USING CONTENT AWARE FILL AND SPOT HEALING

STEP : 1

Open the portrait file you want to apply this effect to and zoom into the area that needs retouching. For example, you may want to eliminate a mole, freckle, wrinkle, discoloration, or other skin blemish, as with the large beauty mark on the man’s right cheek in Figure 38-1.

Figure 38-1

STEP : 2

To use the Content-Aware feature, press L to choose the Lasso tool to make a tight selection around the area to be edited, then select Edit > Fill (Shift+F5). When the Fill dialog box opens, choose Content-Aware from the Use menu and click OK. Photoshop then samples other pixels surrounding the selection to fill the selection with replacement pixels, as illustrated in Figure 38-2. Keep in mind that this technique works best when the selection area is rather small; larger selections can sometimes result in unnatural fills.

STEP : 3

Press J to select the Spot Healing Brush tool, choose a 50-px soft-edged (0% hardness) brush, and select Content-Aware as the type on the Options bar. Then paint in simple clicks or small, delicate strokes across the areas that need retouching.

While you’re at it, you may want to play around with the two other Healing Brush Type options on the Options bar. Use Proximity Match to make Photoshop use pixels around the selection edges for the patch, or select Create Texture to have Photoshop use the pixels within the selection to create a texture for the patch.

Figure 38-2

[box type="info"] HINT: For retouching problem areas like moles, you’ll achieve better results using the Clone Stamp and Smudge tools.[/box]

STEP : 4

Continue working around the image, alternating between the Spot Healing Brush tool and Content-Aware Fill technique until you have finished retouching the image. As a final step, apply a little sharpening to your image using the Smart Sharpen or Unsharp Mask filter. To give you an idea at how dramatic your changes can be, look at the before and after pictures in Figure 38-3.

Figure 38-3