Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the original photo. Not bad, not great. The mountains have a lot of haze, while the foreground is dark. Just when you forgot that nice +2 gradient filter at home. Don't lose hope!
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The original
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the view in Photoshop. I use Photoshop 7, and I'm sure later versions like CS etc. Have a better look and feel. These instructions should work with the later versions.
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First Look
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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The first thing to do is select Quick Mask. It's the icon in the lower right. Look at my junky hand drawn arrow.
Clicking on this button takes you to another layer where you will constuct a mask. When you return to the original view, the stuff you drew will NOT be selected.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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OK, so I'm in quick mask mode, and the first thing I want to do is use the gradient tool. If you see an icon of a paint bucket, that is the fill tool, and you have to click and hold on the little arrow on the icon to show the gradient tool.
If you hover above the icon PS will tell you the name of the tool. Yay!
Click on the gradient tool.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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The next part is somewhat hard to show. You will click on the beginning of this arrow, and then drag to the end of this arrow.
Where you start the gradient will be the positive color (dark in mask mode by default) and where you end will be the negative color (light by default). Mess with the gradient until you get it right.
In this case, I am masking off the mountains gradually so that I can in turn select just the sky.
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Gradient Selection
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the result from the gradient tool. I masked out the dark foreground and gradually lighten to the top of the sky.
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Gradient
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Now that I have my gradient set up, I need to return to the photograph. I click on the icon to return to Standard Mode where the mask will turn into a selection.
Once again a completely non-professional arrow shows you where to click.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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When you are back in standard mode, you will see a marquee selecting just the area you did not mask. Nifty.
To darken the sky, I select Levels from the menu bar from Image>Adjustments>Levels or Control-L.
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Another Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is what the Levels panel looks like. It is a plot of the brightness of the selected pixels from black (on the right) to white (on the right).
There are three Arrows on the bottom. The black shows where the darkest point of the selection is set. The gray shows where the 50% point of the selection is set. The white triangle shows where the lightest point of the selection is set.
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Levels Panel
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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To darken the photo I drag the dark triangle to where the levels appear to taper off. I move the midpoint gray triangle to the left to darken the sky even more.
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Levels Panel
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the result of using the levels control panel on a gradient mask. The sky is darkened, and the selection was so gradual that there are no masking lines as a give away.
NOTE: In this walkthrough I've adjusted the photo using individual masks. However, there is a better way using adjustment layers, which are specififcally designed to adjust images in certain areas or in gradations, and are much easier to use, as they create both the adjustment (curves, level, hue/saturation, brighness/contrast, etc) and the mask all in one step. They will inflate the file size.
With adjustment layers, you can many as many adjustment layers as you want and then flatten the image one you're satisfied, remapping the image only once. Here is a link to the adjustment layers and some PS basics. http://www.twistedtreephoto.com/Photoshop%20tutorial/Photoshop%20tutorial1.html
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The result
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Let's go back to Quick Mask mode. Click on the quick mask button and make sure you have the gradient tool selected.
This time around, I'm going to create a gradient band instead of a steady ramp from dark to light. At the top of the window you can find the icon to click.
Just follow the junky arrow...
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Menu at top
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the result of the gradient, with a blue arrow showing where I clicked and dragged. You start at where the center of the gradient will be, and stop dragging where one end will be defined.
In this case I will select the middle.
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Another Gradient
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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When I return to standard mode, the middle gradient is masked. I have to use the select inverse command to turn the gradient I used from a mask into the selection.
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Select inverse
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Select the levels control panel. I adjusted the levels to darken the background and remove that horrible haze (Next time I'll thread on a UV filter).
Here is the result with the level settings.
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After more levels
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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It's back to the Quick Mask, and this time I'm using the standard ramp quick mask. This time I use the gradient to mask out everything but the foreground, which is dark and loses the bison.
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Another Gradient
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the result and the level settings to lighten the foreground. Now the bison pop out from the grass.
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The result, again.
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Another trip to Quick Mask land...
This time instead of using the gradient, I'm going to use the paintbrush tool, and I use a brush with a blended profile.
Some more arrows to show you I'm going from gradient to brush.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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You can see the brush I selected in the upper left.
Here is the result of my semi-horrible mouse painting skills. If often switch from the positive to the negative on the brush to add and then subtract the mask.
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Mask
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Another shot showing the result of applying levels - this mask was to match up all the other work.
After this one, I go through with a dodge and burn tools set at 5% and do some really fine noodling.
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Touch Up
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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One final adjustment I have to make sometimes is to gently nudge the saturation of the photograph. My digital camera tends to be highly accurate, and I've noticed that the Kodak and Fuji films I used before had better color saturation.
Here is the menu to the saturation panel.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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To make the picture look more like film I sometimes push the saturation a little higher.
Here is the after with the control panel in the screen.
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Saturated!
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Some people have wondered how to get the older look to their photographs.
Read on if you want...
Here is the menu to convert the color image to black and white.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the image in black and white. I hit it with one more level to adjust any light or dark colors that may have turned out light or dark grays. I also tend to darken the mid grays to give the image a little more drama.
Remember: Don't just convert to B&W with desaturation. Actually create the B&W and then correct through levels to get accurate white and black points.
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Black and White
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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This photograph is now a nice black and white.
To give it a nice sepia tone I have to convert it back to RGB color.
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Color!
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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To tone the image, I use the color balance panel. Here is menu path to the color balance panel.
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The Menu
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the result with the settings I used. For a nice sepia tone, I shift the blue channel to yellow, and I add half the amount to red in the red channel. The settings here are +25 Red, and -50 Blue.
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Color Balance
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Here is the final photograph.
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Final
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/20/2005
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Well, go back to the top to see the before and after if you want to see the before and after. Hope that you learned something new to use.
You don't have to use Photoshop. Picasa, which is currently free, has simular tools, as do many other applications.
Check out some of my photographs if you liked the walkthrough. See if you can tell which ones were altered using these techniques and which were not.
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Judi Liosatos
(K=34029) - Comment Date 6/21/2005
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Very well done Michael. I am hoping that an area will be started that we can put all these types of tutorials in, so people can go straight to them, instead of trying to file through all the forums.
Judi
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Naomi Weidner
(K=6579) - Comment Date 6/22/2005
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Thanks, Michael, for the excellent tutorial. This is something I've been meaning to try. Now you've given me great tips and inspiration. -- Naomi
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Kim Culbert
(K=36887) - Comment Date 9/11/2005
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Hi Michael,
Many people seemed to have gotten great use of this article... I was wondering if you could please email me a copy, as the images seemed to have disappeared off Usefilm and I am finding it hard to follow along without the images as references.
My email is kimbalina @ hotmail.com ...
Thanks so much!
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Justin Skinner
(K=690) - Comment Date 9/13/2005
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Hi Michael, I was wondering on how this gradient stuff works. The pics wont load. If you could drop me an email at Farm4Fun@msn.com i would appreciate very much.
Justin
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 9/14/2005
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Justin -
Give me a few days - I have a new laptop to build out, but then I will rebuild the thread.
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 5/31/2006
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Nudge to the top of the stack again.
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Dave Arnold
(K=55654) - Comment Date 6/14/2006
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Fantastic tutorial, Michael. Exactly what I am looking for. I think I will copy all of this to a word doc so I can use it in the event it ever disappears.
Thanks so much, that was a LOT of work you put into this.
Best wishes,
Dave
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/14/2006
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Dave:
I have this in a word doc. I can send it to you if you e-mail me at mkanemoto under a gmail account.
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Dave Arnold
(K=55654) - Comment Date 6/14/2006
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Thanks Michael but now I have it too. I stayed up till 4 AM copying it and then playing with a couple photos using the techniques step by step.
I am going to have some questions for sure but I haven't gone to the site you mentioned on masks.
Agasin, thanks for doing that, it is a BIG help.
Dave
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Dave Arnold
(K=55654) - Comment Date 6/14/2006
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Quickly doing some levels adjusting and then converting to that sepia look, here's what I came up with.
On photos such as this, using the gradient mask to darken the sky alone just doesn't work, correct? Since you would be adjusting the levels of the rock as well as the sky. So on this, I used the magic wand to select the sky.
But, In your original image, you have an uneven skyline due to the mountains and I am not sure how you controlled adjusting the sky only, nor how you accomplsihed the sky being so gradient looking. Unless that was the product of the sky being gradient in the first place.
I've tried a mountain scene as well but suing the gradient mask, it alters the top portions of the mountains, leaving them half adjusted. My gradient is at 100% but once you click back to standard view, the mask leaves a bounding box that is straight-edged.
Maybe I misunderstood when you talked about how your sky is left with a gradient instead of a straight line?
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Tower face
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/14/2006
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Dave:
OK, so now you have discovered that there is a little bit of artistry to this whole quick masking thing. You caught me oversimplifying for the purposes of making the walk through.
In a nutshell - when you have mountains or other objects and you need to really make a huge adjustment you just have to dig in and carefully paint a mask in. Sorry.
At the end of the day you may get a masking line as well - and then you have to take a nice 5 pixel clone stamp and clone in the tones around that masking line to get a clean image. I usually work at 400%.
If it makes you feel any better this image took about 2 straight hours to mask the sky on the pixel level, and then I used the cloning tool to remove any masking lines for another 4 hours so there would not be a visible masking line.
http://www.usefilm.com/Image.asp?ID=1037216
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Dave Arnold
(K=55654) - Comment Date 6/15/2006
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Michael
I kind of, sort of figured as much. On the butte picture you commented on, I did change the sky to a sky of a photo shot moments before. The problem with the butte was that there was a wall of clouds coming in behind the butte. When I tried to work with it, it presented a very blatant white line across the top of the butte, as if I had done nothing to the sky on either side of the butte. I ended up erasing that whole sky and putting in the other.
That whole photo was nothing more than a practice of your tutorial. You mentioned using a wide angle and getting closer. I had hiked up to another mesa and was just trying to capture that view in addition to the close-ups of one I had hiked to.
I will definitely keep in mind your suggestion of wide angle on these landscapes. However, a lot of times, these are on private property and I can't get near them. All of the forests are closed due to fire danger, so in my shoots, I am stuck with a lot of telephoto shots.
I used your tutorial to also re-work the "your help please" photo. The re-worked one is titled "Allen's Slide" in my portfolio. I wanted that vintage, hard core, simple camera sepia look. I THINK I got close to what I was after.
Still playing and learning from you. Many thanks.
Dave
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Michael Kanemoto
(K=22103) - Comment Date 6/19/2006
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