This technique is great for glamour portraits. It's also good for reducing JPEG artifacts. It mimics a soft focus or diffusion lens filter, softening the photo, reducing harsh lines and wrinkles, and intensifying the colors. Follow the steps here to create the soft focus glamour effect in Photoshop.
Difficulty: Easy
Time Required: 5 minutes
Here's How:
- Open the photo.
- Go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur.
- Set the radius to 4-10 pixels (use a high amount for hi-res images, low amount for low-res) and click OK.
- Go to Edit > Fade Gaussian Blur. (Note: This command is under the Filter menu in older Photoshop versions.)
- Set the fade opacity to 50%.
- Go to Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask.
- Experiment within the following ranges: Amount: 80-200, Radius: 2-5, Threshold: 10-15.
- Go to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Hue/Saturation.
- Move the saturation slider up to somewhere in the 10-20 range and click OK.
