher contrast to mimic an antique tin type photography style. I usually ask a client to provide a mood board to suggest the sort of style they would like to acheive.

A typical job would involve

• establishing what style the client would like to experiment with
• estabishing any colour grading style is prefered. I usually provide both a  graded and non-graded version
• research and mood boards are useful to carry out the above points
• skin retouching, eyes cleared up and lightened, hairlines tidied
• use of colour grade, contrast and vignettes to draw attention to the subject

For a large project such as retouching a selection of photos, I would provide some initial examples. This allows the treatment to be approved before comitting to the whole batch.

Please take a look at some of my portrait before and after samples. Also have a look at some finished images in my portrait retoucher portfolio.

All images copyrighted John Deaville / Photofixer.