February 2008 Digital Group Meeting

Meeting Notes March 2009 to 2018.
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spb
Posts: 146
Joined: Tue Mar 25, 2008 7:04 pm

February 2008 Digital Group Meeting

Post by spb » Fri Apr 04, 2008 9:15 pm

Just to expand on a couple of processes I prefer in P/S:

Normally as Steve says you rarely paint as such in P/S however on
occasions it can be useful e.g. rescuing highlights; you may find this
method lacking with totally burnt out highlights (i.e R255,G255,B255)
but it is still worth a try: using the eyedropper pick up a colour that
you would have preferred the highlight to be, probably a colour adjacent
to the highlight. Select a nice soft brush and set the brush's opacity
at 10% to start with; most importantly set the brush mode to "Multiply",
then gentle and gradual brushing over the area will give an acceptable
result.

Although this wasn't mentioned last night if you have a high contrast
situation, this is a method I use at weddings: try to take your exposure
from an area that is equivalent to an 18% reflection e.g a brightly lit
bit of grass, stone or wood and lock that exposure; you should find
there is enough latitude to contain those highlights at in extreme cases
at the expense of shadows. Obviously a more considered approach would be
to use a tripod and either grey graduated filters or two exposures, one
for the sky and one for the foreground and join in P/S but with weddings
you rarely have time for such niceties.

The "Soft Light" method is extremely effective in burning and dodging
and again restoring lost colour: above your background create a blank
layer and set the mode to "Soft Light"; then Edit --Fill with 50% Gray;
again with a soft brush set to again about 10% opacity and with black
paint you can "Burn" in areas or with white paint you can "Dodge"; you
will also realise that you can achieve such with any colour so again it
can be used as a method of "restoring" colour to a washed out
detail.Somebody asked me how do I achieve the dark vignetting on my
pictures; I use the same method again "burning" in the edges; it is a
very useful method to cover up your mistakes :-)

Dark vignetting can also be created more classically by selecting the
areas you wish to darken applying a very heavy feather typically 150px
or more and then use levels to adjust the exposure of your selection to
taste.

I hope this is all useful, if anyone has any questions please feel free
to contact me if Steve is globe trotting.

Kind regards,

Peter.

--
Peter Jones LSWPP; ABPPA; APRS; DPAGB prettypictures
http://www.prettypicturesuk.co.uk; http://www.photoexperiences.co.uk
http://www.allyourimages.co.uk

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