Scott’s Three-Step Portrait Finishing Technique

One of the questions I get asked most about my portraits is how do they look so sharp, but at the same time have a soft quality to them? It’s because for all portraits of women, children, or families, I apply a three-step Photoshop Elements finishing technique that does the trick. It actually combines two techniques you’ve already learned, and introduces a third.

They’re all exceedingly easy—it’s just the order you do them in, and the settings you use. Here’s exactly what I do:

Step One:

Once you’ve color corrected the photo, done any retouching, etc., that’s when you add these three finishing steps. The first step is to add a lot of sharpening to the photo (because in the second step, you’re going to blur the entire photo). I always use luminosity sharpening for this, so start by pressing Ctrl-J (Mac: Command-J) to duplicate the Background layer. Then, go under the Enhance menu and choose Unsharp Mask. The settings I use are pretty strong—Amount: 120%, Radius: 1, and Threshold: 3—but you generally need it. With a small, low-resolution file like this, you might need to lower the Amount to 80%. Click OK.