CoffeeShop Photoshop/PSE Tutorial: Editing Baby Portraits with Textures

Today I want to show you one way I edit baby portraits using one of my favorite actions and free textures.  If you are following along with this edit, you will need to download the CoffeeShop Baby Peach action, the Shadowhouse Creation Oil Painting 5 texture, and this feather texture.

I wanted to mention that Flypaper Textures just sent me their newest Paper Painterly Texture pack and it is so gorgeous!  If you are a texture-addict like me you should check out Flypaper textures.  Their painterly and metallic sets are my favorites.  Paul and Jill also post before and after recipes using their textures.  I love seeing how they use textures and presets to create such stunning photographic art.

CoffeeShop Photoshop/PSE Tutorial:  Editing Baby Portraits with Actions and Textures

1. I am using this beautiful, perfect image from Baby Shots Photography in my tutorial today.  This image is perfect "as-is",  but I wanted to add some texture and color to customize the background.

2.  I ran CoffeeShop Baby Peach on her and then turned off the Baby Glow layer.  In this image it blew out her skin too much.

3.  I love the peachy color, but her skin contrast is still off, so I added a Levels adjustment layer over the background image and dialed up the middle gamma slider.

4.  I opened up the Shadowhouse Creations Oil Painting 5 texture and decided to change the color.

5.  I added a tan color fill layer (#ead2af)  and put it in Color blending mode. Then I flattened the image and dragged it on top of the baby portrait.

6. I moved the texture on top of the Levels adjustment layer and under Baby Peach.

7.  I put this texture layer in Multiply Blending mode, added a layer mask, and used a soft black brush to remove the texture from her skin.  (Shift, Alt,  and click on the layer mask to turn it red so you can see where you are painting.  Repeat to remove.)

8.  The texture on the skin is now gone.

9.   I copied the texture layer and put it in Soft Light Blending mode to add some contrast.

10.  I found the background too dark so I went back to the Multiply layer and adjusted the opacity down to 72%.

11.  I want to add some of the golden texture color to her skin, so I copied the texture again and then deleted the layer mask.

12. I Guassian-blurred the texture to make it a solid color.

13. I  copied the layer mask from the texture below and clicked Ctrl-I to inverse it so that it would add the extra color only to her skin.  You can alternatively add a black layer mask and use a soft white brush to add the color to her skin.

14.  All of the texture layers have blown-out her skin again, so I went back to the Levels adjustment layer and adjusted the midtone middle slider.

15. I opened the feather texture image and desaturated it.

16. I dragged the texture on top of all of the other textures and under Baby Peach and free-transformed the feathers to fit the image.

17.  I put this layer in Soft Light blending mode and adjusted the contrast to taste.

18. I added a layer mask and used a 100% soft black brush to remove the texture from her skin and a 40-60% opacity brush around her body to softly feather the texture background.

Here is the before and after.  I love the soft vintage look of my edit with the golden tones.  This feather texture is a keeper.

You can use any type of image texture. Here is beautiful image from Adia Speer Photography (Facebook) where I used a flower texture.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial.  Any questions, just leave a comment below.  I would love to see your befores and afters posted on my Facebook page.  Have a wonderful Sunday!!!

Do you want to download my favorite CoffeeShop PSE/Photoshop Actions and Lightroom Presets or Design Elements in one convenient zipped file AND help support this blog? Just click here for my action pack or here for a download of some of my most popular design elements, storyboards, and textures.

For complete info on installing all of my actions, click here.