You may have an image at home where you don’t like the skin tone captured on the image. In this tutorial, we will be using the layers palette to apply a skin tone; other tools used in this tutorial include the erase tool.

To begin Navigate create a canvas to fit your image then place the image, name this layer “IMAGE” next we need to create a new layer where we will apply a solid colour to work with. Navigate to your menu bar and select Layer from the dropdown select new fill layer selecting solid colour. Choose a colour close to match the desired skin tone; do not worry about getting the exact tone as we will be applying other effects to make the tone subtle. For this tutorial I have selected the hexadecimal code #e3d586, however depending on the picture you are working with this can vary.

Applying Skin Tone Photoshop

Selecting the paint bucket click on your canvas to apply the colour to your new layer, name this layer “TONE”, this should fill your tone layer with colour and your picture should have disappeared behind, in your new layer pallet change normal to colour burn, you can lower the opacity and fill options to lower the colour. By selecting the colour burn you will notice the image burn through the solid colour.

To perfect the tone trying playing with the opacity and fill levels of the TONE layer, these settings are located on the layers palette. Next we need to remove the tone from the entire image leaving the effect only on the skin, make sure the tone layer is selected and select the eraser tool and with a suitable sized brush erase the effect from clothing, background and objects/furniture in the background. Remember to alter the size of brush you are using to get in close to edges.

The final steps select both layers by holding down ctrl, right click and merge layers.