I am frequently recieving emails with a lot of questions "what is that secret magic that makes images looks good?" so I decided to share the reality. There is no such thing like a trick or magic, something supersecret or some extra plugin/filter that would suddenly turn your pictures to stunning images. It`s a hard work.
To be clear as much as it`s possible I will share my typical workflow that contains NO filter or secret magic which does not exist anyways. Good workflow is a key right after learning, understanding the technique and hard work. We all do our work a bit different. This is the workflow which is giving me the most comfort and freedom when working. Sometimes it varies project from project, depends on what I am working at. But when "simple" retouching it`s just okay. Like 95% of my work lays in adjustment layers because sometimes clients wants you to make some changes and these layers are non-destructive and time saving when doing post edits. I found that a lot of other people use very similar workflow as I do... well, it`s nothing surprising because all these steps has some logical chronology. So here we go...
Step 1
Raw conversion or conversions - I use smart objects and I highly reccomend anyone to learn about them a bit. It`s very flexible tool how to get the most out of RAW. I don`t do coloring in RAW, just basic color corrections if needed. I usually don`t have only one RAW conversion, it might be 2,3 sometimes more. I mask the areas I need. You can fix here some color differences of skin tones, add a bit light to the eyes. Correct exposure failings or create some hair gloss etc. What is important, you can always go back and change everything.
Step 2
General modifications - now it`s a good time to do general changes (liquify tool, transformations, etc.). Why now? Because it changes the scene. Result may end up bad if you do it later. The more you use liquify tool, the more you loose texture so it`s better to not overuse it. It`s always the best to shoot the image in best possible condition and as close to your need as possible. No retouch would save bad image and all effects looks bad when overused.
Step 3
Basic retouch - healing, cloning, feel free to learn about frequency separation - it may help you a bit to touch up problematic areas like skin close to hair and so. There are tons of tutorials around. I don`t say they are mostly professional but they are enough to learn the principles. Get your lazy ass up and spend some time with searching. I talked about high pass in one of my previous posts.
Step 4
Dodge and burn - is there anything needed to be said? There are several ways to do it and all are correct. It`s just up to you which one you use. Tablet is a good thing for it. Some things cannot be done without it, but I don`t tell you to buy 1000 USD Cintiq. Any cheap Wacom would work well for you when "only" retouching. Especially with dodge and burn technique you need to work fast because there is crazy ammount of work to be done on every image. I think some cheap Wacom may cost like $80 maybe less.
Step 5
Light airbrushing - adding general lights to the scene if needed or desired. Can be done many ways - curves, levels, exposure, light and shadows... Masks are always the key. Learn also about blending modes, what do they mean so you don`t have to always run through whole set of blending modes and test how would the result end up (simple but important knowledge).
Step 6
Color corrections - fixing airbrushing and dodge and burn color troubles. When dodging and burning there is always color difference so it`s a small but necessary step to fix saturation and colors. Nothing looks worse than bad color cast over heavily dodged or burned areas same as when model has different face and body skin tone. It looks bad. You gotta fix it.
Step 7
Grading - it means colorizing and general light effects and effects itself - general coloring and effecting of the scene. This is time for personal taste, I can`t say I met anyone who would have exactly the same taste as I do. I and my beloved always argue about colors and effecting the image. This pretty much gives it your personal impact. It can be hardly explained, reach own style, search on your own what you like. I can say this is probably the hardest part on retouching my images. I try to look for new styles and ways how to reach more contrast, better color, interesting effects. This is neverending. Sometimes I have it in a minute, sometimes it takes me several days to find out result that would satisfy me and fit the photo.
Step 8
Final retouches and corrections - very important to criticaly overview your work and touch up the details (can be retouching, cloning, adding some extra light or contrast). It`s good to open your final print in different viewers, see it from different distances, show it to someone else and ask for advices or just save it and leave it for another day or two and then re-open again and judge.
Step 9
Sharpening, again with separated frequecies (I use it mostly) but feel free to use anything
Step 10
Export, resizing + sharpening resized images, adding correct color profiles. There are many ways to resize images but there is always sharpening needed. There are different setups for sites like facebook and so.
Be picky and search. There is nothing ultimate with photoshop. There are so many ways to reach the same effect. Even people who did not reach your quality can learn you something new. I got whole my knowledge from internet and I say all the others, informations are out there, you just have to use a google, youtube and the round thing between your ears. Then practice...
Lucie Kout
I use Adobe RGB for general retouching, other color spaces (LAB, CMYK) for color tweaking (sometimes) or sometimes it´s easier to replace colors in lab than in RGB. I use sRGB for general export. This way I can track what color spaces I went through and keep a control over result in print easier.