Enhancing Photos

[Charlie Bettell]

Using Photoshop7, I first crop the photo to suite...

 

 

I then Resize the photo to suite...

 

 

I then alter Levels to suite...

 

 

Slide the outside level adjusters to the outer edges of your histogram - then slide the centre level adjuster left/right to suite...

 

 

I then have a little play about with contrast...

 

 

I then use Unsharp Mask...

 

 

I up the sharpness by 25% to start with...

 

 

I then sit back and have a close look at my edited photo...

 

 

I go back in History to see exactly how much I have improved the photo...

 

 

When I am happy with the changes, I save the photo as a .jpg file.

 

 

There are various other things that I could have done to improve the finished photo above - like use 'Dodge' to brighten areas of the photo, and 'Burn' on darken areas of the photo - like the water directly in front of the otter's nose.

 

If you want to be really creative, open a new Layer and try your hand at Colour Dodge, Linear Dodge - or various other effects.

 

Have fun!!

Edited June 12, 2006 by Charlie Bettell

[Steve Randles]

Excellent Charlie!!

 

I'll do one tonight, and add it to this thread. How I do it, using Photoshop CS2.

 

Anyone else care to jump in and make a mini tutorial for some of the other editing progs?

 

Steve...

[Guest Jan of the 2 Ghillies]

Excellent Charlie!!

 

I'll do one tonight, and add it to this thread. How I do it, using Photoshop CS2.

 

Anyone else care to jump in and make a mini tutorial for some of the other editing progs?

 

Steve...

 

Great, Steve, I was hoping for a CS2 translation. My pictures from the UK await.

[Colin Brett]

Charlie,

 

Go you enhance for the computer monitor or for print?

 

You can use the crop tool to resize not only the physical dimensions but also the resolution all in one go.

 

Select the crop tool from the tool bar and put in the values in the width and height boxes also the resolution [i use 254 pix/inch] Then click and drag your selection from your original image. If you are happy with the selection click on the tick on the selection line [bar] and Hey Presto CS2 will resize to for example 7in x 5in 254 pix per inch all ready for printing. Well it is after you have sharpened etc.

 

 

 

Why do you save using jpeg?? Do you use PSD or Tiff which are no loss formats? I use both jpeg and psd all depending on what I need to use the images for, I expect you do the same?

 

Colin

[Charlie Bettell]

I mainly enhance for the www Colin.

 

If I were going to print, or send to a magazine for print, I would usually convert to CMYK and save in whatever format the publisher required the photos to be sent in - e.g. RAW, EPS, JPG, TIFF, etc.

 

I prefer to crop first (crop being very different to reducing in size), then adjust my image sharpness - that way I end up with a better quality, smaller photo.

 

The boat photo that you 'reduced' in size, has, in my opinion, became very grainy.

 

The way I do things prevents that sort of thing happening - due mainly to me doing things by eye.

Edited June 9, 2006 by Charlie Bettell

[Colin Brett]

I mainly enhance for the www Colin.

 

If I were going to print, or send to a magazine for print, I would usually convert to CMYK and save in whatever format the publisher required the photos to be sent in - e.g. RAW, EPS, JPG, TIFF, etc.

 

I prefer to crop first (crop being very different to reducing in size), then adjust my image sharpness - that way I end up with a better quality, smaller photo.

 

The boat photo that you 'reduced' in size, has, in my opinion, became very grainy.

 

The way I do things prevents that sort of thing happening - due mainly to me doing things by eye.

 

Charlie,

 

I guessed that the file format answer would be the one you have given, thanks.

 

Can't agree on the resizing though. The method described was shown to me by a pro photographer and if it's good enough for him?? The picture shows no sign of noise when printed.

 

Doing things by eye is a great gift, I have a film maker friend who can take one look at a photo and if there is a colour problem, he can spot it straight away and tell by how much it needs correcting.

Make sure you are wearing eye protection when you are chasing those Sea trout.

 

Colin

[Charlie Bettell]

Charlie,

 

I guessed that the file format answer would be the one you have given, thanks.

 

Can't agree on the resizing though. The method described was shown to me by a pro photographer and if it's good enough for him?? The picture shows no sign of noise when printed.

 

Doing things by eye is a great gift, I have a film maker friend who can take one look at a photo and if there is a colour problem, he can spot it straight away and tell by how much it needs correcting.

Make sure you are wearing eye protection when you are chasing those Sea trout.

 

Colin

We all have our own ways of doing things I guess Colin - I like the way that I 'crop' and 'size', and you like the way that you 'crop' and 're-size' - and change image 'resolution/sharpness'.

 

The main reason why an armature or pro photographer would 're-size' a photo in the way you describe, would be to give an exact photo size and resolution - e.g. 7Hx5W @ 300 DPI/Resolution - although when I tried that out, it did not work as planned.

 

When 'cropping' and 'sizing' your way, I found it best to go 7in x 5in - and leave Resolution blank.

 

The reason why your 're-sized' boat photo looks grainy to my eye, is, in my opinion, because you dropped down to 254 Resolution - which is probably a lower resolution than your original photo.

 

If you do the same edit again, leaving Resolution blank, you should not spot any grain change when viewing the 'cropped & re-sized' photo on the www.

 

As for the eye protection for sea trout fishing, I wear glasses full-time.

 

Click Link: http://www.esox.co.uk/images/Sea-Trout-Mouth.jpg

Edited June 10, 2006 by Charlie Bettell

[Guest CJS2]

Tutorials are excellent, frankly the best I've seen? . . . they are so simple to understand, well don. I have always been concerned when one reads, "Help! how do I . . ." the written description of 'how' gets complicated and so often assume some knowledge!!! . . help would not be required . . .

 

I would add, that for the excellent Tutorial by Charlie Bettell, it could apply equally as well to 'Photo Shop Elements'. I have a beef with the cost of PS at £*!*!* outragouse!!! When 'Elements' can be had for a 1/10th (or less) of the cost, Elements does everything that is required in the 'AN photo comp.,', plus in its v.4 version is capable of so much inc., RAW manipulation.

 

There, got that off my chest, crawl back int me'e corner.

 

[Colin Brett]

When 'cropping' and 'sizing' your way, I found it best to go 7in x 5in - and leave Resolution blank.

 

The reason why your 're-sized' boat photo looks grainy to my eye, is, in my opinion, because you dropped down to 254 Resolution - which is probably a lower resolution than your original photo.

 

If you do the same edit again, leaving Resolution blank, you should not spot any grain change when viewing the 'cropped & re-sized' photo on the www.

 

Charlie,

 

I'll give "your" way a try and see how it goes.

 

Colin

[Charlie Bettell]

Tutorials are excellent, frankly the best I've seen? . . . they are so simple to understand, well don. I have always been concerned when one reads, "Help! how do I . . ." the written description of 'how' gets complicated and so often assume some knowledge!!! . . help would not be required . . .

 

I would add, that for the excellent Tutorial by Charlie Bettell, it could apply equally as well to 'Photo Shop Elements'. I have a beef with the cost of PS at £*!*!* outragouse!!! When 'Elements' can be had for a 1/10th (or less) of the cost, Elements does everything that is required in the 'AN photo comp.,', plus in its v.4 version is capable of so much inc., RAW manipulation.

 

There, got that off my chest, crawl back int me'e corner.

 

Thanks for the kind words mate.

 

I also use Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 - which I prefer in some ways to Adobe Photoshop 7.

 

Elements 2.0 has a quick fix for red eye - the dearer Photoshop 7 hasn't!

 

Elements 2.0, to some extent, has a better layout to Photoshop 7.

 

As I said before, Photoshop Elements 2.0 is supplied with many high end Canon cameras - it's almost worth buying a high end Canon camera just for the free software!