Action figure portrait and retouching

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I took this picture of an old action figure for some lighting tests with really basic gear (build-in flash, à screen for the BG and a shoebox and paper).

After the tests I was left with this picture and thought it would be fun to retouch it and make all of the dirt and scratches go away. In the process I would have to change the eyes, eyebrows and hair which are really damaged.

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Basic Light Room retouching :

First I did some basic retouching in Light Room as I would for a regular portrait. Some white Balance, contrast, details and basic color grading.

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Big Clean Up

The biggest part of the work was to remove all of the dirt and obvious plastic parts and flaws. I decided to keep some darker sports on the skin, it gives it more details and realism, and the character being a soldier makes it more relevant. You cans see some problems in the eyes for exemple, this wil be fixed later. To achieve this result I combined Frequency Separation and mostly the patch tool and healing tool.

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What a Look !

The eyes were too damaged so decided to add real ones to it. It changed the look and gives it now more of a CGI look which is fine.

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Hairs and Eyebrows

For the hairs and eyebrows, nothing too complicated, some color and brightness adjustements and some fibers to give it the "hairs look"

For the last step of the retouching I added a jeans texture to the jacket and did some basic Dodge&Burn to give more depth to his face, and a little texture to the Background.

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