Advanced Sharpening for Portraits of Women

This is a more advanced technique for sharpening portraits of women that I learned (not surprisingly) from fashion photographer Kevin Ames. It does a great job of allowing you to create an overall feeling of sharpness, without emphasizing the texture of the skin. It takes a few extra steps, but the final effect is worth it.

Step One

Open the portrait you want to sharpen without accentuating the skin texture. Duplicate the Background layer by pressing Command-J (PC: Control-J).

Step Two

Go under the Filter menu, under Sharpen, and apply the Unsharp Mask filter to this layer. Use these settings: Amount 85%, Radius 1 pixel, and Threshold 4. Although you'll see the texture in the skin appear to be accentuated as a result of the sharpening, it's okayin the next step we'll fix that.

Step Three

Press-and-hold the Option (PC: Alt) key and click on the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers palette. Holding the Option/Alt key fills the layer mask with black, hiding the Unsharp Mask filter you just applied. Press B to get the Brush tool, and in the Options Bar, click on the thumbnail to the right of the word "Brush" to choose a medium-sized, soft-edged brush in the Picker. Press the letter D to switch your Foreground color to white (if it isn't already white), and then begin to paint over the areas on her face where you want to apply detail (lips, eyes, eyelashes, eyebrows). Using the Brush tool, you're actually going to paint the sharpening back in, so avoid any skin areas (that's the whole point of sharpening using this method) and only paint over detail areas. You can also paint over hair and other areas outside the face that you want to sharpen.

Before

After