How to get leathery-face look?

A gimp mask has got to be good for a leather face.

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No need for special tricks.

  • convert to BW and put weight on green (and maybe blue) channel > skin tone will be darker and pores more visible
  • add contrast to taste
  • pull down midtones, if skin tone is too pale
  • add local contrast
  • oversharpen, especially use too high radius, but watch for jagged lines especially in hair - masking can help in this task

Usually red channel is favored in portrait BW-conversions because it usually yields pleasant low contrast look. Green channel will give darker skin tones and more contrasty skin, usually doesn’t look good if it has lots of weight.

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Had some G’MIC fun. Much gentler treatment.

Edit 2 A side by side comparison might be better. Zoom and enjoy!

The answer is bw adjusted for high contrast skin tones and … flash! Can also be achieve with other lighting but flash does the trick. You won’t be able to postprocess a good result.

Thought of this image when I filtered the dog in G'MIC fun with afre - #49 by afre.

Before

After

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