This business portrait (above) has several problems. The top-half of the head is overexposed, the lower hair is underexposed, the hair is a little messy, the teeth are a bit dark, and the eyeglasses are too low on the nose which puts the frames too close to the eyes.
Manual Retouching: Precision and Reliability
In the above photo, some edits required a human touch: shifting the eyeglasses up; reconstructing parts of the eye, eyelashes, and eyebrow; brightening the teeth; cleaning up stray hairs; evening out the exposure on the face; changing the lighting on the background.
Manual methods are precise and predictable, especially when working with facial features and adjusting the existing lighting. With manual editing, you change exactly, and only, what you want to change.
AI Retouching: Saves Time
Artificially intelligent (AI) tools were used to remove the necklaces and clean up the white shirt. AI can be much faster than retouching by hand. But AI literally has a mind of its own. When it works, it’s amazing, but when it doesn’t deliver as expected, it can be frustrating.
Replacing Clothing
This portrait suffers from bad lighting and a wrinkled, loose-fitting shirt. Harsh shadows distort the bridge of the nose, and the uneven lighting emphasizes skin texture.
Manual retouching can solve all these problems. But AI can fix clothing in a fraction of the time and often with sharper results. AI usually excels at replacing clothing, but it’s not always perfect. In the above photo, after the shirt was replaced, a number of small edits were manually applied to make the shirt more realistic.
Final Verdict: Manual vs AI Retouching
AI has limits. It struggles with fine details, hair, fabric textures, patterns, and facial features. It also lacks enough resolution for high-resolution images. These issues might go unnoticed for online images, but they can be painfully obvious in print.
However AI retouching is here to stay. It’s fast, often impressive, and sometimes even game-changing. But it’s not a complete solution. Manual editing is still essential for precision, reliability, and flexibility.
The best portrait retouching combines both techniques: AI for speed, manual tools for accuracy. Together, they can create results that look polished, natural, and professional.
More information on my photo retouching services.
