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You are here: Home / 2016 / Archives for November 2016

Archives for November 2016

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Using Tone Curve to Fix Shadows & Highlights in Adobe Lightroom

November 30, 2016

I can tell you this with confidence. When editing a photo in either Adobe Lightroom or Camera Raw, I’ve never not used at least one of the primary brightness or darkness sliders in the Basic panel. The sliders I’m referring to are Highlights, Shadows, Whites and Blacks. I’m not sure how many times I’ve used these programs, but these areas are the ones I adjust almost every single time.

While this is all well and good, there’s a small issue that arises when dealing with these areas of an image. The issue is called “clipping.” As any of these sliders are pushed one way or the other, things can go too far, causing either pure white or pure black. I’ve actually talked about this issue a lot on this website. To review my previous posts on this topic, please visit the page below.

Using the Histogram Clipping Warnings in Adobe Camera Raw

Working With Clipping Indicators in Adobe Lightroom

Now, just to fill you in, the clipping indicators in both Camera Raw and Lightroom act the same way. They both offer warning colors that are plainly visible if you’ve either gone too far with your edits or if the image was flawed straight out of the camera. I’ve said this a lot in the past – Camera Raw and Lightroom are very similar in many respects.

Since I’ve already covered most of what I have to say about the clipping indicators in both applications, I’d like to go one step further in today’s post. Today, I’d like to show you a really cool trick I use in Adobe Lightroom that deals with photos that don’t respond well to removing the clipping indicators from a photo without screwing up other aspects of it. It’s a fast and easy trick that I think you’ll enjoy.

Original Image

I’ll use a photo of a beautiful cat for today’s post. I’ve already gone ahead and have completed my usual adjustments to the photo and I’d say it looks really good.

Using Tone Curve to Fix Shadows & Highlights in Adobe Lightroom

Let’s see what happens when I explore the photo further.

Turning On the Clipping Indicators

So far, I’ve make some changes in the Basic panel of Lightroom. There’s nothing out of the ordinary here. Take a look at the panel below.

Lightroom Basic Panel Adjustments

As you can see if you look at the sliders, I haven’t done anything drastic. On my computer screen, I think things look pretty good. On a normal day, I’d say I was finished. Today though, I’d like to turn on the clipping indicators to see if anything is out of whack.

Turning On Clipping Indicators

Umm…yeah. I think there’s something going on that I didn’t notice before. Apparently, I’ve got some areas of pure black and some of pure white. By the way, I circled the clipping indicator controls in the above screenshot. Just click the small triangles inside the circles to turn these on and off. If you’d like to use a keyboard shortcut instead, you can simply press the J key. That controls both indicators at the same time.

By the way, it’s quite common to have clipping issues when using images for the web. They’re not that noticeable. It’s when you go to print them that things look weird. Large blotches of white or black are much more visible on paper.

Controlling Clipping

If you’ve ever edited a photo, only to see that you’ve got some clipping issues, you probably know that it isn’t the easiest thing to cure. Sure, you can push some sliders back and forth in an effort to remove the red and blue, but what happens to the actual photo when you do this? Your changes begin to come undone, that’s what. Also, you’ll notice that moving one slider often isn’t enough. You’ll need to move a few, but when you do this, you may lose track of what you’ve done. Personally, I get all sorts of confused when I start touching too many things in these programs. It gets especially bad when I think I have something set perfectly and when I have to back off some areas. That’s not why I’m in the application. I’m in there to make photos look good, not mild.

Anyway, let me introduce you to the tip I want to share today.

Introducing Tone Curve

I’ll give you some background on what Tone Curve is.

The Tone Curve represents all the tones of your image. The bottom axis of the Tone Curve is the Tone axis: the line starts with Shadows at the left-most end and ends with Highlights in the right-most end. In the middle you have Midtones, which are then further split into darker Midtones, called Darks in Lightroom, and brighter Midtones, called Lights. In other words, going left to right, the curve starts with Shadows, Darks, Lights and ends with Highlights. Source.

In the right column, if I collapse the Basic panel, I’ll find the Tone Curve panel. To open that panel, I’ll click the respective triangle that sits to the right of the panel title.

Tone Curve Panel

The really cool thing about using this Tone Curve is that not much in the way of changes are needed to make a fairly large difference. The trick is, you need to be sure to push things the correct direction.

For instance, I’ll go ahead and grab the lower left curve handle and slide it in about 15%. Let’s see what happens to the Shadow (blue) clipping indicator when I do this.

Shadow Clipping

Wow. I just made things a lot worse. I’ll reverse what I did there and instead, I’ll push that same handle up the left side a hair. I’ll do this until I don’t see the blue overlay anymore.

Remove Shadow Clipping

Now that’s impressive. I merely went up the side wall 2% and all the blue clipping overlay disappeared. That sure beats messing with sliders in the Basic panel.

Next, I’ll grab the opposite corner’s handle and move it to the left about 15%. Let’s see what happens to the Highlight (red) clipping indicator when I do this.

Highlight Clipping

Yeah, that’s not good at all. I definitely don’t want that. To fix this, I’ll do what I did to the shadow side. I’ll push the corner handle down the right side a bit instead.

Remove Highlight Clipping

Again, I didn’t have to move the handle much at all. Less than 1% to be exact. With just that small move, all the red is gone. That’s powerful.

Now, if I wanted to, I could head back into the Basic panel to further edit the photo. I now know that I can fix any clipping that occurs by using the Tone Curve tool, so I have some additional liberty to do as I wish. Powerful indeed, especially if I was using a RAW image that was taken with a camera that offers a wide dynamic range.

The Tone Curve tool in both Lightroom and Camera Raw easily removes any pure black or pure white from a photo. That’s why it’s such a powerful solution when attempting to resolve clipping situations. Give this tool a try the next time you’re in either of these applications. They both work the same way.

Point Curve

I’d like to mention one last thing before I end this post. If you do decide to experiment in the Tone Curve panel in Adobe Lightroom, you may see a different panel than the one I showed here. Basically, there are a few different views. The one you want is Point Curve and the way to get there is to click on the small box that sits in the lower right corner of the panel.

Tone Curve Panel - Point Curve View

Once you do that, you’ll have the same view as I had here and you’ll be able to see what you can do with your photograph.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding this post, please leave them in the comment section below. I’m always here to help. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Lightroom


Building Sequential Virtual Copies For Easier Edits in Adobe Lightroom

November 26, 2016

I was doing some work in Adobe Lightroom last week when I stumbled upon an idea for a post. The project I was working on called for a certain black and white look for a photograph. I wasn’t sure exactly what I wanted, but I was definitely sure that I didn’t want to create one black and white virtual copy of a photo and then create brand new ones thereafter. My idea was to create one black and white virtual copy of the photo, work on it, and then create another copy based on the one I just made changes to. I could repeat the process as much as I needed to and constantly build from what I had already done. Doing this would quickly and efficiently lead me to my desired result.

I completed the project successfully. Since I had saved so much time with the technique I used, I decided to share it here. It’s a small tip, but one that can have profound time saving advantages.

In today’s post, I’ll be using a demo photo to go through the same exact process as I followed with my project last week. I’ll start with the original photo and create a sequence of changes via the use of virtual copies in Adobe Lightroom.

Original Photo

The photo I’ll be working on today to demonstrate the necessary steps in this tutorial is below. It’s the perfect photo to transform into black and white. It’s simply fierce.

Building Sequential Virtual Copies For Easier Edits in Adobe Lightroom

Creating Virtual Copies

If you aren’t experienced with creating virtual copies in Adobe Lightroom, have no fear. I’ve already written a few good posts on the topic. Check them out below.

What Are Virtual Copies in Adobe Lightroom?

How to Create Virtual Copies in Adobe Lightroom

Creating Sample Photos with Virtual Copies in Adobe Lightroom

Just for this post, I’ll go ahead and create a new virtual copy now.

The first thing I’ll do is launch Lightroom and click on the Develop tab up at the top of the application. This will bring me to the photos I already imported a while back. I’ll move through the filmstrip view at the bottom of Lightroom until I locate the image I’d like to work with.

Develop Module Filmstrip View

Next, I’ll right-click on the owl thumbnail (or larger version of the photo in the center Content panel) and select Create Virtual Copy from the menu that appears.

Create Virtual Copy Menu Item

Doing this will give me two similar looking thumbnails down in the filmstrip view. The original and the virtual copy. To learn what exactly a virtual copy is, please read this post.

Original & Virtual Copy Thumbnails

Transforming to Black & White

Converting an image (or virtual copy) from color to black and white in Lightroom is simple. All that needs to be done is to click on the Black & White link in the Basic panel. I’ll do this now for the virtual copy I just created.

Converting to Black & White

Clicking this link will instantly turn any color photo to black and white.

Creating a Sequence of Changes

In this section, I’ll get to the point of this post. I don’t really need to change this photo for any particular reason. I’m merely going to change it to demonstrate how I can do it in a logical order so things make more sense later on.

Okay, I have my original image and I already made a black and white virtual copy. Let’s say that I have a client who wants to see three versions of the black and white. They would like to browse incremental changes, starting with just the plain black and white conversion and continuing on with further changes for each additional photo. This isn’t difficult to achieve at all.

Since I already have the black and white version, I’m done with that. That’s one down. Now, if I were to go ahead and make another virtual copy from the original color version, I’d have to repeat the step of converting the copy to black and white again. To keep things as efficient as I can, I’ll make the next virtual copy from the black and white copy I already made. This is important to understand. I’ll need to right-click on the virtual copy. I’ll do that now.

Second Virtual Copy

If I had copied the color image, I’d have two color images right now. That wouldn’t be all too helpful.

I’m going to go ahead and make some changes to this new copy. I’ll push the sliders around a bit.

First Slider Changes

So far, I’ve got two versions of the black and white image to show the client. All I need is one more.

Since I’m building a sequence here, I’ll need to work from the copy with my most recent changes. To accomplish this, I’ll right click on this latest copy and create another (and final) virtual copy. This last copy will automatically incorporate all the changes I’ve made thus far. After that, I’ll make a few more changes in the Basic panel.

Final Virtual Copy

The Method to Create an Efficient Sequence of Changes

I know I’m repeating myself here, but this really is the point of this post. The create an efficient sequence of changes using virtual copies in Adobe Lightroom, you need to build from the most recent virtual copy created. By doing this, all previous changes will be saved and applied to the newest version. You won’t need to apply anything again – it’ll all be done already.

There we have it. I hope I explained this post clearly and effectively. If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Lightroom


How To Use Multiple Graduated Filters in Adobe Camera Raw

November 24, 2016

A few days ago, I found a photo that looked like it had some great content in it, but also looked like it was rather dull. Whenever I see things like this, I wonder if I could make them appear better by working on them in Adobe Camera Raw. Since I’m fairly confident in my skills, I set it aside for a future project. Well, as it turns out, I’ve got some time today, so I sat down to see what I could do. What I came up with is pretty decent, considering it only took me about five minutes to complete. Take a look.

How To Use the Graduated Filter in Adobe Camera Raw

Don’t worry, I’ll show you the original photo below.

To make my changes, all I took advantage of was two graduated filters. By doing this, I was able to isolate the top of the photo from the bottom. I needed to make different sets of changes to each, so the graduated filter was the perfect choice.

In case you’re wondering what a graduate filter is, I already write a few posts that discuss the tool. You can find the posts here:

Enhancing Photos with Graduated Filters in Adobe Camera Raw

Enhancing Photos with the Adjustment Brush in Adobe Camera Raw

How to Use the Radial Filter in Adobe Camera Raw

While only the top post discusses the actual Graduate Filter tool in Camera Raw, the other two do a good job of explaining how similar tools work. Each of them is in the same family, so if you can come to understand one, you’ll virtually understand them all.

In today’s post, I’ll use two instances of the Graduated Filter tool in Adobe Camera Raw. I’ll limit myself to the edits I make with this tool and I’ll avoid doing anything else. I’ll explain exactly what’s happening as I progress.

Original Photo

Take a look at this photo below. I think you’ll agree that it looks less than stellar.

Original Photo

As I stated above, it’s got issues. First, it’s as dull as all get out. Second, the sky area is full of grain. Finally, I’d like to differentiate the beach area from the sky. In order to do that, I’ll need to alter many different slider characteristics. More on that below.

Making the Beach “Pop”

To kick things off, I’m going to work on the bottom part of the photo. I’ll first select the Graduate Filter tool from the top toolbar.

Graduated Filter Tool Button

Now, I know I’ve got two photos open, as indicated by their thumbnails in the left Filmstrip column. Please ignore the bottom one. That’s the finished version that I need to refer to as I write this post. I made many changes and trying to remember them all and replicate them in this working version would probably drive me crazy.

Anyway, since the Graduate Filter tool is now active, I’ll click my mouse pointer down at the bottom center of the photo and drag up to the horizon line. This will create a very large and soft gradient of changes to things and will be very smooth. I don’t want any abruptness in this part of the photo.

First Graduated Filter Area

If you look closely at the overlay lines of this filter section, you’ll see that one is dashed red and one is dashed green. The green tells us when the gradient starts the the red tells us when it ends. The gradient exists between the two. The closer the green and red lines, the less subtle the gradient will be.

It is worth noting, however, that the edits will still exist in the entire area past the dashed green line. Between the red and green only shows the gradient.

The next things I’m going to tackle are the edits themselves. I’ll push slider values where I want to and then I’ll show the screenshot of the Graduated Filter panel below.

This is what the bottom part of the photo looks like after I made the changes:

Bottom Changes

And here are the slider positions:

Bottom Slider Positions

I think you’ll agree that I didn’t do much in the way of effort, but the difference between the original and this version is substantial. I could go further, but I don’t want to make things look weird. What I primarily wanted to change in this section was the color, which I accomplished by reducing the tint value towards the green side, and the contrast, which I accomplished by increasing the Contrast value and the Clarity value, among a few others.

I’ll now work on the sky section of the photo with another graduated filter.

Giving the Sky Some Color

For this part, I’ll create a new graduated filter area. I’ll begin at the very top center of the photo and drag down just a bit past the horizon line. I want to overshoot slightly this time.

Top Graduated Filter Area

As you can see, the green and red dashed lines are back, but this time they’re upside down. This is because the green always stays where you begin dragging from.

When creating multiple graduated filter areas, slider values will oftentimes be carried over from previous instances. This is almost certainly undesirable in this case. To clear out any preexisting values, I’ll click on the menu that’s located at the top of the Graduated Filter panel and then click on Reset Local Correction Settings.

Reset Local Correction Settings Menu Item

Doing this will zero out all the sliders.

Next, I’ll move the sliders into the proper value positions. This is what I get after doing that:

Top Changes

And these are the new slider values:

Top Slider Postions

Please notice that in addition to the top portion of sliders I pushed, I also adjusted some in the bottom section as well. These sliders are Sharpness, Noise Reduction and Moire Reduction. I mentioned earlier that the sky showed a lot of grain. It was necessary to “denoise” this area to make things look better.

All of these adjustments took fewer than ten minutes to complete. The most important thing to remember when you’re using more then one gradient filter is that you need to reset the slider values when introducing them to the work area. Things can get confusing, so having a clean slate helps a lot.

That’s all for this post. I hope you enjoyed learning about how you can use more than one instance of the Gradient Filter tool to edit a photo in Adobe Camera Raw. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them for me in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Camera Raw


How to Customize the Taskbar in Windows 10

November 22, 2016

I consider the taskbar in Windows 10 sort of like a home base. Everything is down there. I have the Start button, Cortana, shortcut icons for many of the more popular applications I use on a daily basis, audio volume settings, time and date and access to notifications. Without a doubt, the task bar is where it’s at.

In today’s post, I’d like to explore that area a bit. I know there are some ways to customize the taskbar; it’s position, how things are displayed on it and what size those things are shown. Basically, I would like to learn more about the taskbar, so I’d like it if you came along.

The Current Taskbar

When I turned my Windows 10 machine on for the very first time, the taskbar was already set to its default view. It sits at the bottom of the screen and contains the items I mentioned above. If you’re new to all this, I’ll show you exactly what I’m talking about.

Windows 10 Taskbar Views

In the above screenshot, I display the taskbar. Obviously, I cut the left half off and stacked it on top of the right half so we can see the entire thing. I use a 27 inch monitor and there’s no way to get a glimpse of the entire bar in one view (without shrinking it down a lot).

So that’s what we’re dealing with.

Accessing the Taskbar Settings

Now, most people don’t know this, but there’s a lot of customization that can be done to the taskbar. It’s pretty cool, because you can make it look the way you want, within limits.

To access the settings window for the taskbar, I’ll right-click inside the bar someplace.

Taskbar Settings Menu Item

Then, I’ll click on the Settings menu item, which will open the Taskbar Settings window.

Taskbar Settings Window

If I wanted to, I can also launch the Settings window from the Start menu and then click on Personalization. The Taskbar menu access is at the bottom of the left column.

Settings Personalization Window

Current Customization Options

Since the above screenshot isn’t very clear for the Taskbar Settings window, I’ll list the current available customization options below. They are:

– Lock the taskbar

– Automatically hide the taskbar in desktop mode

– Automatically hide the taskbar in tablet mode

– Use small taskbar buttons

– Use Peek to preview the desktop when you move your mouse to the Show Desktop button at the end of the taskbar

– Replace Command Prompt with Windows PowerShell in the menu when I right-click the Start button or press Windows Key+X

– Show badges on taskbar buttons

– Taskbar location on screen (Left, Top, Right, Bottom)

– Combine taskbar buttons (Always – hide labels, When taskbar is full, Never)

There’s also a notification area and some settings for multiple screens that I won’t focus on today. I’d like to stay on the taskbar customization itself. I’ll talk more about some of these options next.

Hide Taskbar in Desktop Mode

I can see a lot of people using this option. Basically, when you flip this switch to On, the taskbar will slide downward and will be hidden from view. It’s only when you move your mouse pointer to the bottom of the screen that the taskbar will slide back up to become viewable. I’d love to show you a screenshot of this, but really, it’s nothing. Remember, the taskbar is hidden. All I’d be showing is an empty desktop.

Use Small Taskbar Buttons

If I ever get to the point of using so many applications often enough, I’d probably take advantage of this feature. When this switch is turned on, the application icons, among other things, reduce to about half their size. This makes way for much more room for more icons. It’s also a cleaner look, if you want to be honest.

Here, take a look:

Small Taskbar Buttons

Even Cortana has been reduced to an icon as opposed to a larger search box.

Taskbar Location on Screen

This will be the final example I show in this post. It’s probably the coolest too. If you wanted, you could change the location of where the taskbar actually sits on your screen. Let’s say that you don’t really like how it runs across the bottom and would like it to climb vertically up the left side. Well, to accomplish this, all you’d need to do is to click the related drop-down box and select Left. Once you do this, the taskbar will jump to its new location.

Left Taskbar View

I actually kind of like it over there.

A final note about the taskbar settings. A while ago, you would change one of the settings I discussed above and would have to hit Apply to see the change. Then, to actually apply the changes and save them, you’d have to hit Save. Well, you don’t need to do that anymore. Now, all you need to do is change the position of the switch from On to Off or vice versa and exit the Settings window. Doing this will take care of everything.

There you have it. I hope I clearly introduced you to the window that handles the taskbar customization settings. If you have any questions of concerns, please leave them for me in the comments section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Technology


How to Set the Time & Date in Your Canon Rebel T3i

November 19, 2016

There are many reasons you may want your Canon Rebel T3i to have an accurate date and time set. First, every single photo you take with your camera will have the date and time attached to its meta data. If you like looking back in time at old photos, this becomes very important. It’s really not difficult at all to see when you took a particular photograph simply by viewing it in a piece of software such as Adobe Bridge. Accuracy matters on occasions like this.

Beyond that, this information is critical when you begin sorting groups of photos and would like to edit them in a particular fashion. It even helps when searching for images via the software I mentioned above (or Adobe Lightroom). Can you imagine searching for a photo you took in May of 2014 when all the dates attached to your photos are wrong? At that point, your search function isn’t going to help much.

What’s more, if you’d like to geotag your photos, you’ll need the date and time set properly. I can go on and on, but I think I’ve said enough on this topic. Just take it from me, don’t have your photos end up like one of my older collections where each and every photo’s meta information told me I took the photo in 1900 some time. That gets depressing.

In today’s post, I’m going to guide you through the process of setting the time and date on the Canon Rebel line of cameras. As an example, I’ll be using my Canon T3i, but really, the entire line pretty much uses the same method.

Accessing the Menu

I’ve taken this step in the previous posts I’ve written on the T3i, but I’ll show you what I’m referring to again. To access the camera’s menu, I first change the mode to Program (P) on the top dial. The various modes offer various functions, but I’ve found that P gives us a lot of choices. Once I do that, I simply press the Menu button on the back of the camera.

LCD Screen Canon T3i

Accessing the Settings

Once in the menu area, I can push the left and right arrows that surround the Set button on the back of the camera. I’ll switch screens until I hit the center yellow Tools menu. When you get to this screen, you’ll know it. The date and time are as clear as day.

Date & Time Menu Option

Next, I’ll push the down arrow to the Date/Time option and press the Set button to open that particular area.

Date & Time Menu on Canon Rebel T3i

Setting the Date & Time

When I make it into the Date/Time screen, I can use the arrow buttons to navigate through the exact areas that need to be changed. Each option will be highlighted when I select it. When I find the one I’m interested in editing, I can again press the Set button to activate it so it’s in edit mode. Then, I’ll use the arrow keys to change the current value. When I’m finished with the one I’m working on, I can once again press Set to accept my change.

Really, it’s just a matter of using the Set button to activate an area, the arrow buttons to make a change and then the Set button again to accept the change. It’s sort of like using the Enter key on a keyboard to say “good” or “done.”

In the same menu area, right below the date and time, you can edit the date format itself. There are only a few choices; mm/dd/yy, yy/mm/dd and dd/mm/yy.

Accepting the Changes

When I’m finished making the changes to the date, time and format, I’ll use my arrow buttons to make my way down to the OK option. I’ll select it by pressing the Set button and then I’ll press the Menu button again to exit the menu area. It’s really that easy.

Set Date & Time OK Option

Note: If you store the camera without the battery or if the camera’s battery becomes exhausted, the date/time might be reset. If this happens, set the date and time again.

I hope I clearly explained how to set the date and time in a Canon Rebel camera. If you have any questions or concerns, please let me know in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

PS – So many of the cameras in the Rebel line behave so similarly that you’ll be able to apply the concepts in this post to the T2i, T3i, T4i, T5i, T6i and the T7i.

Filed Under: Photography


How to Synchronize Settings Across Photos in Adobe Camera Raw

November 16, 2016

Quite honestly, things change as you become a better and better post-processing editor. At first, you’ll be enamoured at what Adobe products can do. You’ll open a photo in Camera Raw, Lightroom or Photoshop and play around for a while. This will be followed by all sorts of oohs and aahs. You’ll tell your friends all about your new-found skills and you’ll have a hunger for more.

Next, you’ll actually want to start getting things done. During this stage, you’ll search around the internet looking for answers. You’re not as impressed with the suite of products you use as you once were because you have tasks that need to be completed. Your thirst for knowledge is quite obvious.

Finally, you’ll have everything you need down pat. You understand how things work and have no issues with executing them wonderfully. It’s during this stage that you begin to wonder how you can get things done faster. You see yourself repeating steps over and over and over again. If you could only combine tasks or mass edit photos. It’s these sorts of solutions you’re on the hunt for now.

Luckily, Adobe is all about speed and efficiency. They have thought, and continue to think, about how you can get from point A to point B quicker than you ever have before.

I’ve written a few posts that touch on this last stage (having to do with Camera Raw). If you’d like to read them, you can here:

Independently Editing Multiple Images in Adobe Camera Raw

How to Copy & Paste Adobe Camera Raw Edit Settings

How to Save Tool Presets in Adobe Camera Raw

How To Edit More Than One Photo at a Time in Adobe Camera Raw

While this isn’t an exhaustive list, it’s certainly a place to start. And as I continue writing, I’ll continue sharing shortcuts and methods for combining tasks. I sincerely hope they help.

In today’s post, I’ll be discussing a new set of tips that will allow you to manage and edit multiple photos simultaneously inside of Adobe Camera Raw. While these tips are somewhat similar to ones I’ve shared previously, there are distinct differences, so it’s important to read the entire post carefully.

The key word today is synchronizing as opposed to processing or managing. Synchronizing means that certain actions are performed after the fact as opposed to simultaneously or “during.” Obviously, the images will be opened into Camera Raw simultaneously and many of the photos will be updated simultaneously, but in essence, there will be a lot of synchronizing with previous settings going on.

Opening the Photos into Camera Raw

I’ve shared this method many times on this blog, so you should be knowledgeable of it by now. From Adobe Bridge, I’ll select the images I’d like to open into Camera Raw and I’ll click on the Open in Camera Raw button that’s located in the top toolbar.

Open in Camera Raw Button in Adobe Bridge

In this case, I’ll be using example photos I took just last night for my other blog – a cooking website.

Once the photos open up inside of Camera Raw, they look like this:

Camera Raw Thumbnails

Notice the Filmstrip column of thumbnails in the left column. That’s where much of my focus will be today.

Editing One Photo

Here’s the thing – when there are many photos opened up and selected in Camera Raw, as they are edited, there’s a lag after each change you make. So if you’ve got 50 images opened up and need to make 50 small edits, each and every change will have to run the gamut through all the photos. Take it from me – after watching this type of thing for a while, it becomes tiresome. It would be great if each change didn’t have to get applied to each photo every single time. Say, perhaps, we could edit one photo in its entirety and then apply all the edits across the rest of the photos at once. Something like, umm, I don’t know – synchronizing them. I think you know where I’m going with this. Please allow me to explain.

I’m going to choose my favorite photo and edit it inside of Camera Raw. I’ll crop it so it’s square and then push some sliders around in the Basic panel. Let’s take a look.

First, notice how I’ve only got the top thumbnail selected at this point. I don’t want all of the thumbnails selected, only one.

Top Thumbnail Selected

Now, check out the image itself. You can see that it’s been adjusted and cropped.

Edited Image

Finally, look at the Basic panel. You can tell that I moved some sliders.

Basic Panel

Sync Settings Across Other Photos

Here comes the fun part. Let’s say that I’ve got a handful of photos in the group that I opened that I want to apply the same exact settings I just applied to the very first photo I edited to. Or, perhaps I’d like to apply these settings to every single photo that’s currently opened in Camera Raw. How can I do that?

Well, if you only want to apply the settings to a few other images, you can use the Ctrl key on your keyboard to selectively highlight the appropriate thumbnails. If you want to apply the settings to all of the images, you can do two things. Use your Shift key to select everything or simply click into the Filmstrip panel and use the Ctrl+A keyboard shortcut to take care of the selection. If you do this, all the thumbnails will become highlighted.

Highlighted Thumbnails

Now that I’ve got all the images selected, I can begin the process of syncing the settings among them. To do this, I’ll click on the menu that’s located at the top of the Filmstrip panel. Once open, I’ll click on the Sync Settings menu item.

Sync Settings

Once I do that, the Synchronize dialog box will appear.

Synchronize Dialog Box

If you look inside this box, you’ll see all the options for the settings you can share with other images. Since I changed some slider positions in the Basic menu along with some cropping a bit, I’ll check off each of the boxes that aren’t currently checked off. When done, I’ll click the OK button and watch as the remaining photos are updated. Now, if you look at the thumbnails, you’ll see that they are brighter and have been cropped. And it only took a few seconds to complete. Much more efficient use of my time than having them update after each and every change I make.

Synched Images

How to Update Individual Photos After the Fact

You may be wondering how you can update individual photos after you applied these changes across the board. Perhaps all the images weren’t as similar as you though or perhaps some changes need to be decreased in intensity or increased in intensity. Whatever the case, all that needs to be done is to have the specific thumbnail for the image you’d like to change clicked on and then edit as you would on any other occasion. The point is, just because you made some mass edits doesn’t mean you can’t make additional edits later on. Remember, the changes you make in Camera Raw are non-destructive, so they can be added to or reversed at any time.

I know this was a simple post, but I think these were very valuable tips to share. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Camera Raw


Using the Spot Removal Tool in Adobe Lightroom

November 14, 2016

If you’re an Adobe Lightroom user, the Spot Removal tool is one of your primary “go-to” tools. It may even be more than that. Perhaps it’s your number one “go-to” tool. Whatever the case, you surely need to know how to use it. Remove a speck here or a blemish there – it’s definitely a helpful feature that can turn an average photo into a spectacular one. There are, however, a few things you need to be aware of.

As I’ve said a zillion times, Adobe Camera Raw is Lightroom’s twin. So, if you know how to use this tool over there, you can quickly pick it up over here. There are a few minor interface differences that stand in your way. By the way, if you want to check out the similar post I wrote about Camera Raw, please click through to them via the links below.

How to Remove Face Blemishes in Adobe Camera Raw

Heal & Clone with Spot Removal in Adobe Camera Raw

In today’s post, I’ll walk through the process of removing a spot in a photograph using Adobe Lightroom. Depending on the photo I choose to use as a demo, this “spot” can be a freckle, blemish or some other artifact that someone like you would want to disappear. Let’s see how things go.

The Original Photo

After a bit of searching, I think I’ve located a really good photo to work on for today’s tutorial. The picture is of a young girl who happens to have some wonderful freckles. Now, I want to be clear about this right now – there’s nothing I want to remove in this photo. I think her freckles are awesome. The thing is, working with freckles like this is going to be perfect for what we want to look at in regards to the Spot Removal tool. There are some aspects that I’d like to explain and the photo will lend itself to these aspects very well. It’s going to be great.

Redhead Girl in Adobe Lightroom

Accessing the Spot Removal Tool

Finding and accessing the Spot Removal tool is easy. After launching Lightroom and locating your photos, simply choose which photo you’d like to work on and then click into the Develop module. That’s exactly what I did here:

Develop Module

Once in that module, you can either press the Q key on your keyboard as a shortcut or you can simply click on the Spot Removal tool icon in the toolbar in the right column.

Spot Removal Tool

After that, we’re good to go.

Defining the Tool’s Features

There are many ways to go about learning how to use this tool. I think the best one of them is to first find out what we’re dealing with. To do this, I’ll work my way through each of the most important features this tool offers.

Starting off in the right column (the area in the red box above), I’ll give some definitions.

Spot Edit: With this feature, we’ve got two choices – Clone and Heal. They’re actually quite intuitive to understand.

Let’s say you would like to create an exact duplicate of a specific area in a photo in another area. In this case, you’d choose the Clone option. When I click somewhere in the photo, another similar area will appear and I’ll have the ability to drag this new area around until I find something I’d like to replace the first area with. Let me give you an example.

Clone

In the above screenshot, I selected the area on the left with the Spot Removal tool. I’m using the Clone feature and I moved the circle on the right so it sits in a fairly distinct spot on the face. I did this because it’s a very clear example of how the Clone feature works. Basically, the area I selected is now replaced by the circle on the right. It’s that simple.

While these two circles are active, I can change which option I’d like to use. I’ll go ahead and now click on the Heal option so you can see what happens.

Heal

As you can see, the area on the left (the target area) now matches the surrounding area much more. This is because Lightroom attempted to blend the area on the right (the source area) with what was already existing. You can still see the sunlight from the source area, but it’s much more subtle. When removing blemishes on someone’s face, I almost always use Heal. It’s so much more forgiving and easy to work with.

Size: This one is really easy. The Size slider controls the size of the tool. In this next screenshot, I increased the size from the last. I also changed it back to Clone, just because I’m giving examples here.

Size

FYI – To increase or decrease the size of the tool, you can either push the slider back and forth or you can press the [ and ] keys on your keyboard. I encourage you to use the keyboard. It’s much faster.

Feather: As things are right now, there is virtually no feathering when using this tool. Feathering is merely how soft the transition is between the edge of the tool and the center of it. I’ll go ahead and move the Feather slider all the way to the right to give you an indication of how soft things can become. Be sure to keep your eye on the left circle.

Feather

With all this feathering going on, Lightroom is pulling over a soft-edged copy of the right circle.

Opacity: The Opacity slider controls how visible the source circle will be. If it’s at 100%, all of it will be visible and if it’s 0%, none of it will be visible. I’ll move the slider to 50% so you can see what I’m referring to.

Opacity

Now, the left circle shows a fairly light copy of the right circle.

Removing Some Freckles

Again, I’m just doing this as an example. I really don’t see anything wrong with tons of freckles.

To remove some of the freckles, I’ll reduce the size of the brush so it’s just a tad bit larger than the freckle itself. Then, I’ll choose Heal and set the Feather to about 50%. Finally, I’ll keep the Opacity setting at 100%, because I would like the freckle completely gone.

Brushing Freckle Away

In this case, I clicked and drew over one of the freckles and Lightroom automatically found a similar area to to pull from. When I let go, this is what remained (above). If I continue clicking, drawing and removing freckles, I’m left with many areas that I’ve worked.

Many Removed Spots

If you make a mistake and don’t want to go through with one of these spot removals, you can easily delete that particular area to start over. I’ll explain exactly how to do this below.

Also, one more point, if you would like to move around either the target area or the source area, all you need to do is to click on either area and drag it where ever you’d like.

Tool Overlay

If you look at the screenshot above, you’ll see that there are many spots I altered with the Spot Removal tool. Many editors find the pins distracting. Because of this, Adobe has included a number of settings that control how the pins appear as you’re working inside of Lightroom. They are accessed in the toolbar that’s located directly under the large center photo.

Tool Overlay

If I click on the drop-down that’s to the right of the Tool Overlay heading, I’ll see four options. They are Auto, Always, Selected and Never. I’ll explain what each of these means below.

Auto: If I choose this option, the pins will only be visible when I roll my mouse over the photograph. When I roll the mouse off the work area, the pins disappear. This is probably the most desirable setting because if gives you quick access to view your changes without any of the source or target area outlines covering things up.

Always: The pins will always be visible when the Spot Removal tool is active. You may like this or you may not. It’s up to you.

Selected: Only the active source and target areas will be highlighted. You’ll need to select them to activate them. All others will be invisible. The way to find the inactive areas is to roll over them with your mouse. When the pointer turns into a hand, that’s when you’ve hit one of them.

Never: None of the spots you’ve worked on will be visible ever.

Visualize Spots

If some of the spots you’d like to work on aren’t all too visible, you can view them another way. Lightroom has an option called Visualize Spots, which turns the photo black and white and makes each and every blemish practically impossible to miss. Let me show you what I’m talking about.

Visualize Spots

With this feature enabled, every freckle and anything else that is distinct from the background will appear white. The background will remain black. You can also adjust the intensity of the tool by pushing the slider to the left and right. Left lightens the intensity and right darkens it. You can even edit in this view – it’s not only for viewing.

Deleting the Spot Removal Tool Areas

It’s super simple to delete a Spot Removal area you created. All you need to do is to click on it so it’s selected (with the Spot Removal tool active) and then press the Delete key on your keyboard. When you do this, it’ll disappear.

Reviewing Before & After Versions

When editing photos in this manner, it’s helpful to look at the before and after versions of the photo itself. Upon viewing these, you may change your mind and make further changes or erase ones you’ve already made. Either way, it’s simple to change these views.

To view the before and after versions of the photo at hand, all you need to do is to set your Tool Overlay setting to Auto or Never and roll the mouse off the work area so the pins disappear. Then, press the backslash (\) key on your keyboard. This will toggle your changes on and off.

Well there you have it – how to work with the Spot Removal tool in Adobe Lightroom. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them for me in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Lightroom


Independently Editing Multiple Images in Adobe Camera Raw

November 12, 2016

In a previous post, I talked about how we can launch multiple photos into Adobe Camera Raw and edit them all simultaneously. As you can imagine, this is a huge time saver. Doing these types of things one by one can become monotonous, especially if the photos were taken of similar objects or subjects under the same lighting conditions. Really, there’s no reason not to “mass edit” these types of things.

I began using this feature in Camera Raw a while back. When photographing, I would focus my efforts on clusters of similar photos with this type of editing in mind. This way, when I returned to my computer from outside, or from wherever it was I was taking the photos, I could easily group them together for some quick modifications. The things is, I quickly realized I needed a bit of flexibility. Having the same exact edits apply to every single image that I opened into Camera Raw sort of tied my hands. I knew I needed to learn more about what was going on behind the scenes because the way things were, I was getting stuck when I went to edit those outlying photos. You know, the ones with the differences that just didn’t fit in with the rest.

In today’s post, I’ll open a few random images into Adobe Camera Raw with the intent of demonstrating how we can edit them all together or how we can use Camera Raw’s algorithms to edit them simultaneously, but independently. I know, that’s weird to think of. Let’s just say that we can have more them one photo launched onto Camera Raw and selected, but have different edits applied to each image. If you found my previous post about editing multiple images helpful, you should find this one just as helpful.

Opening Image Via Adobe Bridge

The first thing I’ll do is to open Adobe Bridge. I’ll locate the images I intend to launch into Camera Raw, select them and click on the Open in Camera Raw icon.

Open Photos From Adobe Bridge into Camera Raw

Once I do that, Camera Raw will look like this:

Multiple Images Opened in Adobe Camera Raw

Selecting All the Images

If you look at the screenshot above, you’ll see that only one of the five images I opened is currently selected (the first one). To select them all, I’ll simply hold down the Shift key on my keyboard and click on the last image in the series. They will appear highlighted when I do this, with the first one still visible.

Highlighted Images

Now, if you compare the previous two screenshots, you’ll notice there’s a difference between them. The first one has only one image selected and visible while the second one has all five images selected with the same one visible.

Selecting a New Image

Where things stand, I have all five thumbnails “selected.” That word is sort of misleading though, so I think a few definitions are in order. When a thumbnail (image) in Camera Raw is selected, it will appear highlighted, meaning, it will have a light gray box around it. If the image is “visible,” it will appear in the content panel at the center of the screen and will not only be highlighted with a light gray box around it in the left column, it will also display a blue outline around the gray box. This is an easy way of distinguishing between which images are selected and which one is actually visible.

In the title of this section, I wrote that I’d like to “select” a new image. In reality though, all five are selected. What I mean is that I’d like to select a new image to make it visible in the center panel instead of having the very first image in the series visible. Making this change is very simple.

If I merely clicked on a new thumbnail with the intention of making it visible, I’d deselect all the other images in the series. To keep the others selected, but make a different photo visible, I’d have to first press and hold down the Alt key on my keyboard. Once I do that, I can click on a different thumbnail so that one is visible. I’ll do that right now. Notice how a different image is visible at the center of the application while all the others are still highlighted in the left column.

Selecting New Image in Series

Auto-Editing in the Basic Panel

Much of this post is going to stray from the “how-to” type of writing I typically engage in to a more “informative” style. There are areas of Camera Raw that essentially need to be explained. I can’t tell you how to do some of these things because there’s really nothing to do. I do want you to be aware of some aspects though. With the knowledge I share below, you’ll definitely be able to go ahead and make all sorts of edits the way you see fit.

With all five thumbnails selected in the left column, I can move over to the Basic panel in the right column. From there, I can begin my editing.

Basic Panel

In my previous post where I discussed editing more than one image at a time, I told you that if more than one image is selected in Camera Raw and a slider in the Basic panel is moved, both images will take on the exact value of that slider, no matter what the image looks like. This is why I said editing this way is perfect for groups of photos that were taken of similar items under similar conditions. You certainly wouldn’t want to use this method to edit two photos; one of bright daylight and one of a dark interior room in a house.

There are, however, methods for editing groups of images independently, no matter their capture conditions. For instance, now that I have all five photos selected in the left column, I can click on the Auto link in the Basic panel. When I do this, the slider values will change depending on what’s actually inside of each image, not just as a blunt instrument. Camera Raw will intelligently adjust all selected images uniquely.

Let’s compare the slider values of two different photos after I press the Auto link in the Basic panel (directly above the Exposure slider).

Basic Slider Values for the First Photo

Basic Slider Values for the Second Photo

As you can see, each image has wildly different slider values, yet they were both edited at the same time. I’m sure you can see the benefit of this, especially if you use the Auto feature frequently. By the way, Auto does a really great job. Even if you use it as a starting point and then edit via the sliders later on, it’s pretty spot on.

Lens Correction & Transform

Using the Lens Correction and Transform features are other areas where you can edit different photos uniquely, but simultaneously. If I head into the Lens Corrections panel, I can see what’s going on.

Lens Corrections Panel

In this panel, I can check off the two top check boxes to allow Camera Raw to automatically adjust and correct any lens issues I happen to have with the photos in hand. Again, since this is an “auto” function, Camera Raw will treat each photo independently.

I do want you to be aware of something though. Just because we can use this auto feature and Camera Raw will determine each photo’s needs uniquely, that doesn’t mean we can go nuts with changing all sorts of things in this panel. Just like in the Basic panel, if I change something manually, that manual change will apply to all selected photos equally. We’re back to the blunt instrument type of thing. So, if I choose Apple from the Lens Profile drop-down box, that value will apply to each and every photo I currently have selected. Think of it this way: auto features are unique among photos and manual changes area applied across the board.

Let’s take a quick look into the Transform panel. I’ll click the Transform Tool from the top toolbar and the panel will appear. Inside the panel, I can click on the Auto button to let Camera Raw auto correct each of the selected photos. Each photo will be corrected independently, while if I pushed a slider at this point, that slider value would be applied to all images the same exact way.

Auto Transform

In the screenshot above, I used the auto feature. I’ll go ahead now and push a slider and show you how that affects the thumbnails. This will give you a clear picture of what I mean.

Rotate Photo

In the above screenshot, I pushed the Rotate slider all the way to the left. When I did this, all selected photos were rotated. Obviously, this is not a good way to edit different photographs.

Converting to Grayscale

This is a very helpful topic. If I visit the HSL/Grayscale panel, I’ll see a bunch of color sliders.

HSL/Grayscale Panel

If I click inside the Convert to Grayscale checkbox, each selected image will turn to grayscale, but with unique slider values. Take a look.

Grayscale Values for First Photo

Grayscale Values for Second Photo

You can see from the two screenshots above that each photo has different slider values. If I went ahead now and pushed one of the color sliders manually, I’d set that value among all photos the same way. Again, the “auto” feature uniquely changes photos while manual changes are applied to all photos the same way.

If you’d like to learn more about how to make photos black and white in Camera Raw, please take a look at these posts:

Creating Black & White Photos in Adobe Camera Raw

How To Enhance Black & White Portraits in Adobe Camera Raw

Other Tools

Editing multiple images simultaneously is a great way to speed up your workflow. You do have to use this method with caution though. If we look up at the toolbar that runs across the top of Camera Raw, we’ll get a glimpse of the available tools.

Top Toolbar in Adobe Camera Raw

As you can well imagine, you should really use some of the tools for independent photographs. For instance, if I cropped one photo to a certain shape while all thumbnails are selected, each and every photo will be cropped the same way. The same is true for the White Balance Tool, Color Sampler Tool, Targeted Adjustment Tool, Spot Removal and Red Eye Removal tools. If you make a change to a photo with one of these tools, that change will apply to everything selected. That’s actually a good thing and a huge time saver in its own right.

Basically, what I’m trying to say here is that you really need to work with each tool to see what it does. Many of them behave differently when you have multiple photos selected. While editing images simultaneously is a huge time saver, you don’t want to do the wrong thing and have to backtrack, especially if you’ve got dozens of photos open at the same time.

I hope I’ve given you a good introduction into working with and editing multiple photographs simultaneously inside of Adobe Camera Raw. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Camera Raw


Lighting Effects Filters in Adobe Photoshop

November 7, 2016

This is pretty cool. I’ve always loved playing with the lighting effects filters in Adobe Photoshop. Adobe has added a lot to this area in the past few years and the changes are worth looking at.

In today’s post, I’ll be exploring the Lighting Effects area of the Filters menu in Adobe Photoshop. This is quite the extensive area, so there’s obviously a lot more involved than what I’m going to include in this post. Effects, in general, have grown to consume a rather large portion of Photoshop. It’s possible that I’ll be writing many more posts on this one topic. For now though, I’d like to merely launch the effects area to get you more familiar with what’s going on inside of it.

Original Photo

While there are tons of different types of photos that would work perfectly with many of the variations of available lighting effects, I chose a portrait of a small child. I think this is a good choice because any sort of additional lighting would make a profound difference in the way the photo is interpreted. And by working with a photo like this, I think the gears in your minds will be turning as you think of the possibilities.

Portrait Lighting Effects - Small Child Portrait

I haven’t done much more to this photo than to add some contrast in Adobe Camera Raw. Well, there was some grain I needed to get rid of and some sharpening that the picture benefited from. Beyond that, this is almost the original.

Converting Layer to a Smart Object

The very first thing I want to do after opening the image into Photoshop is to convert the background layer to a Smart Object. I’ve covered this in a few other posts, but basically, the reason for this is protection. When the photo layer is a Smart Object, I can apply many different filters and effects to it while preserving the layer’s integrity. In other words, I can delete the filter later on if I don’t like it and I’ll still have the original, untouched, image at my disposal.

I’ll go ahead now and right-click on my layer and then chose Convert to Smart Object.

Convert to Smart Object Menu Item

Once I do that, I can head into the filters area.

How to Launch Lighting Effects

Diving into the Lighting Effects area is simple. I’ll go up to the Filter menu item and click it. Then, I’ll go down to the Render menu and hover over that. Finally, I’ll click on the Lighting Effects menu item to launch the editor.

Filter - Render - Lighting Effects Menu Item

After I choose this menu item, the Lighting Effects workspace will appear. For the uninitiated, this is an odd phenomenon. The actual workspace changes to something else. It’s not like an editor or a panel opens or anything – all the other panels disappear and are replaced by new ones. Here’s a screenshot of the options bar up top:

Lighting Effects Options Bar

And here’s a screenshot of the panels on the right side. Notice the Lighting Effects name in the workspace drop-down in the upper right corner.

Lighting Effects Panels

Lighting Effects Presets

One of the most popular areas of this new workspace is the Presets menu. This is probably the best place to start off if you aren’t a Photoshop expert. There are many types of effects to choose from, so I suggest you click on each one to become familiar with what they do. Exploring this like puts the necessary information in the back of your head so the next time you think you might want to add some light to a photo, so you quickly head to this area.

To demonstrate, I’ll choose Five Lights Down.

Lighting Effects Presets: Five Lights Down

With this preset, five light sources appear at the top of the photo. When I click on any of the light sources (the small white circles at the top of the photo), I can manipulate that particular light. I can change its intensity, change its scale, rotate it, move it and many more things. I can also choose the light source from the Lights panel over on the right and pretty much do exactly the same types of things to them.

Lights Panel

Adding a Soft Light to the Photo

Since this photo is a portrait with the subject front and center, I think a nice soft light is appropriate. I think I’ll go for Soft Omni in the Presets drop-down. This will place a circle overlay on top of the image that I can modify.

Soft Omni Lighting Effect

Changing the attributes of this effect is really easy. All I need to do is to click and drag the circle from its center so it’s in the position I would like to see it. Then, I can just push the sliders in the Properties panel over in the right column. I’ll explain what each of these sliders means next.

Colorize: Tints the overall lighting.

Exposure: Controls highlight and shadow detail.

Gloss: Determines how much surfaces reflects light.

Metallic: Determines which is more reflective, the light or the object on which the light is cast.

Ambience: Diffuses the light as if it were combined with other light in a room, such as sunlight or fluorescent light. Choose a value of 100 to use only the light source, or a value of –100 to remove the light source.

Texture: Applies a texture channel.

I’ll push the sliders for this image now. Just as an FYI, you’ll need to really experiment with all the available sliders to see which ones will work best for your photo. For instance, when I pushed the Metallic slider, absolutely nothing happened, no matter where I put it. I did, however, manage to get a good result with the other sliders.

Lighting Effects Sliders

The Final Photo

Once I’m done with the sliders, I can click on the OK button up in the Options bar to apply my changes. When I do that, I’ll have to wait for a few seconds as the changes are applied to the Smart Object. Once they are, a Smart Filters layer will appear in the Layers panel and my filter will take effect. Check out the photo now.

Photoshop Lighting Effects on a Portrait of a Baby

As you can see, the background has been somewhat muted out and the emphasis of the lighting has been placed on the model’s face. Just where I wanted it.

If you’d like to make similar changes to your own photos, all you need to do is to follow the same pattern of steps. There’s not much more to it. Of course, I can go into the specifics of each and every attribute of the workspace and I may actually do that one day, but I think this was a good introduction. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave them in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


Nondestructively Auto-Correcting Tone in Adobe Photoshop

November 5, 2016

I remember back, years ago, when I used to color correct photos for one of my blogs. I used auto-correct as if it was going out of style. Throughout my editing, I learned that I only did so many corrections and over time, I concluded that auto-correct was the way to go. I’d use auto-tone, auto-contrast and auto-color ad nauseum. This type of editing held me over for a very long time. It’s not like I was selling professional photographs or anything. I was only taking pictures of trees and flowers in my back yard.

In case you’re wondering, the auto-correct options I’m referring to are located under the Image menu inside of Adobe Photoshop. If you click on that menu item, you’ll see the three options. Again, they are Auto Tone, Auto Contrast and Auto Color.

Image Menu Item - Auto Correct Options

The one thing I always thought about was how the auto-correct options I was using were permanent. Once I made the change, that was it. I was stuck with them. They were what we consider, “destructive.” As you may well know, destructive editing should be avoided when possible. More often then not, you’ll want to go back and change something. Rarely does someone simply make an edit and remain happy with that edit forever. Photoshop was made for manipulating photos, not once, but always. You need to keep your options open.

In today’s post, I’d like to show you how you can take advantage of the Auto mode of two adjustment layer types in Photoshop. While only two are available right now, I’m sure more will be along soon. The two modes I’m talking about are Levels and Curves. Both of these modes adjust tone and color, so they should do us just fine. And the best part is, using the Auto feature in these two adjustment types is completely non-destructive. Any changes made can immediately be discarded at any time.

Original Photo

For this post, I’m going to use a fairly generic photograph of some wheat. The reason I decided on this photo was because of its blandness. It’s a great photo, it just doesn’t “pop” and it could certainly use some correcting.

Photo of Wheat

Auto-Correcting Levels

To kick things off, I’ll apply the Levels adjustment layer. If you aren’t familiar with adjustment layers, I encourage you to read this post:

Using the Adobe Photoshop Curves Tool For Photography

In the post, I walk through the exact instructions you’ll need to apply pretty much any adjustment layer. While I focus on only Curves in the post, the same general idea can be used for all of them.

So, I’ll apply the Levels adjustment layer by clicking the appropriate icon in the Adjustments panel. Once I do that, I’ll see the new layer in the Layers panel. The related Properties panel will also appear.

Levels Adjustment Layer Panel

When I apply this adjustment layer, nothing happens. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. It isn’t until I begin moving things around that the photo will appear differently. In this case though, I’m only going to use the Auto capabilities of this tool.

In you take a look at the above screenshot, you’ll notice that I circled the Auto button. If I click on the button, the levels will automatically adjust according to what Photoshop things are the proper settings. I’ll do that now.

Auto Adjusted Levels

If you compare the values for the blacks, mid-tones and whites between the two most recent screenshots, you’ll see they’re different. For a lot of folks, this is fine. But not for me.

If I press and hold down the Alt key (Windows) or the Option key (Mac) and then click on the Auto button, the Auto Color Correction Options dialog box will appear.

Auto Color Correction Options Dialog Box

As you can see, there are a few options to choose from. I’ll focus primarily on the Algorithms section.

In this section, there are four options. They are Enhance Monochromatic Contrast, Enhance Per Channel Contrast, Find Dark & Light Colors and Enhance Brightness and Contrast. Each option does its own thing and if you roll over the radio button for each option and stay there for a second or two without clicking, some informative text will appear that describes the feature exactly.

Below these options is a check box. It’s called Snap Neutral Midtones and it subtly adjusts whichever selection you choose. All but the last one. The checkbox is grayed out and unavailable for the last selection.

Now, you can go in and play with each of these settings to get a glimpse of their effects. What I want to do right now is show you how each of them alters the photo I’m using for this post. to do this, I’ll slice a section from each altered photo and combine them into one. They go from left to right.

Combined Adjustments

By looking at the examples, I can see that the second option, Enhance Per Channel Contrast, gives me the most accurate and vibrant look. I’ll apply that to see the entire photo now.

Auto Correct Color

I can tell you right now that this one change made the photo look a heck of a lot better. I’ll go ahead and press OK to apply this selection to the adjustment layer. Remember, I can delete this change at any time since it’s non-destructive.

Auto-Correcting Curves

As I mentioned above, I can follow the same instructions for the Curves adjustment layer, so I won’t rehash them here. What I do want to point out is one small item.

If I go ahead and apply the Curves adjustment and then hold down my Alt key while pressing the Auto button in the Properties panel, the same dialog box will appear.

Save as Defaults Check Box

I’ve gone through each selection and have settled on the same combination I picked earlier. I chose Enhance Per Channel Contrast and checked off the Snap Neutral Midtones box. I can see that this is becoming a habit.

When choosing the same selection over and over again, it may be in your best interest to make that your default choice when you press the Auto button, as opposed to having to constantly change the selection. To make it the default, simply make the selection and then check the Save as Defaults box all the way at the bottom of the dialog box. When you press the OK button, Photoshop will remember what you did and what you’ve chosen will appear the next time you use this feature.

I hope I’ve clearly explained how you can use the auto-correction features that are built into the Levels and Curves adjustment layers in Adobe Photoshop. If you have any questions or concerns, please share them in the comment section below. Thanks for reading!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop

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