{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0\deflang3081{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Courier New;}}
\viewkind4\uc1\pard\f0\fs2 The Artistic Skills The Commercial Skills Image Scanning&Manipulation in Adobe Photoshop OVERVIEW THE MISSION VITAL PHOTO STATISTICS TYPES OF SHOTS GET IT IN CONTEXT SHOOTING FOR THE PRINT MEDIA SOME TECHNICAL ASPECTS COMPOSITION TRAVEL PHOTOGRAPHY SUBJECTS LIGHT - THE PHOTOGRAPHER'S PALETTE EQUIPMENT AN INTRODUCTION TO DIGITAL IMAGING IMAGE SCANNING & MANIPULATION IN ADOBE PHOTOSHOP (THE MOST USEFUL TOOLS) A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND - DOLLARS? ON ASSIGNMENT BIG SUBMISSIONS - BOOK PUBLISHERS GET YOUR PHOTOS OUT OF THE CUPBOARD Image Scanning&Manipulation in Adobe Photoshop This section is devoted to demystifying the scanning and manipulation of digital images, in the Adobe Photoshop software platform, which is the industry standard for image handling and manipulation - although many other image manipulation software packages offer similar features, albeit sporting different nomenclature. Tip: 'Adobe Photoshop Elements' has some of Photoshop's features, for a fraction of the price. In this document, references to Photoshop Elements commands in are in blue. The following examples are by no means an exhaustive display of Photoshop features. For that you would need to buy a full instruction manual. The examples given here are typical examples of functions you will need to use 90 per cent of the time when scanning and manipulating images for editorial needs; in other words, the most useful tools in the box. The steps shown here are essentially the same whether you are using a dedicated slide (or film) scanner or a flatbed scanner. A word of warning though - scans of prints are way down the quality scale when compared to the output from dedicated film scanners. Magazines are unlikely to buy scans of prints, as the colour fertility and sharpness is distinctly inferior to either digital camera or slide scanner outputs. For those of you wishing to manipulate digital camera files, go straight to step No.7, bypassing the scanning section. INTRODUCTION TO THE PHOTOSHOP INTERFACE Please see below for a screenshot of Photoshop 7 with its main interface features highlighted for familiarisation purposes. NOTES: OPTIONS BAR: This is the 'nerve centre' of Photoshop, where all the main functions such as opening, saving and printing images can be facilitated. Other features enable the resizing of images and backgrounds, the perspective of images to be altered/restored, as well as the real 'meat' of image contrast and colour editing. A whole slew of creative controls such as 'Filters' can be applied, from the utilitarian but useful 'Unsharp Mask' filter (for restoring sharpness to an image) through selective blurring and even surreal effects like 'liquefying'. The new 'Extract' function allows for the seamless 'masking' of images, whereby elements of an image can be trimmed out and placed onto other backgrounds. The 'Window' function is always there to refer to when looking for lost 'tools' or functions, and when you're totally out of ideas, hit the 'Help' button at the extreme right! TOOLS BAR: This slimline panel houses a dizzying array of practical image editing tools, enabling the cropping, repairing and touching-up of images. PALETTES: These panels serve as handy reference points, such as the Navigator which provides an image preview and pixel colour display. Other palettes allow you to apply, delete and edit different layers, adjust the individual colour channels and toggle through the 'history' of all changes as they have been applied to an image. AN 18-STEP GUIDE TO SCANNING AND IMAGE MANIPULATION IN PHOTOSHOP Before scanning, the author advises that you calibrate your monitor according to the Adobe 'Gamma' settings, which can be initiated by selecting the 'Adobe Gamma' icon in the 'Control Panels' folder or in the Program Files/Common Files /Adobe/Calibration folder on your hard drive. A step-by-step Wizard will guide you through the process. STEP 1 Specify the film type (for slide scanners and flatbeds with film scanner adapters only): Usually a slide scanner's native software will recognise whether you are scanning slides or negatives, but do remember to specify the film type when scanning negatives, i.e. Kodak 100R6, since scanning software usually comes complete with various values to match different manufacturers' emulsion types. Scanning software is programmed to process a negative image and assign positive colour values based on a given film's characteristics. Colour negatives have an overall orange mask, which is there to aid the printing of negatives onto photographic paper. The shade of orange used varies with different film brands and types, and is displayed as a strong greenish blue when converted to a positive image. Always be sure to match up the film type when scanning negatives, as the software has to 'balance out' the negatives' orange mask and convert it to the correct colour in a positive image. Film scanners are not very good at capturing tonal variation and detail in dark areas of slides, typically rendering subtle shading graduations in an amorphous black, peppered with 'noise', or speckled pixel clusters. Noise is seen in the dark areas of scans from slides (like shadows) and in light areas of images from negatives (like skies). Film scanners have a much easier time of scanning negatives than slides, essentially because any dark areas of the negative are inverted (dark becomes light) and light areas are represented as darker portions of the negative strip. Additionally, the problem of 'noise' is alleviated when scanning negatives, primarily because noise is much less detectable in light areas of film. There is no provision for specifying slide film types/speeds, since the scanner is reading a positive image, thus 'what you see is what you get'. OFFBEATIP #1: When shooting slide film that you intend to scan, consider shooting one image at the correct exposure and another at half a stop overexposed. The resulting lighter transparencies will make life easier for film scanners, helping to overcome the problem of 'noise' and lack of detail in dark areas of transparencies. STEP 2 Set the resolution Typically the maximum dpi available STEP 3 Reset the scanning software 'levels' values: This is to ensure that the preview scan is accomplished with reset, 'default' values, enabling the operator to accurately and consistently determine how the scanner is 'reading' the image. (See later section on adjusting 'Levels) STEP 4 Do a preview scan: This will scan the film according to pre-set values, and ultimately reveal whether any 'tweaking' of the image is needed. Generally, such previews are in the form of small on-screen 'thumbnail' images, so it can be difficult to fully appreciate what needs to be done to the image. Still, think of this stage as a general guide to how the finished scan will turn out, and adjust the 'levels' or 'curves' to suit. (More about adjusting levels and curves in step 11. STEP 5 Crop image in the scanning software preview box (If required) STEP 6 Scan the film strip/slides (You can save on slide mounting costs by specifying 'process only' of your transparency film, and cutting of the film into strips of six frames. These strips can then be simply inserted into a slide scanner's 'six shot' film holder and scanned at will. The same goes for negatives, so remember to ask for 'process only' and for the negatives to be cut into strips of six frames rather than the usual four or five) STEP 7 Cropping Shut down the scanning software and survey the scanned images in Photoshop. Image>Crop with the rectangular marquee tool (if necessary) and convert image to 16 bits/channel (Image>Mode>16 Bits/channel) before editing the image any further. The Rectangular Marquee tool STEP 8 Straighten crooked horizons: Go Image>Rotate Canvas, (Image>Rotate in Photoshop Elements) where necessary - to straighten up slanting horizons (select 'arbitrary' option to customise the angle of rotation), either CW (Clock Wise) or CCW (Counter Clock Wise). It is possible to specify fractions of a degree of rotation (Image>Rotate Canvas>Arbitrary.) STEP 9 Image>Image Size/Canvas Size/ Print Size (Image>Resize>Image Size/Canvas Size in PS Elements): These commands can alter the pixel dimensions (Image size), the size of the document for printing purposes (Print Size) and the overall size of the background you want to work with (Canvas Size). Also, note the 'Resolution' field, which reveals how many pixels per inch (or pixels per centimetre) the document is set to print at. When changing the Pixel Dimensions of an image for printing purposes, ALWAYS change the Resolution first, (around 200dpi for most newspapers and 300dpi for magazines), then specify your desired Document Size (Print Size). The overall Pixel Dimensions are not important in this case - the resampling of an image up or down in size will always alter this field. At this stage, only alter these values if you really need to. STEP 10 Correcting imperfections: (On the 'tools' floating palette): Clone or use the Healing Brush (Clone tool only in PS Elements) tool to correct imperfections, causing them to disappear into the surrounding image. Both tools enable you to paint with sampled pixels from an image or pattern, while the Healing Brush tool also matches the texture, lighting, and shading of the sampled pixels to the source pixels. As a result, the repaired pixels blend seamlessly into the rest of the image. Simply select the appropriate tool and then define the area to be 'cloned' by mousing over it with the 'brush' tool (specify the brush size in the 'Options' bar, at top) and alt-clicking to select. STEP 11 Adjust contrast: Image>Adjustments>Levels or Image>Adjustments>Curves (Image>Enhance>Adjust Brightness/Contrast>Levels in PS Elements) to edit overall contrast (also try Auto levels/Auto Contrast). Some explanation is in order here, because this step is the most important in determining an image's overall contrast and ultimately, its visual impact. Get it wrong and the picture will either look washed out and 'ghosty' or dark and unappealing. Adjusting image contrast with 'Levels' (Options Bar>Image>Adjustments>Levels) (Options Bar>Image>Enhance>Adjust Brightness/Contrast>Levels in PS Elements) We will start with the 'Levels' dialog box, which displays a simple bar chart graph of the count of pixels of every tone of grey that occurs in the image. From this graph, or 'histogram', we can 'diagnose' the overall contrast of an image and decide how to correct it. Only when the contrast of an image is optimised can we begin to think about editing its colour values. LEVELS DIALOG BOX: The above histogram maps 'Luminance' or the apparent brightness of the pixel tones of the image (at right), from a range of 0 (the Dark Tones) at the left of the graph through 100 at the centre of the graph (the Mid Tones) to 255 (the Highlights) at the extreme right. The height of each 'peak' indicates how many pixels there are in a particular luminance value. Note the three 'sliders', which controls three different image contrast values (Dark tones, Mid tones and Highlights) in a similar way that a graphic equaliser controls specific audio frequencies. These three sliders alter the 'Input Levels'; essentially, the levels that we are going to be working with. The 'Input Levels' values are as per default; at zero for the left-hand dark tones slider, 1.00 for the mid tones slider and 255 for the highlights. In this image, we have a very high count of pixels that are near the dark end of the scale, and a moderate amount of pixels in the midrange and bright highlights. The dark areas are a representation of the rainforest in heavy shadow, while the lighter areas represent reflected light from the surface of the muddy river. Take a look at how the graph drops steeply, at right and how there is a gap between the 'foot' of the graph and the extreme zero, or dark end of the scale. This indicates that there are no pixels recorded in that range, i.e. no information. These gaps give visual cues to the following problems; * Large gaps on the left-hand, dark end of the scale indicate poor contrast or 'ghosting' of an image * Large gaps on the right-hand, light end of the scale indicate a generally dark scan, with a lack of information in the lightest pixel range of an image. These problems can be partly remedied by dragging the end (left and right) sliders to the beginning of the histogram graph (where the image details begin) at either end, as below in Levels 2: The next step is to brighten the midrange contrast, and this is done by moving the middle slider to the left (to brighten the image) or to the right (to darken the image). The original scan as depicted in 'Levels pic one' was slightly dark overall, so the middle slider was nudged to the left of centre to brighten the image, as in the above picture example Levels 2. When brightening an image with the centre slider, there is a chance that contrast will be impaired - leaving the image with a slightly milky, 'ghostly' look. This undesirable effect can be alleviated by easing the left hand slider to the right, which darkens pixels at the dark end of the scale and introduces sharper contrast to the image. Often, just a nudge is required to bring the image back to an acceptable contrast range. Be very careful when adjusting the levels sliders. It is very easy to go too far, leaving the image looking inky black or overblown white. Often, image contrast can be improved by applying Auto Levels and/or Auto Contrast, as these features edit the image automatically according to default values. Sometimes, applying Auto Levels and Auto Contrast makes little difference to an image, which can mean that the general trend of the histogram is sound; thus the overall contrast is good. But that is of little help if the image still looks too dark or light, in which case the Levels values will have to be manually adjusted, and perhaps 'tested' after editing with the Auto functions. OFFBEATIP #2: The Auto Levels/Contrast functions give good results when an image with an average distribution of pixel values needs a simple contrast adjustment or when an image has an overall colour cast. However, adjusting the Levels or Curves controls manually is more precise. What about the really tough shots? Whoa! Don't throw those over or underexposed negatives or slides away just yet. You may be able to salvage them with some serious editing in Photoshop. Aha! Now it's time to really test those image manipulation skills, with a woefully over-exposed image from a throwaway underwater camera. This is a picture of Clarissa and Tamoko holding a freshwater tortoise in Packsaddle Lagoon, near Kununurra in Western Australia's Kimberley region. The camera didn't allow for exposure adjustment, so we will have to adjust the contrast values of the image after the fact. CORRECTING OVER-EXPOSED SHOTS BEFORE CHECK THE HISTOGRAM First of all, let's look at the histogram of the above image which, as expected, reveals an abundance of pixels in the light half of the scale. The dark half of the scale has relatively few pixels, which means that the left and middle slider need to be moved right to correct the overblown trend of the image. TWEAK THE LEVELS AFTER After some serious slider shifting, the image looks much healthier. Note how the right-hand (dark tones) slider has been dragged from its normal home at the zero end of the histogram range to a value of 68, and the middle (mid tones) slider has been nudged from its 1.00 default value to 0.84. Of course, the image we had to work with was badly over-exposed, so naturally the pic required some heavy-duty editing. CORRECTING UNDER-EXPOSED OR DARK SHOTS BEFORE The above scan depicts a group of dirt bikers returning triumphantly from Cape York, Australia's northernmost finger. As you can see, the image is dark overall, with poor contrast. The histogram tells the tale: a peaky 'island' of pixels in the dark end of the scale, with very few pixels in the light end. The right and left hand sliders need to be brought to the foot of the histogram so as to maximise contrast, and the middle slider needs to be eased to the left to brighten the image. AFTER Although it may not be possible to 'make a silk purse out of a sow's ear', the contrast and overall brightness of the image has been improved by some simple slider editing. SELECTIVE CONTRAST EDITING There are times when only a portion of an image needs its contrast tweaking, and this can be accomplished be selecting only the area that needs to be edited while leaving the other areas untouched. Often this technique is used to balance out overly 'contrasty' slide scans, i.e. images that have an unacceptable range of contrast. The picture below of a boy peeking out from a curtain of icicles is a good example of such a contrasty slide scan, and a handy example of how film cannot always record useful detail in both the light and dark areas of a scene. Note how the exposure of the snow-dappled foreground is acceptable, while the boy is apparently cast into deep shadow. Photoshop offers several different ways of accomplishing almost anything, but to keep things simple we will chop out the dark portion of the scene in two ways: (1) With Filter>Extract > (Photoshop 7) or Image>Extract (Photoshop 6) (2) With the 'Lasso' tool MASKING WITH THE 'EXTRACT' FUNCTION (Options Bar>Filter>Extract) (N/A in PS Elements) Let's have a look at the 'Extract' method first, which is a very straightforward way to 'mask', i.e. remove elements of a picture without leaving ragged edges. First of all, the area to be selected is defined by the 'Edge Highlighter' tool: which is shown in the image below as a green band. The idea is to pick the appropriate size tool to 'straddle' either side of the outline that forms the desired selection area. Then the area to be cut out is filled in with the 'Fill Tool': which is shown below as a blue mask. After clicking 'OK', the image portion is extracted as shown below at left. All that needs to be done now is to subtly alter the levels of this extracted portion, and drag it back into the original image with the 'Move' tool (on the 'Tools' Bar): Tip: Go Image>Duplicate to make a copy of the extracted portion (which you then work on with 'Levels' etc), then revert to the original image and go Edit>Undo Extract to return to the original 'contrasty' scan. Then use the 'Move' tool to superimpose the two images. The finished image, at right, is effectively a composite of two layers; the dark original image underneath with the lighter cutout section placed on top. Always remember to 'Flatten' the image (combine the layers) when you have finished making the composite by going Layer>Flatten Image'; to make sure the layers can't be inadvertently knocked out of alignment and also to minimise the file size. SELECTING THE WORK AREA WITH THE 'LASSO' TOOL The second method of selective editing is 'Lassoing', which is not as precise or as easy as using the 'Extract' function, although in this case there is no need to use multiple layers. Just select the 'Lasso' tool from the 'Tools' Bar and run a line around the area you wish to edit. Then 'Feather' the effect by going Select>Feather (specify the pixel radius to be Feathered) before making contrast changes to the selected portion with the 'Levels' dialog box. After changing the levels values, simply deselect the Lasso tool and assess the results. SELECTIVE CONTRAST EDITING: ADJUSTING THE CONTRAST AND COLOUR SATURATION OF SMALL AREAS When very small areas of an image need to be brightened, darkened or colour-adjusted, it's time to go to the Tools Bar and work with the Dodge, Burn or Sponge tools. Their functions are: * Dodge: Used to brighten a selected area. Select the Dodge tool from the Tools Bar then specify your brush type and size on the Options Bar, as well as the pixel range you wish to work with (Shadows/Midtones/Highlights) and the Exposure (strength of the effect). * Burn: Used to darken a selected area. Select the Dodge tool from the Tools Bar then specify your brush type and size on the Options Bar, as well as the pixel range you wish to work with (Shadows/Midtones/Highlights) and the Exposure (strength of the effect). * Sponge: Used to either saturate (deepen) or desaturate the colours a selected area. Select the Sponge tool from the Tools Bar then specify your brush type and size on the Options Bar, then specify whether you want to be in Desaturate or Saturate mode and how strong you want the Flow to be (how quickly the effect is applied). Adjusting image contrast with 'Curves' (Options Bar>Image>Adjustments>Curves) (N/A in PS Elements) Like the Levels dialog box, the Curves dialog box lets you adjust the entire tonal range of an image. But instead of making adjustments using only three variables (highlights, shadows, midtones), with Curves you can adjust any point along a 0-255 scale while keeping up to 15 other values constant. In this way, the Curves dialog box allows for more precise adjustment of images than with the Levels dialog box. The horizontal axis of the Curves graph represents the original intensity values of the pixels (Input levels, i.e. the contrast values of the pixels we want to alter); the vertical axis represents the new colour values (Output levels, i.e. the pixel values post-editing). In the default diagonal line, all pixels have identical Input and Output values. Note: Curves displays intensity values from 0 to 255, with shadows (0) on the left, or percentages from 0 to 100, with highlights (0%) on the left. To reverse the display of shadows and highlights at any time, click the double arrow below the curve. * To make the Curves grid finer, hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS), and click the grid. Alt/Option-click again to make the grid larger. * Click any points on the curve that you want to remain fixed. For example, if you want to adjust the midtones while minimising the effect on the highlights and shadows, click the quarter and three-quarter points on the curve. * You can add up to 14 control points to the curve, locking those values. To remove a control point, drag it off the graph, select it and press Delete, or Ctrl-click (Windows) or Command-click (Mac OS) it. You cannot delete the endpoints of the curve. To determine the lightest and darkest areas in the image, drag over the image. The intensity values of the area under the pointer, along with the corresponding location on the curve, are displayed in the Curves dialog box. Do any of the following to adjust the curve: * Drag the curve until the image looks the way you want it. * Click a point on the curve, and enter Input and Output values for the point. * Select the pencil at the bottom of the dialog box, and drag to draw a new curve. You can hold down Shift to constrain the curve to a straight line, and click to define endpoints. When you're finished, click Smooth if you want to smooth the curve. * Click Auto to adjust the image using the settings specified in the Auto Correction Options dialog box. How do I start? Firstly, determine which specific tones of an images' contrast to adjust by opening the image in question, then opening the Curves dialog box. Place the Curves dialog box alongside the image, and mouse over the areas of the image that you want to adjust, as in the example above - where the sky is being sampled to determine which pixels to change. In this case we are going to brighten the sky, while trying to preserve the contrast of the rest of the image. The first move Below, we can see that the sample point (an Input value of 24%) has been eased downwards, to lighten the 'Output' value to 18%. (These values can be either be expressed as a percentage or along the scale of 0 to 255, as in the case of the 'Levels' dialog box. Just toggle between the two methods of displaying information, as detailed in the diagram below but be aware that moving the scale line downwards in 0-255 mode will darken rather than lighten the pixel values.) As we can see the sky has been lightened slightly, although the whole Curve scale has been bowed downwards as well and this has lightened some pixel ranges that were not intended to be altered. The solution This 'bowing' of the scale line can be remedied by clicking points on the curve either side of the desired 24% zone to fix the scale line in place, as below. In this way, you can effectively isolate the pixel range you want to edit while preserving the other pixel range values. Of course, this process can be applied to numerous points along the scale line, to brighten or darken any point along the 0-100% or 0-255 contrast range. STEP 12: Image>Adjustments>Colour Balance/Selective Colour/Hue/Saturation/Replace Colour/Auto Colour: (Image>Enhance>Adjust Color>Hue/Saturation only in PS Elements) All these commands have different ways of going about altering the colour or colour balance of an image. Also consider using Image>Adjustments>Auto Colour (Image>Enhance>Auto Color Color Correction in PS Elements) initially to see if the software can 'guess' its way to the truth. If the results are unsatisfactory, simply go Edit>Undo. * Colour Balance changes the overall mixture of colours in an image. This function is particularly useful for correcting colour casts that may occur on film as a result of shooting under fluorescent lights and so on. The task of doing so is simple, providing one appreciates how the 'Colour Wheel' works; a vital reference that shows how to take away one colour by adding its opposite colour. * Color wheel: A. Green B. Yellow C. Red D. Magenta E. Blue F. Cyan Essentially, the colour wheel is used to predict how a change in one colour component affects other colours and also how changes translate between RGB and CMYK colour models. (RGB refers to Red, Green and Blue which is the method used for displaying colours on a computer monitor. CMYK refers to Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black and is used in printing. RGB has a much higher number of possible colour combinations than CMYK. Generally speaking, it's fine to submit your digital images in RGB as this is a more economical file format i.e. you can fit more images on a CD-Rom, or while emailing, reduces the size of the file of the image. In the printing process, RGB colours will be converted to CMYK at the colour separators. In Photoshop, you can change an image from RGB to CMYK or vice versa by going Image>Mode>RGB/CMYK. You can also convert an image to black and white by following these steps and specifying 'grayscale'.) For example, you can decrease the amount of any colour in an image by increasing the amount of its opposite on the colour wheel and vice versa. Similarly, you can increase and decrease a colour by adjusting the two adjacent colours on the wheel, or even by adjusting the two colours adjacent to its opposite. In a CMYK image, you can decrease magenta either by decreasing the amount of magenta or its complement (by adding cyan and yellow). You can even combine these two corrections, minimising their effect on overall lightness. In an RGB image, you can decrease magenta by removing red and blue or by adding green. All of these adjustments result in an overall colour balance containing less magenta. Example of colour cast correction with the 'Colour Balance' dialog box The picture below was taken under fluorescent lights without a correcting filter, in order to have the maximum amount of light entering the lens. The camera could then be hand-held, but the downside is the pronounced green cast on the film. Before Colour Balance correction: A pronounced green cast To correct this greenish trend, we simply consult the colour wheel, which says that green can be counteracted by adding magenta, so that's what we'll do. Just go Options Bar>Image>Adjustments>Colour Balance, which will bring up the following dialog screen: Simply slide the scale across to magenta until the picture looks like the scene as it was on the day: After Colour Balance correction * The Selective Colour command is a high-end colour-correction method that adjusts the amount of process colours in individual colour components. This command is typically used by commercial printers than by photographers, although it is worth experimenting with on those rare occasions when other contrast or colour correction methods prove difficult to implement. * The Hue/Saturation command adjusts the hue, saturation, and lightness values of the entire image or of individual colour components. Photographers are more likely to use the Saturation command, either to restore colour richness to a faded slide or to tone down overblown colours on a tourism company's promo CD of images.
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\par You can saturate or desaturate the entire tonal range of an image by using the default command (Master), or work on Reds, Yellows, Greens, Cyans, Blues or Magentas individually. The sequence of screen shots below shows how a plus value of 21 to the Saturation makes all the difference to a badly faded transparency, taken at Gantheume Point in Broome, Western Australia. Note that the Master field is set, allowing all colours in the range to be boosted. Boosting the Saturation of a image * The Replace Colour command replaces specified colours in an image with new colour values. Once again, this is a specialist command which has little application in image editing as it applies to freelance travel photographers. STEP 13: (On the 'tools' floating palette): Magic Wand tool - to select areas of sky etc for editing. Use in conjunction with Grow/Similar (to increase the pixel selection) and Inverse (to select all areas outside the defined area). Use Paintbrush and Airbrush tools to fill in colour. Sample colours with the Eyedropper tool. STEP 14: Image>Duplicate when working on backgrounds or making composite images STEP 15: Filter>Blur>Motion Blur (to introduce movement into a scene, from any angle) * Filter>Blur> Radial Blur (to impart 'spin' to car wheels (use 'elliptical marquee') or to impart a 'zoom' effect to an image. * Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur (to blur backgrounds out) STEP 16: Filter>Sharpen>Unsharp Mask (software that 'finds' edges in an image and defines the transition, effectively 'sharpening' the picture. Note: the Unsharp Mask filter also 'finds' grain that is present in film, so consider 'lassoing' or otherwise isolating areas of sky etc to avoid ugly grain developing. Sharpening the edges of the image. As a final step, use the Unsharp Mask filter to sharpen the clarity of edges in the image. This step helps restore focus to images that have undergone resampling as a result of tonal adjustments. Unsharp masking, or USM, is a traditional film compositing technique used to sharpen edges in an image. The Unsharp Mask filter corrects blurring introduced during photographing, scanning, resampling, or printing. It is useful for images intended for both print and online viewing. The effects of the Unsharp Mask filter are far more pronounced on-screen than in high-resolution output. If your final destination is print, experiment to determine what settings work best for your image. To use Unsharp Mask to sharpen an image: Choose Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. Make sure the Preview option is selected. Click on the image in the preview window to see how the image looks without the sharpening. Drag in the preview window to see different parts of the image, and click + or - to zoom in or out. Here are the Unsharp Mask sliders and a rundown of their functions: * Amount: The Amount slider specifies the strength, or amount of the sharpening effect. Amount slider methodology: Drag the Amount slider or enter a value to determine how much to increase the contrast of pixels. For high-resolution printed images, an amount between 150% and 200% is usually recommended. * Radius: This slider specifies the radius of the region to which each pixel is compared. Radius Slider Methodology: Drag the Radius slider or enter a value to determine the number of pixels surrounding the edge pixels that affect the sharpening. For high-resolution images, a Radius between 1 and 2 is usually recommended. A lower value sharpens only the edge pixels, whereas a higher value sharpens a wider band of pixels. This effect is much less noticeable in print than on-screen, because a 2-pixel radius represents a smaller area in a high-resolution printed image. * Threshold: Unsharp Mask locates pixels that differ from surrounding pixels by the Threshold you specify and increases the pixels' contrast by the amount you specify. Threshold Slider Methodology: Drag the Threshold slider or enter a value to determine how different the sharpened pixels must be from the surrounding area before they are considered edge pixels and sharpened by the filter. To avoid introducing noise (in images with flesh tones, for example), experiment with Threshold values between 2 and 20. The default Threshold value (0) sharpens all pixels in the image. Note: If applying Unsharp Mask makes already bright colours appear overly saturated, convert the image to Lab mode and apply the filter to the L channel only. This sharpens the image without affecting the colour components. Finally: Click OK! Before and after sequence: The Unsharp Mask Filter BEFORE AFTER (On the 'tools' floating palette): Blur/Sharpen/Smudge to modify the sharpness or saturation of small portions of the image. Sharpening should always be the last stage in the editing process. Please note that sharpening an image may increase its final file size, drastically so in the case of some .JPEG files. Therefore, use this filter judiciously, and make sure you flatten any layers before finally saving the image to disc. STEP 17: (Image>Mode>8 Bits/channel) Always make sure you convert the image back to 8 bits/channel after editing. STEP 18: Save image as a TIFF or JPEG file, as required. 'Batch processing' images in Photoshop There will be many times when you want to convert a batch of high resolution .tiff extensions to low-resolution .jpeg extensions with much smaller pixel dimensions. To do this manually is extremely tedious and time-consuming, but Photoshop has a way to automate the process, as follows; 1. Open up the first of the big TIFFS from its folder 2. Make a new sub-folder in the source folder, and name it 'low res' or 'jpegs', (simply to indicate where to send the smaller files) 3. Go Window>Show Actions and click the 'create new action' tab. 4. In the 'New Action' box that comes up, type in a name for the process you are about to perform, i.e.: 'Greenland pix shrunk', then hit the 'RECORD' button. Leave all the other fields alone. 5. Go Image>Image Size and resize the big TIFF as desired, (remembering that there may be vertical AND horizontal format pics in the folder) then save it in the 'low res' or 'jpegs' folder at the quality level you desire. 6. On the 'Actions' palette, click 'Stop Playing/Recording' 7. Go File>Automate>Batch which will bring up a large 'Batch' window. The 'Play' box should be OK but make sure the 'Action' field is 'Greenland pix shrunk', as previously recorded. In the 'Source' box (which should be set at 'folder'), click 'Choose' and specify the folder of big TIFFS and in the 'Destination' field, set the file path to the 'low res' or 'jpegs' folder. 8. Then click 'OK' and the process of automated file conversion will commence. Just sit back and watch the magic! Note: File>Automate>Batch can be used to apply any process to a batch of images, from Levels through Saturation to Unsharp Masking. Just be careful that each image needs the same treatment though! BACK (AN INTRODUCTION TO DIGITAL IMAGING) NEXT (A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND - DOLLARS?) BACK TO TOP BACK TO INDEX SCREEN Offbeatrips Travel and Tourism Journalism 9 Compass Close Edge Hill, Cairns 4870 Far North Queensland Australia Email: info@offbeatrips.com Web: http://www.offbeatrips.com Tel: (In Australia): (07) 4032 1708 Mob (In Australia): (040) 1135 372 Tel: (Outside Australia): (617) 4032 1708 Mob (Outside Australia): (6140) 1135 372
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