Photoshop or not to Photoshop?
Skin Smoothing page 2
So let the debate commence - on the previous page we had an actors headshot of Tom.
Tom has no serious skin issues such as extreme acne - which can often hit a young performer.
However as you can see skin smoothing has removed the small blemishes he has got, without being to extreme and therefore false in a casting situation.
My guidelines on this is now that skin smoothing is the industry norm - not to include it can sometimes count against you - but never falsely remove permanent or longterm scars/blemishes on a Headshot casting image. On publicity images and so on then go with the flow!
Now the image above of Anthony is to my eye a bit to extreme, but actually is the level we now tend to see in publicity shots [eg look at a TV listing guide or celebrity magazine.
Again you have a before and after to make your own judgements.
Remember I am an old film photographer I was taught retouching on an individual print basis - not a computer mouse click and move on process.