1. What’s the most misunderstood aspect of portrait retouching that you’d like photographers to know?

When working with an outside retoucher, their job is to take the vision of what the photographer would like the image to look like and bring that to life using various editing software. It’s not the retoucher’s job to add their own style to the image.

2. What photo or brand-related skill do you lack that you wish you had?

Marketing. Part of being a perfectionist comes with never being satisfied with your work and feeling like you could always keep improving your images. Because of this, it’s hard for me to think about my work as good enough to be on a public stage. But that’s what keeps me growing, so I’m okay with it. This is actually one of my goals for 2019!

3. You were an actress back in the day. What made you decide to move on?

I loved performing when I was growing up. Not only was it good to teach me poise while speaking publicly, it also taught me a lot about time management. Being in school while juggling acting classes, singing lessons as well as tap, jazz and ballet classes each week was not easy. But to be honest, being a professional performer is hard. It requires a ton of rejection, and I didn’t want to put myself through that day after day.

4. From your time being in front of the lens as a performer, what did you note that you wanted to improve as a photographer?

Since I grew up performing on stage and doing musical theater, I had experienced what it was like to be a headshot client. When I got my headshots done, we were recommended to a photographer, but the person who recommended him told my mother not to leave me alone in a room with him! Yikes… I wish I were kidding. Needless to say, now that I’m the photographer, I pride myself in making sure no client feels uncomfortable during our sessions.

5. What’s the story behind the name of your retouching company, SharkPixel?

It started as a play on my last name, Sherk. I figured I had two choices: Shrek (the green ogre) or Shark. The decision was kind of made for me. I’ve always loved the water, am an avid diver and underwater photographer, so Shark stuck. It also helps remind me to be more shark-like in business. Women tend to be too kind and tread lightly around sensitive issues. I feel that type of behavior can sometimes work against you in the business world, so the name SharkPixel helps remind me to be more tenacious when running my company.

6. How did you fall into underwater photography?

No pun intended? [laughs] I started as an underwater model for a well-known photographer named Chris Crumley. He is known as one of the first “mermaid photographers.” As I mentioned, I’ve always loved
the water and feel comfortable in it. It’s a calm, serene environment that strips away most of the world’s sensory stimuli. After a few years of working with Chris, he became a mentor for me. I like to say I’ve recently graduated from mermaid to mermaid photographer.

7. What’s the biggest trend you’re seeing in portrait retouching right now?

Color-grading is a big trend at the moment. It helps to make a photographer’s body of work look more consistent and cohesive. A really well-known retoucher named Pratik Naik just came out with his Photoshop plugin called Infinite Color Panel. It’s really cool!

8. What’s your opinion on retouching by slimming or reshaping a person’s facial features and other body parts,and where do you draw the line?

Depending on which lens a photographer uses to take a portrait, there is some distortion that can be created on facial features. This is something I feel comfortable tweaking in Photoshop.

9. You have some before and after shots on your site, and the differences are truly remarkable. What’s one of your key techniques?

Dodge and burn. Retouching skin and reshaping light are skills that take a lot of practice. It starts with training your eye to be able to see slight differences in color and tone. Once you get good at seeing these, the technique of dodging and burning will become easier—and something you’ll quickly learn you can’t live without. One of my main Photoshop mantras is, 90 percent of what you do in Photoshop can be accomplished by either changing the color of a pixel or changing its lightness or darkness value. Many photographers are too quick to jump into liquify to fix a problem that could easily be mitigated by simply tweaking the color or tonal value.

10. What’s your favorite remedy when you’re not feeling 100 percent?

Colloidal silver. Yep, I’m one of those crunchy weirdos. Back in 2014, I had a bad case of Lyme Disease and one of the things that helped me ultimately beat it was colloidal silver, along with antibiotics. Oh, and Halo Top ice cream. I can eat that stuff by the pint-full.

Kristina Sherk has been a high-end photo retoucher based out of Washington, D.C. for the past 10 years. She loves “translating Photoshop” for people and subsequently, she’s a contributing author for educational publications and the author behind five KelbyOne classes and Photoshop Cafe’s Fashion Retouching DVD.

See Kristina at WPPI 2019

“Retouching Faces: Photoshop for the Beauty and Portrait Photography”
Wednesday, February 27
10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Las Vegas, NV

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