Wanna Make Their Eyes Pop? (My workflow - for DIVA)

anonymouscuban · June 7, 2011

Diva asked me what I am doing lately to the eyes of my subjects to make them sharp and give them pop. I wish I could say that it's all in-camera technique but I'd be lying. It goes without saying that you must start with getting the eyes well in focus in camera. Nothing will help get eyes ultra-sharp in post if you don't get it right in camera. Trust me, I've tried many times to sharpen OOF'd eyes only to end up with pixelated and OOF'd eyes.

I thought I would take a few minutes to put together a tutorial with my workflow. I'm including a few screen shots to aide understanding. It seems a bit involved but once I got these ingredients down and created Actions for them and only takes a couple clicks and a few brush strokes to get it done. So why don't I get started with trying to thoroughly confuse you; I'm not very good at this sort of thing.

NOTE: OH... I should mention that I am doing this all in Photoshop CS4, which I use as a plugin from LR3.

BEFORE PHOTO SOOC - you can see all the layers/steps here but they are turned off

Close-Up

Step 1 - Clone & Heal

The first thing I do is create a duplicate layer of the original image. I use this layer to heal and clone any imperfection in the skin, wild hairs in the face and any other distractions. In this case, I used the healing brush to clean up the little pimple on her chin and also to get rid of the highlight on her left cheek and tip of nose. I also cloned out the spa drain and the bit of green showing in the top right corner of the photo. BTW, once I use the clone tool on these spots, I then go over them with the healing brush just to smooth things out. This is a trick I learned that I find very useful.

Clone & Heal After - No Drain/No Green

Close Up (100%) - Pimple and Highlights Gone

Step 2 - Eye Bump

The next step is to brighten the eyes a bit. I do this by adding a levels adjustment layer with the properties below. I then invert the mask and take a small soft brush, set to about 12% opacity and 70% flow and paint the whites of eyes to my liking. You can also use this to brighten the teeth. Sometimes I will finish by adjusting the overall opacity of this layer to fine tune the adjustment. It's important not to over do it. I like turning the layer on and off just to see the effect to make sure I didn't go overboard.

Levels Properties

Eye Bump After - Eyes are just a tad brighter:

Step 3 - Eye Pop

This next steps adds some contrast to the eyes to make them pop a bit. I merge a copy of all visible layers into a target layer (CMD+Option+Shift+E). I then apply the Unsharp Mask Filter to this layer. I follow this up with a levels adjustment layer and merge it with the unsharp mask layer. I then apply a Layer Mask and invert it (CMD+I). Then I take a small soft brush with same properties as in step 2 and paint the effect onto the iris of the eye, eyelids, eyebrows and lips. I also apply it to the parts of the hair that are in focus. Again, make sure not to go overboard. Just a few light strokes is enough. You can always adjust the overall opacity of the layer to your liking if you do.

Unsharp Mask Properties

Levels Properties

Eye Pop Close Up

Step 4 - Eye Sharpen

This is the final step that will really make the eyes come alive. Again, I use the CMD+Option+Shift+E shortcut to create a target layer from all the previous layers. I then apply the Unsharp Mask Filter to this layer but this time I use much different parameters. I then add a layer mask to it and invert it. Just like before, I take a small soft brush to selectively sharpen the eyes, eyelids, eyebrows, mouth and hair.

Unsharp Mask Properties

Eye Sharpen Close Up

Here is the is the before and after for comparison:

Before

After

Qarik · June 8, 2011

nice technique and does what you advertise..except too much work!

ajroahkni · June 8, 2011

Wow, spectacular. Thanks for the workflow. With the shortcut keys and your experience on it, how long does it take on average to do the POP? (no other touch-up)

Thanks,

Bryans12v · June 9, 2011

I do somehting very similar except use the brush tool in LR3, takes about 15=25 seconds to do the same thing.

divamum · June 9, 2011

Tx Alex! I have an action which does something similar, but it's really good to have more of an idea of some of the steps which can be included so I can control it manually when I want to

You guys are speed-obsessed!!

Seriously - what does this take, Alex - maybe 30 secs-60 seconds once you have the steps memorized? The only drawback is having to open up PS, but I've tried similar things in LR w/the brush and am never as happy with the results - it gets grainy/noisy faster ime because you can't control the sharpening parameters as well.

anonymouscuban · June 9, 2011

This does seem a bit involved at first glance, but as I said in my OP, you can record Actions that do all the steps with a couple of clicks... aside from the brush strokes that is. I have 3 actions created, one each for steps 2, 3, and 4. It takes my iMac all of 15 seconds or so to run all three. It probably takes me longer to get the photo opened in PS from LR3 than it does to run the actions.

I know of the adjustment brush in LR3, but as Diva said, I don't find I get the same results as I do in PS with these actions. Especially since I can adjust the overall opacity of each layer to fine tune the effect. This also steps right into my workflow if I am already opening the file in PS.

There are numerous ways you can do this kind of stuff, this simply another method that I like to use.

divamum · June 9, 2011

anonymouscuban wrote: »

There are numerous ways you can do this kind of stuff, this simply another method that I like to use.

briandelion · June 9, 2011

divamum wrote: »

Tx
You guys are speed-obsessed!!

It always looks a lot more complicated in print than it is to perform the steps. Great explanation. Some of this I haven't tried. One thing I do differently you may want to try is when it comes to the Levels Adjustment Layer step I leave as is and simply change the blending mode of the Adjustment Layer to "screen," then mask the areas I don't want effected and dial back the opacity of the layer to get the amount of brightness needed.

divamum · June 9, 2011

Btw, the action I use that does something very similar to Alex's technique is Coffeeshop's "Glamour Glow". You get a skin smoother/brightener (best used at VERY VERY low opacity, but it's nice with a light hand), and eye bump (whitener) and an eye define (sharpen/contrast). Coffeeshop's Perfect Portrait also includes an eye define, but I like the one in Glamour Glow better, plus GG is only 3 layers/elements and thus runs way faster than Perf Portrait.

I've also started using the Screen blend mode a lot more if I just want to lift certain areas without significantly affecting contrast. For whatever reason, it doesn't "burn out" the pixels in the same way and can really help when a fill flash didn't go off powerfully enough, or eyes are too recessed under the brim of a hat etc etc.

ETA: Btw, Alex, when I posted that in your other thread about the eyes I seriously thought it was ENTIRELY due to your lighting and lens. Seriously! I so wasn't expecting a PP reply

anonymouscuban · June 9, 2011

Here is the photo with the rest of my workflow completed:

Antonlm · June 9, 2011

Thanks for the tutorial. Bryans, care to share your process lr3?

BradfordBenn · June 11, 2011

Thanks for the notes Alex. Also thank your wife for allowing you to point out what you tweaked.... just saying Jennifer wouldn't let me.

Wanna Make Their Eyes Pop? (My workflow - for DIVA)

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