Image retouching is not about changing an image meaninglessly or playfully. Or, only ‘good looking’ begets no good if it doesn’t serve the purpose. Professional’s ground never lets room to any nonsense or mind’s pleasure. I mentioned it, because I found many, specially amateurs, are biased with these.

My experiences in image industry want to say something about retouching and glamour enhancement here.
A short Prelude: Image retouching and glamour enhancement require Photoshop experts powered with deep understanding about photography and communication as well. First of all, you must investigate the given image to find out the drawbacks. Then you need to destine the changes in it; and finally work on it to serve the goal.

Story, Expression and Appeal: The first thing is to reveal the storyline that you are going to tell through the image. Your image must talk in favor of the goal. Again to say, be aware of futile beauty. It may be dumb before your viewer.

Observe the image thoroughly. Find out the ways to make it more expressive for a better story. Find out the key parts to put expression. Think about a human face. Where the key parts are? Eyes, lips and hair, bodyline. And What their expressions are? Look, smile, hair-dressing, gesture. Work on those and try to make photos good to better and better to best.

Coax up the appeal. It is a good technique to make the image stand out. Remember, the appeal should conform to the theme or it will distract the viewer. If there are approaching eyes or hands of model with a product, make sure that they are directed toward the viewer with detail, vivid look.

Retouch the dullness, wrinkles & spots: By thorough observation try to find out the dullness and spots. The better help you will get by enlarging the image. Then you can examine part by part, meticulously. Remove the spots; repair the wrinkles; but be careful with the dullness. Retouching of dullness is very intricate and involves experienced eye and arty mind. Don’t blunder here with much color and brightness. Never sponge or dodge it unnecessarily. Experienced says, – little retouch does good. So, be restrained and do better. You can streamline an image with well-designed Photoshop retouching tools. Combined and artful use of color, contrast and brightness can enhance an image amazingly.

For professional image retouching service: You must ask clients about where they are going to use the image and what do they think about changing it. It will not help you to plagiarize images or ideas from other. Consider every single project special. Think for special service for special photos. Family, official/organizational, model, product, travel – every particular kind has particular demand and approach. Try to interpret and translate them in your work for betterment.
With best care and intelligence an artist can enliven an image with another life. It will express more than its physical appearance and of course, soon you will get enthusiastic feedbacks from your clients and viewers. To be a professional, first make your eyes. Watch photos and the professional websites. They will tell you what to do with photos and what not. Try over and over again. From tradexcelgraphics.com and some other websites, I found lots of exciting photos and those inspired me to deal with photos and Photoshop.

Followings are some retouching and enhancement services that we can do with Adobe Photoshop tools:
Photo Optimization
Skin Smoothing
Red Eye Removal
Glare and Shine Removal
Clothing/Spot Touchup
Custom Cropping
Contrast Correction
Color Enhancement
Straighten Image
Brightness treatment Image
Minor Blemish Removal
Noise Removal
Edge Touch-up
Minor Wrinkle Reduction
Scar Removal
Minor Recoloring
Dark Circle Lightening (Eyes)
Teeth Whitening
Unwanted Vein Concealing/Removal
Makeup Enhancement
Hair Taming and Hair Dressing
Eye & Eyelash Enhancement
Color Cast Removal
Minor Object Removal
Selective Blurring
Lens/Focus Correction
Gesture Correction
Perspective Treatment

The convenience and quality of Photofiltre’s software is comparable to other popular choices, but it has the advantage of its free program offered for download. Like basic levels of Photoshop, the program allows users to crop and edit images, as well as remove or add elements from photos and graphic images.

Basic Editing
Basic editing features with Photofiltre are virtually the same as the basic features for Paintbrush, Photoshop, and other image software programs. Cropping and resizing functions include whole and partial images and canvas or frame size. These features allow users to shrink photos or images by pixel size or crop the edges from photographs.

Basic sepia and black and white functions allow users to alter images with an antiqued appearance with a single click. Functions for adjusting photo light levels and image contrast are on par with other programs, with an easy-to-use toolbar located just above the editing field.

Editing PhotosPhotofiltre’s software includes easy steps for removing “red eye” from photographs, a welcome improvement over many digital camera software programs whose automatic correction features leave something to be desired.

The “sharpen” and “soften” features allow users to correct some focus mistakes in photos or draw out artistic details in others. The user can sharpen colors or reduce harsh lighting in some photos using features like “gamma correct”, “contrast”, and “saturation” to modify the photo’s basic appearance.

Additional Features
Photofiltre’s free software program includes additional features that enhance artistic projects. Users can frame images with beveled or layered dimensional frames, or alter the color spectrum of an image, tinting the overall aspect in shades of green or pink. Photofiltre users can also layer text directly over an image without blocking out the underlying design, choosing from a variety of fonts and shadowing effects.
Editing details within images is also possible with Photofiltre. Graphic artists can cut items directly from an image or paste others in, using the image softening function to help blur the paste effect. Users can splice pieces of the background together to fill in the gap where an item has been removed.

Although the features are less impressive than advanced software like Photofiltre, the quality is advanced from Paintbrush or basic digital camera software programs, with a simple or user-friendly format that may appeal to less experienced artists.

Advanced Possibilities
Additional features provided allow users to alter an image to resemble charcoal or pen-and-ink sketches. Users can also employ the stamp function to add pre-chosen designs to an existing image, from snowflake lines to bird-like flock of miniatures.
Professional Photofiltre software includes functions on par with advanced Photoshop techniques, including advanced features for editing and improving photographs. The free program, however, will benefit most artistic users as well or better than many basic digital software program.