Skip to content
Journal

Shooting skin without retouching

What changes when you promise a client that nothing will be smoothed out afterwards.

, 1 min read, beauty, light

Close up of a woman with dark hair pulled back and natural freckled skin

For the Skin series I made one rule: no retouching beyond dust. It changed everything about how we worked.

Light does the retouching

Big, soft, close light from one side. It keeps texture but never makes it harsh. Freckles and pores stay, and they look good.

Makeup as care, not cover

Elin Berg prepped skin for an hour and used almost no product. The glow in the pictures is moisturiser and daylight.

Objects in the same light

The products were shot in the same corner, at the same hour, so faces and bottles read as one series.

More from the journal

A hand in a linen sleeve holding a small woven bag against a pale wall

, process, styling

Building a set from one wall

Notes from the Linen campaign, where the whole shoot happened against a single stretch of plaster.