Retouching Eyes in Photoshop

I think the key to a fantastic portrait lies with the eyes. They really need to capture the viewer and draw them into the picture in my opinion, and a little bit of Photoshop can go along way to making eyes pop. Here is a small tutorial to describe my way of doing it.

• Use a soft edged brush for this.
  
• Start with the Dodge tool set on highlights (around 15% opacity) to lighten the whites of the eyes (usually after any other retouching to skin etc) and the catch light in them if there is one.
• Use the Burn tool set to midtones (around 15%) to darken the pupil.
• Go back to the Dodge tool and set it to midtones (15%) and lighten the iris.
• Finally, use the Burn tool again (15%) set to midtones to darken around the outside of the eye. The brush size should be quite small, and try to keep just inside the eye so as not to make the whites outside darker.

And there you have it, eyes that pop. Here is an example of before and after of my mum's eyes.