Editing photographs on Photoshop

Lesson objectives To understand how to edit the brightness, contrast and colour levels of a photograph To use content aware tools to edit photographs All students will use adjustments to alter images Most students will use adjustments to improve images Some students will use different adjustments together to improve images

When you think of Photoshop or “Photoshopping” an image, what do you think of? Often we think of celebrity photographs and magazine covers. Photoshop is now synonymous with making people look younger, prettier, thinner etc etc etc. Photoshop sometimes has negative connotations.

But it’s not always about celebrities. Which of these images do you prefer, and why? What changes can you see?

How about now?

Images are often edited to make them look more effective.

Making photographic adjustments – how confident are you? I have never used this tool/skill before I know what this tool/skill is and can give it a go I know this tool/skill but need help from my teacher/ friend to get it right. I know this tool/skill but still make a few mistakes that I can fix by myself I feel confident using this tool/skill and have few problems I know this tool/skill very well and could explain it to others Complete your Levels Diary: 4.1,4.2,4.3,4.4 and 6.1,6.2 and 3.4 We are going to use the adjustments panel on photoshop to edit photographs. We will then use some tools called “Content aware” tools to remove elements from photographs. Could you do this?

Adjustments Top row - tonal adjustments Middle row - colour adjustments Bottom row – anything else

File>OPEN Open the image called Dark Land.jpg This is a pretty boring image that isn’t of a very god quality. We want to make it brighter and more vibrant.

Step 1:Brightness and Contrast You must alter the brightness and contrast so that the grass is greener, but you don’t loose the clouds in the sky Click the arrow to go back to the menu After

On the layers panel Notice how your adjustment has made a new layer. You can double click here to edit the adjustment Or click the eye next to it to hide/ show it

Step 1:Brightness and Contrast You must alter the brightness and contrast so that the grass is greener, but you don’t loose the clouds in the sky Before After

Step 2: Levels Levels shows a graph of all of the LIGHT, MEDIUM and DARK colours. These are known as –Highlights –Midtones –Shadows This graph shows there are a large amount of shadows, or dark areas. This is because the image is still very dark. You can slide the tones around to alter the image. If you click the AUTO button, you will see a good automatic result which alters the tones for you. See how the graph changes

Step 3: Vibrance Finally, sometimes you want to make the image more saturated the colour. For this, use the vibrance adjustment. Alter these sliders to make the colour more vibrant, or have more depth on the page.

Before After

Try it yourself Open the image called AutoLevels.psd (FILE>OPEN) Use the Brightness, levels and Vibrancy tools to alter the image We want the man to be lighter, but the beard to still stand out. Before After

File>OPEN Open the file called Colour Balance

Colour Alterations Sometimes you get photographs which are clearly saturated with one colour. This can happen a lot on poor quality cameras or phones This picture has been saturated with red/orange. How do we know? See how the door frame is pink? This is supposed to be bright white.

Colour adjustments BEFORE AFTER

Colour Balance Select the colour balance icon on the adjustments menu. Here you can alter the shadows, midtones and highlights. Because we know that the door frame is supposed to be white (highlight) we need to sort that out first. 1.Click highlights 2. The image is too red – drag the slider down to Cyan to balance is out 3. The image is too yellow, drag the slider to blue to balance it out.

This is just from altering the highlights. We also need to alter the midtones to get the perfect image Original Highlights

Now alter the midtones The mid tones are the tones that are in the middle in terms of lightness and darkness. You need to use your eye to get the image to look right. Always use the door frame as a reference point – this should be bright white. 1.Click Midtones 2. The image is too red – drag the slider down to Cyan to balance is out 3. The image is too yellow, drag the slider to blue to balance it out.

I don’t think the image needs editing any more. If you want, you can alter the shadows to see if it makes it better.

Try it for yourself Open the file called Colour balance Kitchen. This kitchen should have bright white tiles on the floor and walls. Use the colour balance to edit them.

Content Aware Now that we’ve altered the colour and brightness of an image, we can edit the image itself. Sometimes there are unwanted objects, marks or blemishes on a photograph that we want to “photoshop” out. Content aware tools are intelligent. They look at the surrounding area of the image and make up what should go in the middle.

File>Open Rubbish-Beach.psd We want to edit this image of a dirty beach to remove all of the litter and trash. We cant just rub it out, or it will leave a blank space We cant just colour over it because sand is make up of a number of different colours. We are going to use some content aware tools instead.

Step 1: Duplicate the layer We are doing this so that we can see the before and after image. Right click on the layer. Select Duplicate layer Rename the layer “content aware”

Spot Healing Brush Tool This is the easiest to use, but not always the most effective. Select the tool and draw over the bottom aluminium can. It will disappear and be replaced by sand Do the same with the bottle and the other can ONLY Do not rush ahead!!

Healing brush tool This does the same, except photoshop wants you to tell it where it get inspiration from. This is more accurate as it doesn’t just pick the surrounding area, it picks where you have selected. We are going to use it to get rid of the blue plastic Select the tool Hold down ALT and select around where I have drawn an X. Colour over the blue plastic

Patch tool This is most effective when the area you want to remove has two different colour or textured backgrounds. Select the tool Draw around the area you want to remove Drag the dancing ants to the place you want it to replicate. In this case, you still want a bit of stand and a bit of sea so you need to drag it to around where I have put the x When you move the dancing ants, make sure the shoreline matches up You can also use this tool to move objects around in your image (people, animals etc) without altering the background

Finishing off Use these 3 tools to complete the image, getting rid of any rubbish from the beach. When you have finished, compare the before and against by hiding/un-hiding the content aware layer. Can you tell where you have edited the image?

Give it a go yourself In the folder are 4 old photographs “OldPhoto1” “OldPhoto2” “OldPhoto3” “OldPhoto4” Each of them need restoring to their original glory using content aware tools. See how close you can get them to the “after” version on the right.

What are your strengths and weaknesses? We have edited several images this lesson. Looking back, some will be more effective than others. Open what you consider to be your BEST edited image and your WORST. With a partner discuss why you think each photo is good/bad. Give each other suggestions for improvement Fill in your feedback diary with WWWs and EBIs

Making photographic adjustments – how confident are you? I have never used this tool/skill before I know what this tool/skill is and can give it a go I know this tool/skill but need help from my teacher/ friend to get it right. I know this tool/skill but still make a few mistakes that I can fix by myself I feel confident using this tool/skill and have few problems I know this tool/skill very well and could explain it to others Complete your Levels Diary: 4.1,4.2,4.3,4.4 and 6.1,6.2 and 3.4 We are going to use the adjustments panel on photoshop to edit photographs. We will then use some tools called “Content aware” tools to remove elements from photographs. Could you do this?