How to Photoshop an Aging Face

Wrinkles, crow's feet, sagging skin and a double chin are emphasized more in a digital photograph than they are in real life. With the help of Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Photoshop Elements, you can lighten and erase these imperfections with standard editing tools. Remember to make small, short corrections instead of trying to fix large portions all at the same time, as this can lead to an uneven, plastic-looking complexion. The goal is to make an aging face look normal, not perfect.

Instructions

1. Open Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Photoshop Elements and navigate to the Standard Edit area. Select "File -> Open" in the toolbar to open your photo.

2. Navigate to the band-aid tool in the left side of the workspace. It looks like a tiny bandage and houses two tools. Click this healing-brush icon and look at the top of the workspace. Two buttons should appear at the top left: the first is the spot-healing brush, which is designed to remove things like acne, blemishes, moles and other small imperfections. The second is the healing brush tool, which you can use to smooth out wrinkles and sagging skin. Click on the second one and specify the appropriate brush size for your model. Drag the diameter slider to a pixel size between 10 and 15 for optimal results.

3. As soon as you click on the image with this tool, you'll be prompted to select a clone skin tone for your model with the "alt" key. Find a smoother spot on the face to match the color, press the alt key and click the skin. This skin tone will be used hereafter until you select a new one or close the image.

4. Begin smearing, smudging and smoothing out the wrinkles using this tool. For wrinkles that begin near the nose and eye and slide downwards, begin at the top of the slide and move the cursor over the wrinkle. Use only one stroke whenever possible. When trying to fix crow's feet near the corners of the eyes, just click once or twice on top of the wrinkles.

5. Use this same process to get rid of the redness and saggy skin underneath eyes. This will help fix the reddish, purplish or grayish tones along the skin and give a softer appearance.

6. Enlarge the brush size of the healing-brush tool to take care of grayish areas around men's shaved skin. Oftentimes men develop gray tones that look like a permanent five o'clock shadow that you can remove with a few clicks or short strokes of a healing brush with a larger diameter.

7. Save your file by clicking the "File -> Save" command or the save icon.

References

• "Adobe Photoshop CS One-on-One;" Deke McClelland