W
Face Sculpting
ith the smallest change in the shape of facial features or with the shape of the face itself, striking improvements can be made. Plastic surgery is based on this idea and, in Photoshop, we can do the same. An original portrait of a young woman in the Akha tribe of northern Thailand is shown below left. Note her round face and narrow eyes. In the comparison picture, below right, I narrowed her face and enlarged her eyes just a little bit. I also smoothed her skin. The difference is compelling.
18
To do this, I used Filter > liquify. At the far right of the opened dialog box there are submenus titled Eyes, Nose, Mouth, and Face shape. Each of these have a down arrow that makes available several sliders to control specific portions of a face. For example, to narrow this woman’s face I used ‘Face Width’, and to enlarge her eyes slightly I used Eye Size. Be judicious in the changes you make. It’s easy to exaggerate the changes and distort a face completely. But if you want to retain the original character of a face, make subtle changes in small increments. §
