Figure 4.0.1. Before
Figure 4.0.2. After
Light, gesture, and color are the key components of any photograph. Light and color are obvious, but it is gesture that is the most important. There is gesture in everything. It’s up to you to find the gesture that is most telling.
—Jay Maisel
In this chapter, you will go beyond exposure and apply the concepts of Extended Dynamic Range photography (ExDR) to focus, blur, and image structure by using image harvesting. You will apply this to the image editing process in order to support the aesthetic choices you make regarding light, shape, gesture, and color when you first take the picture. Picasso said, “Art is the lie that tells the truth.” With that in mind, you will also apply techniques to create an aesthetically satisfying final image rather than a historically accurate one. Additionally, you will use the approach introduced in Chapter 1, and expanded on in Chapters 2 and 3, to guide the viewer’s unconscious eye through the image. Finally, you will explore the changes in workflow that you need to make when working with large megapixel files. (The files for this lesson were captured with a Nikon D3x, which is a 24.5MP camera.)
The concepts behind this lesson are the outcome of conversations that I have had over the years with two great photographers: Jay Maisel, who has forgotten more than I will ever know about light, gesture, and color, and who first introduced me to those concepts; and my uncle, photographer CJ Elfont, who taught me photography and, most importantly, how the eye “sees.” The writings and images of poet-photographer Ernst Haas have also strongly influenced me by teaching me how to allow the eye to see the feeling of the moments in my images; to be taken by the photograph rather than take the photograph. When you master this lesson, you will have grasped the heart of what I have discovered about how it all works. The real journey begins now.
The late painter and designer Josef Albers said that “shape is the enemy of color.” By that he meant that when shape is in the presence of color, we tend to remember the shape and not the color. But if you understand how to control color—regardless of whether the photograph is color or black and white—you will have complete mastery of the images you create. The key is to find a way to cause shape to become color’s unwitting ally, and thereby make color a shape that the viewer will remember.
This is easier said than done, of course. What you need is a catalyst to make shape and color work in harmony. And this is where pattern comes in.
Patterns are shapes we tend to see in things, sometimes when they are not really there. Patterns tend to manifest themselves as shapes. Whether it is light coming through tree leaves, a paper bag in a subway trash can, or raindrops on a windshield, everything can form or be perceived as a pattern. Patterns are interesting, but a pattern interrupted is more interesting. If you interrupt a pattern, you are on the path to finding a way to use shape as the unwitting ally of color.
Jay Maisel says that light and color are obvious, but it is gesture that is most important. In the photograph of my niece, the gesture is obvious. The pattern we recognize first is her face, and the finger stuck in her nose interrupts that pattern (Figure 4.0.3).
Figure 4.0.3. A universal gesture
Here is an example of an image where gesture is not as plain as the nose on my niece’s face. Look at the image of the flower and the leaves, then look away (Figure 4.0.4). Which color do you remember? Most people will say magenta or red. Even though 90% of the image is made up of greens, you tend to remember the part with the most shape. The shape has become an unwitting ally of the color. The color is further reinforced because the magenta/red flower’s shape and circular pattern is interrupted by the linear pattern of the green blades. Further, the magenta flower appears to be moving away from the green blades, and this pattern holds the gesture that is most telling.
Figure 4.0.4. Do you see the green or the magenta?
Of light, gesture, and color, light is the most frequently taken for granted. You see it, it is there, end of story. But rather than merely accepting its presence, why not consider viewing it as an object? Treat it as if it were a solid and a part of the experience being expressed in the photograph.
Take, for example, these images from the original Seattle Sequence series (Figures 4.0.5, 4.0.6, 4.0.7, 4.0.8, 4.0.9, and 4.0.10). The light tells the story of the moment in each image, whether black and white or color. (If you can see something, it has color. The artist Matisse said, “Black is the queen of all colors.”)
Figure 4.0.5.
Figure 4.0.6.
Figure 4.0.7.
Figure 4.0.8.
Figure 4.0.9.
Figure 4.0.10.
The 12 images that are the original Seattle Sequence were shot in 45 minutes. My skill as a photographer had nothing to do with how quickly I shot; I had forgotten to charge the battery in my camera. I saw the charge eroding as I watched one of the prettiest displays of light that I have ever seen. Shafts of light broke through the clouds of a departing rainstorm, while a new rainstorm was moving in. Knowing that I had little time to record these images, fear became my caffeine, and I shot until my battery died. Among the images that came from those 45 minutes were 12 that I thought were particularly outstanding. The lessons that I learned were to just shoot the image—don’t think about shooting the image—and carry an extra battery.
In each instance, no matter how brief, I perceived the image in its final form as I photographed it, and that perception determined how I harvested the images. In each capture, the light informed the image, made the patterns and interrupted them. In each instance, light was as physical and tangible a thing as the flowers, and for each I considered (no matter how momentarily) how I would use dark, intermediate, and light isolates.
The Isolate Theory, conceived by CJ Elfont, is a way of looking at composition and explains the interrelationship of the elements (or isolates) in a photograph and how these can be used to evoke meaningful, emotional responses in viewers. (See the sidebar for a very brief overview of this theory.) This compositional theory formed the basis for how I see and remains one of the cornerstones of my vision today.
In the next image of Calla lilies, the primary isolates are the two flowers that are slightly to the right of center. The gesture that is most telling is the spiral that starts from the upper right in the dark isolate. This is the darkest area in which there are definable structures, and it continues to the center of the photograph, where the primary light isolates exist. This particular pattern occurred by happenstance, but I reinforced it (Figures 4.0.11, 4.0.12, and 4.0.13).
Figure 4.0.11.
Figure 4.0.12.
Figure 4.0.13.
By using selective contrast and sharpness, I gradually created the dramatic effect of motion in a still image. I also interrupted the pattern of the background with the spiral of light-to-dark and, in this way, found the most telling gesture. All of this was already present in the image, but it had to be brought out; I had to remove from the file everything that was not my vision.
If gesture is the expression of the photograph, and light is its language, then colors are its words, and contrast, saturation, and sharpness are the alphabet. Without words and language, expression has no meaning. Without the alphabet, there are no words.
If the words of color are lost in a cacophony of shapes, the image will be less than it could be. The better you support color and its expression, the better your images will be appreciated. And just as in a street fight, the only rule is that there are no rules. Everything you do is in service of the print, which will always be in service of what is ultimately most important: your voice and vision.
Stop taking pictures. Be taken by your pictures.
—Ernst Haas
In the first edition of this book, I used a series of images that I captured one morning at sunrise in Cades Cove (in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park). Without planning what I would shoot, I had gotten up extraordinarily early hoping to shoot in the fog at sunrise. I actually saw the field of flowers after all the fog had burned off and I was about to leave. I just found the images, or maybe they found me (Figure 4.0.14). With this set of images, I began to be aware of the difference between taking a picture and being taken by one.
Figure 4.0.14. Cades Cove flowers
As I crawled around on my hands and knees among the flowers in the dew, the light moved and changed. I tried to approach the light the same way I approached the flowers, as if it were a solid object. I made sure to get as many captures as I could using as many options as I could. Moments like those happen; you cannot make them re-happen.
If you look at the images that I shot, you can see the evolution of my vision as I experienced the flowers. It is in that journey that I discovered the destination.
For this rewriting of Welcome to Oz, I decided to change the image for this lesson so that I could go beyond using my first epiphany (or Eureka!) moment images in order to more deeply explore the concept of ExDR and how to manage the huge amounts of data and the large files that are generated when using high-megapixel DSLRs.
If you look at the images that I captured of the flowers that were randomly placed in buckets in a crowded market (Figure 4.0.15), once again, you can see the evolution of my vision as I experienced the flowers. Each was a part of the journey on which the flowers took me (Figures 4.0.16, 4.0.17 and 4.0.18).
Figure 4.0.15. Images captured of flowers in a bucket in a market
Figure 4.0.16.
Figure 4.0.17.
Figure 4.0.18.
The lessons to be learned using the images that make up this lesson are not just about the bokeh of the lens, they are also about using sharpness and defined image structures to selectively extend the areas of focus in an image that is mostly about blur.
If you look at the image as some photographers might shoot it and call it a day (_VAV072122_SHRP.tif), it is boring, but historically accurate; something you might see on a seed packet. If you look at _VAV0722BASE_LITE.tif, it is a far more interesting image due to the bokeh or blur. Though more visually appealing, it still does not realize the vision that I had when it took me. To recreate that vision, I needed an expanded exposure range so that multiple areas, at different distances and at different levels of sharpness, were all in focus, while existing in a shallow DOF. As I discussed in the previous chapter, that cannot be achieved in one capture using a fixed optical/sensor plane system. To achieve the end that I had in mind for this image, I had to practice preemptive Photoshop and capture all of the image elements that I thought I might need to extend the dynamic range of each of them. Simply put: Real pixels are always preferable to computer-generated ones.
Up to this point, you have been working with images that were captured with cameras that were no larger than 5.5 megapixels. In this lesson, you will be working with images captured from a Nikon D3x, a 24.5 megapixel camera. You will see how to adapt your workflow to the needs of the file. A 24.5MP RAW file, when opened in 16-bit in the ProPhoto color space, is about 149 megabytes. This means that if you harvest four images, you will have a file that is almost 600 megabytes before you do anything.
Once you have chosen the images with which you want to work, you can begin making structural and aesthetic choices. (Because the fulfillment of your vision starts with the choices you make at the time of capture, you should let them guide you in choosing how and what to photograph. The more you get right in your captures, the better off you will be when you begin building the image in Photoshop.)
Here are some initial considerations:
• You will need to align all the images, so that they will blend together as seamlessly as possible.
• Because the lightness of the images differ, you must make aesthetic choices that you can accomplish without leaving chalk marks. More specifically, do not make choices that require technical adjustments that will be obvious to the viewer once your work on the image is complete.
• Aesthetically, you want to support the image’s yellows rather than its greens.
• The gesture of this image is the way the top of the flower wraps around the stem and flows downward to the right before tapering to the center bottom where it attaches to the stem. However, you want the viewer’s eye to travel in the opposite direction: from the lower right, up through the middle, to the flower embracing the stem, because it makes for a stronger visual journey and therefore a more successful image. This movement should be repeated as long as the viewer is looking at the image (hang time). You will use sharpness, contrast, saturation, and focus to cause the viewer’s eye to travel through the image along a path you create, and you want to use blur to give the eye a place to which it can retreat.
Disregard for details is the first sign of doom.
—Kai Krause
As in the previous chapters, you will approach the creation of this image going from global to granular. The following steps will show you how I removed everything that was not my vision from the Seattle Sequence 2.0 flower images and how I practiced preemptive Photoshop at the point of capture. I chose the lens I used for its bokeh, because, in my vision of this image, it is the quality of the blur in relationship to the area(s) of focus that I find aesthetically appealing.
_VAV0719BASE_DRK.tif
_VAV0722BASE_LITE.tif
_VAV072122_SHRP.tif
In this step, you will use Match Color to make a lighter version of a layer. It would have been lighter had I done this in the camera, but while I was shooting this part of the harvest, the clouds moved, changing the lighting. Normally, when I am working this way, once I have established focus, I do things in manual mode, which affords me greater control over exposure and DOF. The trade off is that the camera cannot automatically readjust exposure for changes in light. So even though I wanted a brighter image, I did not get it. Using Match Color is one way to match both the color and the brightness of one file to another. There is a caveat—when the Match Color adjustment works, it works really well, and when it does not, it is useless. Match Color works best when you harvest images of the same thing at the same location. It might not work if you try matching color from two different locations and/or of two different objects.
Figure 4.2.1.
Figure 4.2.2. Selecting SEATTLE_LILLY_ALIGN_16bit. in the Source pull-down
Figure 4.2.3. Selecting BASE_LITE in the Layer pull-down
Compare the image before the Color Match adjustment (Figure 4.2.4), after the Color Match adjustment (Figure 4.2.5), and after the Luminace and Color Intensity increases (Figure 4.2.6).
Figure 4.2.4. Before the Color Match adjustment
Figure 4.2.5. After the Color Match Adjustment
Figure 4.2.6. After the Luminance and Color Intensity increases
These choices were made because you want the viewer’s unconscious eye to go first to the flower and to see the yellows before the greens. Because the eye first goes from light to dark, you lightened up the layer that contained the most defined image structures. However, you had to increase the color intensity because when you lighten an image, color saturation decreases. Conversely, when you darken an image, color saturation increases.
No matter how good your tripod, tripod head, and camera fastening system, whenever you touch the camera during the capture process, even to refocus, you introduce some form of camera movement. This next step addresses this first part of the alignment problem.
I have observed that when using the Auto Align Layers feature in Photoshop CS5, the order of the layers in the layer stack and which layer you click on first (top or bottom) has an effect on how the layers will be aligned. Therefore, you must decide which is the primary layer (the BASE_LITE layer is the primary layer in this image) and make sure it is at the top of the layer stack.
You will notice that the alignment process has resulted in an image that is no longer full frame (Figure 4.3.1). You could crop the open areas, but that would change the image, and perhaps risk losing parts of it. This next step addresses this second part of the alignment problem.
Figure 4.3.1. After the alignment, the image is not full frame
You are not saving this file so that you give yourself an exit strategy. Because the aligned layers are now in the SEATTLE_LILY_16bit.psb file, there is no need to have two copies of them. Should you feel the need to re-align the layers later, you have a file that is already set up for that in which the layers are not aligned.
In this step, you will not only extend the range of exposure, you will also extend the range of the sharpness and blur. I have found that real pixels are always better to use than attenuated ones. By using pixels unmodified in Photoshop, you reduce the amount of overall artifacting. You can also control the amount of detail in any specific area. Essentially, you can have your blur and see the image, too. In the first part of this next step, you will add dark, and in the second part, you will add light and sharpness.
All the decisions that you make from this point forward are about how the viewer’s eye will move through the image, how to reinforce the gesture of the image, and how to cause shape to become the unwitting ally of color.
You will begin by making sure that the viewer sees the yellows before the greens, so that their unconscious eye moves from the lower left of the image to the center, then to the upper part of the flower where the top of the lily intertwines with the stem, and then to the top of the lily that goes out of the frame.
Figure 4.4.1. The image map
Figure 4.4.2. The layer mask
Figure 4.4.3. Before brushwork
Figure 4.4.4. After brushwork
Figure 4.4.5. The layer mask
Figure 4.4.6. After more brushwork
Figure 4.4.7. The layer mask
Figure 4.4.8. After more brushwork
Figure 4.4.9. The layer mask
Figure 4.4.10. After more brushwork
What you have done thus far is to manually extend the dynamic range of the dark aspect of this image without using tone mapping software. Also, you used real pixels created at the point of capture to darken the image. This approach leads to more realistic looking colors and shadows, and you did not introduce the potential artifacts and color shifts that can result from using Curves and Levels adjustment layers.
In the first part of this step, you created an image that is all about the bokeh or the quality of the blur of the lens that created it. In the next steps, you will selectively add lightness to extend the dynamic range of the exposure even further. You will accomplish this using the layer on which you did the Match Color adjustment. Specifically, you are going to add sharpness from an image that was shot at a greater DOF. (In Step 2 of this lesson, Creating a Lighter Version of a Darker Flower, you matched the color and brightness of that image to the present one.) You will also add sharpness from the original image (before you applied the Match Color adjustment) that was captured at about the same exposure level as the BASE_DRK layer that you have just brushed in.
Here are the image maps for the three things that you will be doing to this image: The Sharpen Lite image map (Figure 4.4.11), the Sharpen Dark image map (Figure 4.4.12), and the Lily Tip Sharp image map (Figure 4.4.13).
Figure 4.4.11. The Sharpen Lite image map
Figure 4.4.12. The Sharpen Dark image map
Figure 4.4.13. The Lily Tip Sharp image map
Figure 4.4.14. The selected area
Figure 4.4.15. The layer mask on SHRP_LITE
Figure 4.4.16. After brushwork on SHRP_LITE
Figure 4.4.17. The layer mask on SHRP_DRK
Figure 4.4.18. After the brushwork on SHRP_DRK
Figure 4.4.19. The layer mask on TIP_SHRP_LITE
Figure 4.4.20. After the brushwork on TIP_SHRP_LITE
In the lower left corner of the image, there is an area of light that pulls the eye’s focus away from the flower. To address this issue, you will first use a clipped curve that you will also darken. Here is the image map for the Darken and Lowered Contrast adjustment layer (Figure 4.4.21).
Figure 4.4.21. Image map for the Darken and Lowered Contrast Curves adjustment layer
Figure 4.4.22.
Figure 4.4.23. The layer mask
Figure 4.4.24. After the brushwork
You will notice that there is a light band that runs across the bottom of the image. This occurred during the alignment process. Also, there may be some parts of the aligned image that may fall outside the canvas of the original BASE_LITE image (the image onto which you dragged the ALIGNED_PARTS layer group). In this step, you will address both issues.
Figure 4.5.1.
New to CS5 are Content Aware Fill and Content Aware Spot Healing. Both of these are implementations of PatchMatch technology. These algorithms work by copying multiple patches to stitch together from the surrounding background and fitting them inside the area of the fill selection or the area of the Spot Healing brush. This is an improvement over the old Spot Healing proximity match approach that used only one patch from the background. By stitching together multiple areas, you get a much more convincing and seamless patch. The PatchMatch algorithm works not only for small areas, but for large ones, as well, as you have just seen.
As I discussed earlier, a pattern is interesting, but a pattern interrupted is more interesting. Currently, the image on which you are working has a pattern of greens and yellows in the background with one area of pinkish red. You want to interrupt that pattern while reinforcing the yellows over the greens. And there are still light areas that need to be toned down so that they do not pull the unconscious eye away from the main focus of the image, the lily. For that, you need some darker shapes to conceal the lighter ones and then some red/pink shapes to interrupt the pattern of greens and yellows. Simply darkening the image by using Curves would not accomplish this. Whatever you do, when you are finished with this next step, the image must look as if it was originally captured that way. To accomplish this, you will harvest image structures from within the image. Here are the image maps for the two things you are about to do. View the Stem Parts image map (Figure 4.6.1) and the Reds image map (Figure 4.6.2).
Figure 4.6.1. Stem Parts image map
Figure 4.6.2. Reds image map
Figure 4.6.3. Copying the lower right corner to its own layer
Figure 4.6.4. Duplicating the stem area
Figure 4.6.5. Moving the new STEM_PART layer to the lower right
Figure 4.6.6. Stretching the selection upwards
Figure 4.6.7. Before brushwork
Figure 4.6.8. After brushwork
Figure 4.6.9. The layer mask
Figure 4.6.10. Adding STEM_PART copy 2 above the lily
Figure 4.6.11. Expanding the selection left
Figure 4.6.12. After the brushwork
Figure 4.6.13. The layer mask
Figure 4.6.14. Adding the STEM_PART to the bright area on the left
Figure 4.6.15. Transforming the selection
Figure 4.6.16. The image after the brushwork
Figure 4.6.17. The resulting layer mask
You should now have an image in which the central focus is the lily. There should be no light areas to pull the eye away from that. You have used both image structures and colors that were inherent in the image. In this next step, you will add reds into the image to interrupt the pattern of the greens and yellows in the background, and to introduce visual depth. By introducing red elements, I think that all the aspects of the image become more appealing, which means that the viewer will look at it longer. Look again at the Reds image map (Figure 4.6.2).
Figure 4.6.2. The Reds image map
Figure 4.6.18. Duplicating the REDS layer twice and flipping the REDS layer copy 2
Figure 4.6.19. Aligning the two new layers with the Move tool
Figure 4.6.20. Selecting Content-Aware and turning off Sample All Layers
Figures 4.6.21 and 4.6.22. Brushing in the gap to correct it and the result
Figure 4.6.23. Moving the REDS_DUO above the lily
Figure 4.6.24. Activating the Free Transform tool
Figure 4.6.25. Expanding the width
Figure 4.6.26. Rotating the selection
Figure 4.6.27.
Figure 4.6.28. The image after brushwork
Figure 4.6.29. The layer mask
Figure 4.6.30. Adding red below the lily
Figure 4.6.31. Free Transform tool
Figure 4.6.32. Expanding the width
Figure 4.6.33. Rotating the selection
Figure 4.6.34. After the brushwork
Figure 4.6.35. The layer mask
Figure 4.6.36. Adding red to the left side
Figure 4.6.37. Selecting the Free Transform tool
Figure 4.6.38. Expanding the selection
Figure 4.6.39. Rotating the selection
Figure 4.6.40. The image after the brushwork
Figure 4.6.41. The layer mask
In this last part of the “inner harvesting” step, you will smooth out any places where the transition from sharpness to blur occurs more abruptly than you would like. Also, this is a good time to increase the colors’ intensities and the lightness of the background to further fine tune the image. You will use the Base Layer to accomplish all these tasks. Look at the Base Lite Brush Back image map (Figure 4.7.1).
Figure 4.7.1. Base Lite Brush Back image map
Figure 4.7.2. The image after the brushwork
Figure 4.7.3. The layer mask
The reason for doing this is that the current file size of what you have just done is 2.1 gigabytes. That is a lot of file to have to move. Everything you just did was to create one image from many. Every decision that needed to be made, has been made. By breaking the image workflow up into different files, you save time while preserving an exit strategy.
Every act of creation has to start first with an act of destruction.
—Pablo Picasso
As I indicated in the previous chapter, the human eye is an amazing biological optical system. But this eye is by no means conscious. True, the eye evolved from migrated brain tissue, but it does not think. It sees what it sees and does so in a very specific, predictable manner.
But I believe that humans are in possession of another eye, the conscious one; the one that gives meaning to what we see. The unconscious eye records, while the conscious eye interprets what is recorded.
To this point, you have made decisions on how to manipulate an image so that it will speak to the conscious eye of the viewer. You have done that by causing the unconscious eye to go where you wanted it to go, so that the story would be seen the way you determined it should. You did this by using the alphabet of the photograph: contrast, saturation, and sharpness and by the recognition that the unconscious eye first recognizes light areas and then moves to dark ones, sees high contrast before low contrast areas, records areas of high sharpness before low sharpness, notices areas in focus before those that are blurred, and focuses on highly color-saturated areas before moving to less-saturated ones. Thus, you overrode the tendency of the unconscious eye to wander and sent it on a path of your own choosing.
By controlling the sequence of things that the unconscious eye sees is another facet of control by which you cause shape to become the unwitting ally of color. Previously, you created a pattern interrupted to control the unconscious eye. Now you will do that by working from dark-to-light to remove the light that does not belong and light-to-dark to add brightness where it should be. Also, you will further control the unconscious eye through use of contrast and several forms of “unsharp” sharpening.
At this point in the lesson, you realize that the image you now have was created from conscious decisions that were made at the time of capture. You did not fix this image in Photoshop; rather, you used Photoshop to re-create the vision that you had at moment of capture using fragments of the image itself. No tone mapping software was used to extend the exposure’s dynamic range.
It is at this point in an image’s workflow that you would probably do a color cast correction, as you have in the previous three chapters. You will not do that for this image, because here, the color cast works to your advantage. Remember, the cleanest file that exists, the one with the least amount of artifacts, is the original RAW file, and a non-destructive workflow endeavors to minimize artifacting, as well as assuring an exit strategy. The important lesson is that workflow is dynamic and image specific. You will never do the same things, and in the same order, all of the time.
As I discussed in Chapter 3, each type of sharpening sharpens the image in a slightly different way and each has a benefit. By separating your sharpening steps into different layers and then using opacity and layer masks to blend them together, you get the benefits of the different types of sharpening without the cumulative effect of artifacting.
In this step, you will selectively enhance sharpness using High Pass sharpening. Look at the Image map (Figure 4.8.1).
Figure 4.8.1. High Pass Sharpening image map
Figure 4.8.2. High Pass Sharpening set to a radius of 13.5 pixels
Figure 4.8.3. Before High Pass sharpening
Figure 4.8.4. After High Passs sharpening
Figure 4.8.5.
Figure 4.8.6.
Figure 4.8.7.
Figure 4.8.8.
Figure 4.8.8.
Figure 4.8.9.
Figure 4.8.11.
Figure 4.8.12.
Figure 4.8.13.
These next steps require that you have Nik Software Sharpener Pro 3.0 or that you have downloaded the free 15-day demo. For this image, you will use control points to define the sharpening. When I use control points for sharpening, I zoom in to the area of most importance and use the global sliders to get the look I want. Then, I drop the control points to either sharpen the areas I want or to define those I do not want sharpened. Below is the workflow I employed for this image.
Figure 4.9.1. Zoomed in on the center of the lily in Sharpener Pro 3.0
Figure 4.9.2. Selecting Control Points in the Selective Sharpening pull-down menu
Figure 4.9.3. Making the Control Point active
Figure 4.9.4. Adjusting the sliders for the control point
Figure 4.9.5. Placing the second control point
Figure 4.9.6. Placing the third control point
Figure 4.9.7. Before
Figure 4.9.8. After
Look at how the image evolved by looking at the image map (Figure 4.9.9) the layer mask after the brushwork (Figure 4.9.10) the image before brushwork (Figures 4.9.11 and 4.9.12), the image after the brushwork (Figures 4.9.13 and 4.9.14), and the image after the brushwork is combined with the CS_SHARPEN layer (Figures 4.9.15 and 4.9.16).
Figure 4.9.9. The image map
Figure 4.9.10. The layer mask
Figures 4.9.11 and 4.9.12. Before brushwork and detail
Figures 4.9.13 and 4.9.14. After brushwork and detail
Figures 4.9.15 and 4.9.16. After brushwork and combined with CS_SHARPEN and detail
In this next series of steps, you will create two contrast layers: a Tonal Contrast layer and a Contrast Only layer.
Figure 4.10.1. Setting the Protect Shadows and Highlights to 15%
Figure 4.10.2. Before
Figure 4.10.3. After
Figure 4.10.4. Image map
Figure 4.10.5. Layer mask
Figure 4.10.6. Image after brushwork
Figure 4.10.7. Setting the Tonal Contrast sliders
Remember that there is a bit of a dance between Contrast Only, Tonal Contrast, and Sharpening. Every image is different and, frequently, that difference determines the layer order. For this image, it was best to have Sharpening beneath Contrast—and to have Contrast Only above Tonal Contrast. The reason for this former choice was that when Sharpening was beneath Contrast, it minimized the noise that sometimes comes with sharpening. I placed Contrast Only over Tonal Contrast to further lower the noise and to brighten the areas that I wanted the eye to go to first. So not only did I help move the way the unconscious eye tracks across the image, I enhanced light-to-dark and high-to-low contrast just by layer placement.
View the image with the Contrast Only adustment only (Figure 4.10.8), the image with the Tonal Contrast and Contrast Only combined (Figure 4.10.9), and the Sharpening, Tonal Contrast, and Contrast Only combined (Figure 4.10.10).
Figure 4.10.8. Contrast Only adjustment
Figure 4.10.9. Tonal Contrast and Contrast Only
Figure 4.10.10. Sharpening, Tonal Contrast and Contrast Only
The Color blend mode affects only the color of the image; it does not change the highlights or the shadows. When you last used the Nik Software Skylight filter, you saw that the image brightened and the colors warmed when you ran the plug-in. When you changed the blend mode to Color, the colors did warm up, but the shadows and highlights remained unaffected.
I generally prefer to switch to the Color blend mode for the last step in my process—when I am finished with my adjustments to sharpness, color, and contrast. When I use the Luminosity blend mode, however, I frequently use it when I do an adjustment to sharpness or contrast, because I do not want to affect the color of the image.
Figure 4.11.1. Image map
Figure 4.11.2. Layer mask
Figure 4.11.3. After brushwork
In this step, you will visually neutralize the whites using a Hue and Saturation adjustment layer that will specifically target the yellows of the image. First, you will reduce the saturation, then you will add some blue with the Hue slider, and finally, you will lighten everything without removing all the color.
Obviously, if there is any color in a white, it is not white. This is where having a calibrated monitor is important. If you do not have one, what you see on the screen is not what you will print.
Figure 4.12.1. Selecting Yellows from the Colors pull-down
Figure 4.12.2. Lower Saturation slider
Figure 4.12.3. Lower Hue slider
Figure 4.12.4. Increasing Lightness to +6
Figure 4.12.5. The image map
Figure 4.12.6. Layer mask
Figure 4.12.7. The image after the brushwork
Figure 4.13.1. Clipping the “a” Curve at the bottom point
Figure 4.13.2. Clipping the “b” Curve at the top point
View the image map for the planned work (Figure 4.13.3), the resulting layer mask (Figure 4.13.4), and the image after the brushwork (Figure 4.13.5).
Figure 4.13.3. The image map
Figure 4.13.4. The layer mask
Figure 4.13.5. The image after brushwork
In my view you cannot claim to have seen something until you have photographed it.
—Emile Zola
Everything you have done on your journey through this image has been to get to this point—controlling the viewer’s eye by the use of isolates (you might want to review the Isolate Theory sidebar at the beginning of this chapter). As I have discussed in the previous chapters, dark is as important to an image as is light. And as you have already seen, there is more to adding dark than merely adding dark. How you darken an image affects its color. Therefore, the blend modes that you choose to use, and where you use Curves adjustment layers with regard to the layer stack, become important in the creation of the dark aspects of any image.
What is true for the dark aspects of the image is also true for the light ones. You will see, as you create dark-to-light and light-to-dark Curves adjustment layers, that how you create and place the light aspects of the image are also important.
Just as was the case when you used Curves adjustment layers to remove color cast, there is no one Curves adjustment layer that will do everything in one swift move. It will take a number of steps to create just the right balance of light-to-dark isolates to take the viewer’s eye on the path you intend.
In this step, you will first work on the dark and intermediate isolates in the image by using two Curves adjustment layers. The final goal that you seek for this image is to cause shape to become the unwitting ally of the color yellow, which includes the yellow-tinged white areas of the lily as well. Your aim is to direct the viewer’s eye in such a way that they first see, and remember, the yellow, even though the image is mostly green. Also, by building the dark-to-light and light-to-dark relationships in the next series of steps, you will add an almost three dimensionality to the image by enhancing the warm colors (that tend to move forward in a image). Here is the image map of the brushwork that you will do (Fig 4.14.1).
Figure 4.14.1. Brushwork image map
Figure 4.14.2. Dragging the center point down
Compare the image before the brushwork (Figure 4.14.3), the resulting layer mask (Figure 4.14.4), and after the brushwork (Figure 4.14.5).
Figure 4.14.3. Before brushwork
Figure 4.14.4. The layer mask
Figure 4.14.5. The image after the brushwork
The goal of the next D2L Curves adjustment layer is to both deepen the yellow of the lily base (due to the increase of color saturation that occurs when you darken an image) and to cause the white part of the image to become more prominent by increasing the relationship of light-to-dark (part of the ABC’s of how the eye sees). This is the image map of the areas that you will brush in the D2L_NORM_2 Curves adjustment layer (Figure 4.14.5).
Figure 4.14.5. Image map for D2L_NORM_2
The reason that you are duplicating this Curves adjustment layer is first, by simply duplicating the layer, you do not need to go through all the work of darkening over again (workflow efficiency) and second, you will have more granular control. This granular control comes when you fill the layer mask with black and do brush work on it. In some cases where you have already done brush work on the L2D_NORM Curves adjustment layer (that you have just duplicated), you will further fine tune the layer’s opacity.
You did not duplicate the layer twice after filling the layer mask with black in Step 6, because this is what I did when I created this image for the first time. You are seeing my “thought workflow.” It was after doing the brush work on the first L_2_D_NORM Curves adjustment layer that I realized that I wanted to apply more targeted “darkness” in certain areas. I liked what I had done in the first L_2_D_NORM Curves adjustment layer, and because I did not want to change that, I chose to create a new layer rather than to paint more on the existing one.
Look at the image before (Figure 4.14.6), the image after brushwork (Figure 4.14.7), and the resulting layer mask (Figure 4.14.8).
Figure 4.14.6. Before the brushwork
Figure 4.14.7. After the brushwork
Figure 4.14.8. The layer mask
What you did in the last step was to set the stage for the primary light isolate, to which you want the eye to be drawn, by adjusting the supporting dark and intermediate isolates. (See the Isolate Theory sidebar at the beginning of this chapter.) These supporting isolates will be the areas that allow the eye places in which to wander and begin to recognize the subtle nuances that support the primary isolate and draws the eye to it. To accomplish this you will use three Curves adjustment layers, two blend modes, and placement above and below the two D2L Curves adjustment layers.
This approach is based on a renaissance painting technique called sfumato, which is the intricate mixing of thin layers of pigment, glaze, and oil to yield the appearance of lifelike shadows and light. In his work, of which Mona Lisa was a prime example of sfumato, Leonardo da Vinci used upwards of 30 layers of paint with a total thickness of less than 40 micrometers, or about half the width of a human hair. You can accomplish a similar effect using opacity and blend modes with both pixel-based layers, as well as adjustment layers. This approach works amazingly well in the creation of realistic looking atmospheric effects, from misty haze to inner glow, which, in addition to creating a primary light isolate, is the goal of the next series of steps.
These are the image maps for the brushwork you will do on the three Curves adjustment layers layer masks:
• L2D_SCREEN (Fig 4.15.1)
Figure 4.15.1. L2D_SCREEN image map
• L2D_SCREEN_2 (Fig 4.15.2)
Figure 4.15.2. L2D_SCREEN_2 image map
• L2D_NORM (Fig 4.15.3)
Figure 4.15.3. L2D_NORM image map
Figure 4.15.5. The layer mask
Figure 4.15.6. After brushwork
Figure 4.15.7. Layer mask
Figure 4.15.8. After the brushwork
Figure 4.15.9. Tweaking the Curves adjustment
View the resulting layer mask (Figure 4.15.10), and the image after the brushwork (Figure 4.15.11).
Figure 4.15.10. The layer mask
Figure 4.15.11. After the brushwork
If you now analyze the color image of the Seattle Lily using the Isolate Theory, you can see that all of the elements come together to create a composition where the lily (the primary isolate) is reinforced and brought to the foreground so that it appears to be almost three-dimensional. The subtle appearance of the green stalks and reddish background, rendered as dark to intermediate isolates, surround the lily and allow it to pop out of the image and start the viewer’s seeing process. As the viewer becomes more involved with the image, he/she begins to see and feel the subtle supporting isolates that add to his/her emotional response and appreciation of the entire composition—and this is what you set out to do at the beginning!
If you make a print and find that areas of high blur exhibit a stepping pattern that looks like a topographical map, you are seeing banding and possible posterization. Banding has a tendency to occur in the very blurry areas of an image, because the computer is trying to linearize the randomness of the blur. There are several ways to address this issue, but the quickest one is to add noise to the affected areas. The noise breaks up the banding. Generally, you want to use Monochromatic Gaussian noise.
The size of the image file determines how much noise to add. I have found that the range is between 2 and 8, but as a rule, it is better to add as little noise as possible. The smaller the file, the less noise you should add. For the purposes of teaching this technique, I am going to have you do this step at this point in this image’s workflow rather than doing it after sharpening for output, which is when I generally do this. This step is best done after output sharpening because the last thing you want to sharpen is noise.
Figure 4.16.1. Creating a new layer
Figure 4.16.2. Adding noise to the image
When you look at the 100ppi version of this file, it appears to be much noisier than the original, because the amount of noise that you apply to an image is dependent on the size of the file. For example, if the file size was 100ppi instead of the original file size of 300ppi, the amount of noise that that you would apply would be around 2 or 3. I have turned off the NOISE layer in the 100ppi reference file, but you should turn it on and play with it to see how adding noise works.
View the image map (Figure 4.16.3), the resulting layer mask (Figure 4.16.4), and the image after the brushwork (Figure 4.16.5).
Figure 4.16.3. The image map
Figure 4.16.4. The layer mask
Figure 4.16.5. The image detail after the brushwork
I hope you are now convinced that there is more to dynamic range than just bracketing your exposures. I also hope that you have found that there is a much bigger high to be had by exploring and exploiting the power and subtlety of image harvesting for the purpose of extending the dynamic range of all aspects of an image. You have also had a master class in directing the viewer’s unconscious eye.
Figure 4.0.1. Initial image
I believe that once you understand how to control color, you will have complete mastery of the images that you create. I also believe that you have to learn the rules before you can effectively break them. But if you make all of this a game, the playfulness and spontaneity that you bring to the process will be inherent in the image. It is from this sort of spontaneity that the truth of your experience will be captured.
Figure 4.0.2. Final image
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