Category Archives: retouching

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Brit & Mac - Save the Date Retouching

December 19, 2007 – 9:37 am

Brit and Mac are making their save the date and want to use a photo from our recent engagement photo shoot.

The bright blue wall doesn’t go with their color scheme, however. This is the design for the save the date:

As you can see, there’s a really nice sage green used in it. So why not try to make the wall the same color?

We’re always happy to try to match your photos to your style, personality, and definitely your wedding colors. And be sure to send along a copy of wherever you use them so we can show off your gorgeous details to future clients! :)

By Lara | Also posted in engagement, portrait | Comments (1)

ASI Retouching Samples

December 7, 2007 – 8:19 am

There are many different types of retouching - and really, the sky’s the limit on what we can do in Photoshop. Below are samples of the various types that we’ve done, and I hope it gives you a good idea of the different types and what they involve.

Cosmetic

For cosmetic retouching, we are cleaning up parts of the image for the client. This may mean removing blemishes and wisps of hair, it may mean using various techniques to make an individual look thinner, it may mean cleaning up a photograph that got dirty or dusty. It may even mean giving the photograph an entirely new spin by color-correcting, contrast-correcting, or other overall techniques.

Compositing

When you are compositing, you are taking elements from different photos and melding them together. This is much more work, and it’s helpful if you have two very similar photographs to work from. This happens for a lot of group shots where one person is blinking and you need to swap in their head from another photo.

Creation of new elements

In this case, there are elements that didn’t exist in the original photo that we had to create. We had no photo to copy these elements from. This is the most difficult kind of retouching.

If you want to see if we can retouch your photo, feel free to send it along! We can always give it a shot.

By Lara | Comments (1)

Colorful Thursdays: Combining color and black and white

December 6, 2007 – 8:52 am

Although it’s starting to go out of style, many couples wanted a few images where there was a selected area of color and the rest in black and white. Some wanted their bouquets in color while they were in black and white, others wanted people in color and backgrounds in black and white, and so on. This can be a really interesting thing to do, and there’s many ways to do it. Here’s how to do it the easy way.

Brad took this image at one of our weddings this summer. We’re going to make it so only the pink flowers are in color. For those of you who are interested in doing this, I’d suggest you also make any greenery attached to flowers in color - it looks better. But for this example, pink makes our point clear!

First, go to your Layers palette. Click and drag your Background layer to the New Layer button (shown below) to make a copy of it.

Now your Layers palette should look like this:

Select the bottom Background layer. We’re going to make some changes to it. Go to Image > Adjustments > Hue & Saturation (otherwise known as Ctrl+U).

A window will pop up. Click the Saturation slider and slide it all the way to the left. This will desaturate your Background layer, turning it into black and white.

Although your image won’t look black and white because the top layer (”Background copy”) is still in color, the Background layer has desaturated. If you look in your layers palette, like in the picture above, you can see that it’s now in black and white.

Select the top layer, “Background copy”. Now we’re going to erase all of the parts around the pink flowers. First, select the eraser tool. You should have a low hardness on it. The diameter depends upon the level of detail that you’ll be going in and erasing. If there are lots of little bumps that you’re erasing around, or some very tight corners, use a smaller brush. If it’s a large, smooth area, you can get away with using a larger brush.

Click on the image where you want to erase. As you drag your brush around, you’ll notice that the black and white layer underneath appears!

Here’s what the Background Copy layer will look like when you’re finished, if you have the Background layer hidden:

Now, I did a pretty sloppy job, so I would then go back and do more detail around the parts that I missed. Here’s the finished product:

Tomorrow is the last in our series of “How-to”s for Photoshop this week. Leave a note in the comments if there are other techniques you’d like to learn how to do!

By Lara | Comments (0)

Retouching - How to use blur in a creative way

December 5, 2007 – 9:57 am

You may have heard the term “short depth of field”. What this essentially means is that a very select portion of the photo is in focus. Sometimes photos have foreground elements that are in focus and background elements that are out of focus; this is a photo with a short depth of field. These photos are much more interesting than photos with a long depth of field.

So what happens if you’re not sure how to set the depth of field on your camera, but you want that same effect? Well first, I’d highly recommend reading up on how to work with your aperture to achieve this goal, but in the meantime, here’s a quick Photoshop tip.

In this photo, we have a longer depth of field. You can still see clear edges of the trees in the background, and the foreground is also in focus. We are going to use the blur tool to simulate a shorter depth of field.

The blur tool is in your tool palette. Go ahead and select it as shown above. Now, we need to change the blur settings. This looks very similar to the brush tool - you can choose your diameter, hardness, etc. We want a very soft brush here because we don’t want it to be clear where we’ve blurred and where we didn’t - things should blend together. I typically start with 0% hardness and try it out. If it’s too little, then I increase the hardness and try again.

I also typically start at a strength of 70%. This allows me to see a big effect when I use the tool but not so much that it looks fake. When you use the tool, you can always go over a blurry area over and over to increase its blur, so don’t worry about it not being blurry enough the first time. This is another thing that you can change based on what image you’re using, so feel free to try an even lower strength and change it through trial and error.

Now it’s time to create some blur. Just like you’re painting with a brush, click and drag on an area of the photo to blur it.

I painted on everything in the background - all of the trees and the fence. Here’s the result:

As you can see, it makes a difference in the image. You can make it more subtle or more flagrant - it depends on the photo and what your style is.

By Lara | Comments (0)

Retouching - How to make your photos pop

December 4, 2007 – 9:21 am

Adjusting Levels in Photoshop

This is a really simple technique to use to add a whole lotta punch to your photo. What you’re working with is a histogram - a map, sort of, of everything from bright spots to dark spots. It shows you how much darkness and how might lightness is in your image. By changing these you can change the contrast and drama of your photo.

If you look at the picture below (which was taken by one of my awesome brides), you can tell that the moth is absolutely beautiful but a little more contrast could add a lot to the image. The Levels box is open (I’ll walk through that in a second). There are more shadows than there are bright spots, so the map is heavier on the left and lighter on the right. (The map goes from complete black on the left to complete white on the right - midtones are, you got it, smack in the middle.)

moth1

A really dark photo will have the whole left third of the map filled in. A really bright photo with parts blown out will have the whole right third of the map filled in.

To see your levels, go to “Image” (in the top bar), then click “Adjustments”, then click “Levels”. Also known as Ctrl+L.

Here comes the fun part. See the black triangle on the left, under the map? It’s right by “0″. Slide it to the right. Your darks become darker. You can take the midtones and slide them around, and the brights and slide them around. You have so many options, especially with midtones.

moth2

Often I slide the shadows triangle until it hits the first big spike. In the image above I’ve slid it until it hit a big spike - it created some really cool contrast, and makes the moth pop because the leaves are darker and less distracting as now they’re not similar to the shade of the moth. You could also move the brights triangle to the left and make the image pop even more. It’s up to you, artistically.

Adjusting Saturation in Photoshop

A last, subtle thing for incredible quality. This is in the same area as levels (Image > Adjustments > Hue & Saturation, aka Ctrl+U).

Slide that “saturation” ticker up. Keep going. Nice - now THAT is GREEN!

moth3

There are no hard and fast rules for these little touches - it’s all based on your style and artistry, and what the image needs. Some need just a hint, others need a lot of work. It’s good to practice with it so you know what works for you and your style of photography.

By Lara | Comments (0)