# "Softening" in LR4



## flashpixx (Sep 6, 2012)

Have a photo shoot on the weekend shooting a friend whose complexion is very very fair, and skin has visible pores. She has had some very bad experiences with photo shoots. Mostly when a flash is used her complexion is all washed out, and if well exposed the sharpness tends to highlight her skin.

I'm planning to shoot in a park in mid-late afternoon under a large tree filtering the light, no flash. Long way to the question...

What options do I have in LR to flatter her complexion through softening or filtering??

I don't have PS Elements or PSCS.

Appreciate any tips.


----------



## donoreo (Sep 6, 2012)

You can use the adjustment brush and one of the presets is "soften skin".  You just brush over the areas you want to soften.  You can adjust the clarity and sharpness to fine tune the brush effect.  I do this for photos of my wife and it almost makes her happy.


----------



## Brad Snyder (Sep 6, 2012)

As donoreo says, that's what the soften skin brush is intended for. If one application is not enough, you can create a new brush and add extra softening to previously softened areas. This takes a bit of care, as you can quickly arrive at obvious doctoring.


----------



## flashpixx (Sep 7, 2012)

thank you! Will give it a try


----------



## Brendatn (Sep 9, 2012)

Great article on this @ http://xposurepro.com/category/lightroom


----------



## Unbroken Chain (Sep 10, 2012)

I find the Luminance slider does a wonderful job of softening skin.  I have used this slider on some scans of 25-year-old Kodachrome slide portraits with spectacular results (but I don't know how well it will work with digital).  And as pointed out above, applying negative clarity works as well.

UC


----------



## GBM (Sep 11, 2012)

Go to Youtube and type in the search box " lightroom 4 skin smoothing".... a whole slew of great tutorials there....


----------

