About Face: Replacing Faces in Photos with Miss Behaving Workshops

In my previous tutorial, I showed you how to combine two photos together to get the pose you want.  Now, I’m going to show you how to use the same technique to change FACES on your photos!  Be honest with me. How many photos do you have where your child is looking the wrong way?  Perhaps you have more than one kid and at least one of them is making a goofy face or my personal favorite, digging for gold, in the middle of a family-portrait moment.

Awww … sweet photographic memories!

(Don’t toss the originals for goodness sakes!  They will come in handy when they get to be teenagers.  These precious photos will be perfect to show all of their friends and prospective dates when needed. Parenting perks! Ha!)

This photograph is perfect for Christmas cards, however, my little elf friend is looking the wrong way! Luckily, I never take just one photo.  I snap a minimum of three because I live in eternal hope that one will be perfect. However, if perfection is fleeting, I can also splice photos together.
Using the same Quick Selection technique explained in my other article in this issue of the DST Insider, How to Get That Perfect Shot or Make Your Own with MissBehaving Workshops, I selected the face from this photo.
Right-click inside your Layer Palette and select the Duplicate Layer option.
The Duplicate Layer Option box will pop up.  I want to send it to my first photograph.  Left-click on the Destination pull-down menu and send your selection/new layer mask to the original image.  Then click OK
Go back to your original image and your new face will be there waiting for you in the Layer Palette!  Yayyyyy!
However, you may need to tweak it and fit it into the space. Here is where the handy-dandy Transformation tool comes into play.
Hold down the CTRL key and the letter T key to activate the Transformation tool.  Mac users: Hold down the CMND key and the letter T key.
Take your mouse and hover over one of the anchor points. The arrow will turn from a solid black color to a double arrow to indicate that an anchor point has been selected. Grab and pull on only one of the anchor points.  You will see that the entire side of the section will transform.
Ummm … not exactly the look I’m going for here.  Heh!
However, to simply enlarge or minimize the overall section evenly, make sure to hold down the SHIFT key to resize the entire section as a complete unit.
Sometimes you may need to rotate your face.  Simply place your mouse away from the anchor points and the rotate arrows will appear. Then simply move your mouse to the left or right to get the correct angle to make then new face look natural.

Things to keep in mind while you transform a face:

1. The middle anchor points will affect the perspective as a whole, while the corner anchor points will transform the size.
2. Aspirin is in the cupboard.

So, here is our original:
And here is our final result:

Pretty cool, huh! Just in case you missed it, I have one more example for the cheap seats in the back.

Ahhh … Holiday Cheer!

Oh wait … we have one grumpy pants. If you have a daughter who happens to be a Drama Queen, I would bet big money that you have a shot just like this! I have several … thousands.
This really must be appreciated to the fullest.  Here’s a close up so you can share the love.
Using the same Quick-Selection technique again, I’ve selected the smiling young lady’s face in another photo…
…and then turned her frown upside down by replacing her *ahem* concern with some true holiday cheer.
The Spirit of Fairness must prevail, so I am happy to share our princess with a close up of her much more pleasing puss.

And now this family will have a cheerful family Christmas card photo to send:

Thank you so much for joining me during this learning adventure.  It is my fondest wish that you had fun and more importantly, learned something new! May this season find you all filled with love, happiness, maybe some fruitcake (eh) or even eggnog (yay!) and the beauty of this Holiday.

I’ll tell you a little bit about me but I’m a pretty short person. (Both in verbiage and stature … heh). I like to make up for it in personality! My name is Melissa but most know me as MissBehaving. I’m married to a hunk o’ burnin’ love who fortunately cooks. Fortunate in that none of us starves around here. We have three kiddos. Home is South Florida. Right on the edge of the Everglades. We have the most fabulous neighborly visits from a backyard full of fun critters such as gators and exotic birds. We LOVE art around here. Most of the artwork hanging in my house is done by family. I was a teacher by day and I really love the “Aha!” moment when a student discovers how to do something. It’s the spark in their eyes and the fiercely proud grin they can’t hold back that gets a smile on my face every single time. I really enjoy teaching and writing tutorials. I learned Photoshop by tutorials and I figured, why not give something back.You can find my workshops here at DeviantScrap. Track me down on Facebook, visit my blog or sign up for my newsletter.

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