Top 10 Retouching Tips Required For High Value Products
Shooting images of your high value products (jewellery, cars, luxury handbags etc.) is
one thing, but retouching them to kindle the desire to possess them in customers is a
totally different ball game! The photos of these products need to possess your
customers in order to make them want to possess your products. And for that to
happen, you definitely need professional photo retouchingprofessional photo
retouching. This means proficiency with multiple high-end technologies on one hand
and a creative and visual bent of mind on the other. While it is best to hire professional
product photo retouching services to breathe life into your photographs, here are ten
tips that you can do yourself.
- Choose correct angles and framing – Make use of the crop tool to position the product in the most aesthetic position in the frame which need not necessarily be the centre always! The composition of the image should meaningfully highlight the product and its key features. Also, any professional photo retouching makes sure to cut away all distracting objects or artefacts in the photograph.
- Keep colours and textures natural – Making drastic changes in the colour or texture of the product will work to your disadvantage because the marketer wants the image to resemble reality as closely as possible. In the same vein, avoid smoothing the image or sharpening it too much because it will lose its natural feel. The best product photo retouching services make images realistic and not artificial.
- Use frequency separation method – Corrections and edits become easier when you make separate high-frequency and low-frequency layers. This helps you make specific colour corrections without universally affecting the other colours in the photograph. But even here, do not overdo the correction such that the photo loses its ‘real’ feel.
- Try out free presets – You will be amazed at the perfection and precision in many of the presets that Photoshop, Lightroom or other photo editing softwares offer. These presets are the easiest and fastest means to professional photographs of high-value products. Even the best photo retouching services start off by using presets and then making necessary modifications.
- Minimise noise – Noise is the surest and fastest way to degrade the value of your products in photographs! While noise can be eliminated in photo editing softwares using filters, it would be best to start off with as little noise as possible via proper photography lighting. The RGB channels in your photo editing software give you a measurement of the noise while the surface blur tool will help you reduce and even eliminate noise.
- Make the necessary shape and silhouette corrections – These product photo retouching service corrections are mostly applied to garments and handbags where a shape is in need of a bit of straightening. A basic correction can be easily applied for most cases in small sized images. However, once the photos are in higher resolutions, you will need to use complex and time-consuming masking and path techniques. They alone will ensure pixel-perfect results and make it possible for the image to be enlarged to larger than life sizes.
- Utilise healing brush and clone stamp tools – Get rid of any inconsistencies in the product or distractions in the background using the healing brush tool rather than the spot healing tool. Cleaning up certain portions of the product without losing its texture is made easy through the clone stamp tool which replicates the pixels themselves. This tool can seamlessly blend transitions and patterns. None of the photo retouching services can do much work without mastering these two tools.
- Use the ghost mannequin effect to perfection – This is among the most powerful post-production techniques which is extremely useful mainly for apparel photography. The best photo retouching services use a combination of layers, magic wand tool, pen tool and the warping effect to create a picture that is a perfect representation of how your product fits in the 3D space. This requires expertise and skill in separation of the product from its background and mannequin.
- Master the dodge and burn tool – Light is to photography what paint is to art and chisel strokes are to sculpture. The dodge and burn tool will help you sculpt the shadows and light on the product to create a better sense of dimensionality. Use layer masking and the different brushes to regulate the exposure on the different areas of the image. Our pro tip would be to make use of the dodge and burn tool to make the product or subject pop out. Use transitions of shades from dark to light in some areas of the image to enhance the feel of colour depth.
- Level the hue, saturation and brightness – These are basic controls for any photography but are very critical in maintaining the realism of the subject. Small changes in these controls, especially the hue, can make the product look unreal or like a piece of fantasy. Use these controls in professional photo retouching to make the high value product look real.
By MubyTech
Global Image Editing Partner
Global Image Editing Partner