How to get creamy skin tone in Lightroom

Question

I googled some tutorials on "creamy lightroom", but most of what I found ended up turning my photos' skin tones too orange, too "vintage".

I tried desaturating Orange to counter this, but the results are not that great. What is the best way to get some film-looking, non-digital, creamy skin tone that doesn't change much of the overall color in Lightroom?

Examples:

Skin tones are nice here. Not too sharp, not blurry either, not too "digital" with natural creamy tones.

Do you mean creamy as in a color or creamy as in a texture? One can soften/blur skin by decreasing the Clarity slider. — ahockley, Jun 07 '11 at 15:30
Those examples don't look like they have been heavily edited. One common theme I see, though, is soft light. — Evan Krall, Jun 08 '11 at 08:10
Actually I know for a fact that the photog uses a combo of Lightroom and Alien Skin Exposure to process all his photos. Just trying to figure out the right process here... — rabbid, Jun 09 '11 at 12:12

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 07 '11 at 16:33

I find reducing clarity, far to the left, works wonders. Use the adjustment brush to paint the areas you wish to smooth, and then slide the clarity slider to the left. Then , you can also use the brush to apply selective sharpening to eyes, lips etc so it does not look entirely fake.

Note that when you select the brush, you can also choose 'soften skin' in the Effects list, which does essentially this same thing

chrisjlee · Answer 2 · 2011-06-07T17:55:54.520

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Terry white did a face retouching vodcast utilizing lightroom.

He used a clarity brush to clean up the subject's face:

http://creativesuitepodcast.com/use_lightroom_2_for_basic_portrait_retouching

edited Jun 07 '11 at 17:55

answered Jun 07 '11 at 17:42

chrisjlee

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score 1 · Answer 3 · edited Sep 06 '12 at 06:17

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I love the example images that you provided and I too wonder about how to get skin tone like that.

The adjustment brush works with skin texture but not color so much. My tip is to perfect your white balance and then play with the Saturation and Luminance of the orange and red. Desaturate and boost luminance will lighten and brighten the skin tones.

edited Sep 06 '12 at 06:17

Francesco

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answered Sep 06 '12 at 01:01

Anna

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have you tried the advices in the other answers? Those are actually explaining how to achieve them, so I don't think that it's a case of secrets-being-kept... – Francesco Sep 06 '12 at 03:44

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Sep 06 '12 at 01:41

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In the Adobe Lightroom tutorials, they explicitly say that "clarity" is not to be used on babies or pretty young women.

http://tv.adobe.com/watch/learn-lightroom-4/the-basics-clarity/

answered Sep 06 '12 at 01:41

Pat Farrell

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score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Jun 07 '11 at 17:25

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I'll let others speak about the colour adjustments, which is probably the major component of what you're looking for.

What I love doing for skin is is smoothing out skin (wrinkles, texture, and freckles) using combinations of Sharpness, Clarity, and Noise Reduction. Reducing the first two (whole-picture or just in areas using the Adjustment Brush) and increasing the latter really helps even out the texture of skin. In turn this gives a "creamy" look which can take years off your model.

answered Jun 07 '11 at 17:25

Craig Walker

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Thanks, I'll try your suggestions. Although, what I'm looking for is not necessarily to beautify faces. Instead I am looking for a creamy natural skin tone that doesn't look to "digital" nor too "vintage." – rabbid Jun 08 '11 at 03:03

How to get creamy skin tone in Lightroom

5 Answers5