Photo Editing - Aging Skin

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

.....Both Ben Wilmore and Scott Kelby have some good tips in their PS books. I have the each author's CS2 version. I also recommend Katrin (Kate) Eismann's Photo Retouching with Photoshop books.....

The 'bible' type books are fine if you want a detailed guide as to what the program will do. If (and this is my preference) you want a guide to using particular techniques then I second Bill's recommendation. For Scott Kelby have a look at

"Scott Kelby's 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop"
"The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers"

and also the Eismann book.

At different times I have found each to be invaluable, when trying to achieve a result and not quite remembering how I did it last time (senior moments are getting more frequent )

[Bobby]

Thanks Hunt - I have a couple of Kelby books that I haven't opened in quite a while - I will hunt for a solution there. I don't think I want to put that much effort into this as a 20 layer edit, but we'll see.

[momoffduty]

Here is a tutorial that I recently used that Chuck posted on the Soften a Photo thread:

http://www.photoshopessentials.com/phot ... ooth-skin/

It works great!

[Bobby]

Thanks Cheryl - I have done the opposite - to do in effect custom sharpening, but will try with the Invert.

[Barb O]

Bobby,
I realize that you are using "full photoshop" but .....

For the benefit of forum participants who are interested in this subject and only have Photoshop Elements, I want to mention the book
"The Photoshop Elements 5 Restoration and Retouching Book" by Matt Kloskowski

Amazon USA currently shows it at $14 and despite the fact that it is a couple of versions old, I think it is worthwhile for someone using PS Elements and looking for beginner to intermediate techniques available in the Elements product. Its instructions and illustrated examples are easy to follow.

A specific example : for selective reduction of wrinkles it illustrates using the Healing Brush to a new layer and reducing the opacity of that layer.

[cdeemer]

I'm just listening in here but if we ever needed sample excerpts to show what this place is about, these comments are great. Like Steve says, tech and wine tips at the same time!