Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2023 i Practical Photoshop

“Welcome to issue 144 of Practical Photoshop! If you enjoy the issue, why not subscribe and get a whole year for just $19.99?” Black-and-white images speak to us in a way that color photography simply can’t touch – but there’s more to it than just converting to mono. This month we explore some of the fundamental skills you need to create great monochrome photos. Elsewhere, learn how to shoot and edit stunning shutter blends. • james.paterson@futurenet.com www.digitalcameraworld.com…

» While the black-and-white tools we’ve talked about give you ultimate control, you don’t necessarily want to be shifting half a dozen sliders every time you want to try out a monochrome treatment. This is where Profiles can be invaluable. Available in Camera Raw and Lightroom (as well as via the Camera Raw filter in Photoshop), Profiles let you quickly apply different looks to your images with a single click. There are a range of default black-and-white Profiles to experiment with – but we’ve supplied 16 more effects for you to try out. There are eight black-and-white and eight tinting effects. All of the Profiles work on raws, but some may not work on JPEGs. To load them in, simply go to the Basic Panel in Camera Raw, click the…

» In the early days of Photoshop, the spot color look was horribly overused. But on the right kind of image, selective color saturation can create eye-catching results. This is easily done in Camera Raw or Lightroom… 01 REMOVE COLORS Head to the Color Mixer Panel and click the Saturation tab. Grab the target tool from the settings, then drag over colors in the image to selectively lighten or darken them. Here we can darken the oranges and yellows while intensifying the reds. If you like, click on the Hue Panel, then use the target tool to shift the colors of the area. If you need to tidy up any unwanted patches of color, press K for the Brush Tool, paint over the area then drag down on the Saturation…

» The image-editing process begins as soon as you’ve transferred your photos from your memory card to your computer. 1 The first stage is to begin sifting through your pictures to discover which are the keepers. The image organizer that comes with Photoshop is ideal for this task. Adobe Bridge has controls for keywording, rating and filtering your images, and there are handy tools for batch renaming files, creating panoramic stitches, making contact sheets and more. Launch Adobe Bridge and navigate to a folder containing new images. Use the cursor keys to quickly flick through the images and click below a thumbnail to add a star rating, or use the keyboard shortcut Cmd/Ctrl+1-5. You can then filter your photos by the star rating to group the ones you want to…

» Over the following pages, you’ll find lots of useful information on how to transform your color images into beautiful black-and-white photos. But before we get stuck into ‘how’, it’s worth taking a moment to consider ‘why’. So ask yourself: what is the reason for removing color? It could be that the lack of color draws attention to other things like patterns and textures; or that a mono treatment gives the scene a calmness that would be difficult to convey in color; or that stripping out color enhances an expression or the play of light across the scene. Here are a few things that black-and-white tends to do better than color… PATTERNS Recurring patterns can look especially bold when given the black-and-white treatment EXPRESSIONS Removing the color in portraits can…

WATCH THE VIDEO https://bit.ly/3XMdmAG » One of the best things about black-and-white is how much headroom you have to selectively lighten or darken areas of the image. There are lots of ways to do so (check out our dodging and burning masterclass in this issue), but one of our favorites is with Curves. Thanks to a recent update, we can now use Curves in combination with masks in Camera Raw and Lightroom. This allows us to quickly isolate part of an image with a mask, then fine-tune the brightness or contrast of the area with Curves. Open an image into Camera Raw. After converting to mono, press K for the Brush Tool and paint over where you’d like to adjust. Next, go to the Curves settings on the right. Drag…

WATCH THE VIDEO https://bit.ly/41dT6ey » The Dodge and Burn tools in Photoshop are ideal for selective lightening and darkening. There are lots of other tools that do a similar job, but there’s something about this duo that will keep you coming back to them. Perhaps it’s the darkroom connection… In a traditional film darkroom, areas of a print would be ‘dodged’ by shading some of the light from the enlarger bulb. A disc on a piece of wire would often be used, echoed in the Photoshop Dodge Tool icon. By contrast, parts could be ‘burned’ by focusing light from the enlarger onto specific areas, resulting in darker tones. An ‘OK’ hand shape could be used, the hole between thumb and finger channeling light onto the print, hence the hand-shaped icon…

» There are myriad different settings that offer an equivalent level of exposure. As such, we can vary our shutter speed, aperture or ISO for creative results, while still keeping a balanced overall exposure. This is where stops of light can be hugely useful. For aperture, our f-stop intervals come at f/1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16 and 22. Similarly, a halving or doubling of shutter speed or ISO is a stop of light. So we can add or take away a stop from either aperture, shutter speed or ISO for an equivalent exposure. For a 20-second shutter speed at f/16, ISO100, we can achieve an equivalent exposure by doubling ISO to 200 (+1 stop), and then halving the shutter speed to 10 seconds (-1 stop). Our choice…

» The latest version of the raw file processor included with Photoshop is so powerful that most photos can be processed entirely in the raw processor, with no need for further editing in Photoshop. And by making your adjustments in Adobe Camera Raw, rather than in Photoshop, you’ll ensure the best possible image quality, because raw files contain more picture information than bitmap images such as un-layered PSDs and JPEGs. Here’s our reference to the features you’ll use the most in the Basic panel. THE BASIC PANEL IN ACR TEMPERATURE Use this slider to warm or cool an image if the White Balance tool fails to correct a color cast TINT This slider enables you to correct a green or magenta cast, again, if the White Balance tool fails EXPOSURE…

» Black-and-white conversions are best carried out on raw photos, as raws retain more color information than JPEGs. But why is this important when we’re getting rid of the color? We make use of the color information during the raw conversion, in order to fine-tune the luminosity of different color ranges. This is best done using the B&W color range sliders in the Black and White Panel of Camera Raw or Lightroom. The extra color information is also invaluable if we want to pull detail out of deep shadows or bright highlights, and it can also help to prevent banding occurring in tonal gradients when we boost the contrast. 01 IN CAMERA RAW Navigate to the image in Bridge, right-click and select Open in Camera Raw. Click the B&W button…

WATCH THE VIDEO https://bit.ly/3XIg8Hq 01 CONVERT TO MONO Open the image in Photoshop, then go to the Layers Panel. Click the Create Adjustment Layer icon and choose Black and White, then fine-tune the sliders to control the look of the black-and-white image. Next open the brushed_border image supplied, then grab the Move Tool. 02 POSITION THE BORDER Drag the border up to the tab of the other image, then down and in to copy the image over. Use the Move Tool to position the border over the other image (if you need to resize, press Cmd/Ctrl+T for transform or go to Edit > Free Transform), then drag the bounding box to change the size. 03 BLEND THE BORDER Click the Blending Mode dropdown in the Layers Panel and choose Screen…

» If you’re relatively new to editing in Photoshop, or you just don’t know where to begin, then this section is the best place to get started. Over the next 10 pages, you’ll find an overview of the different versions of Photoshop available; a breakdown of the typical image-editing workflow in Photoshop; an overview of raw file editing; a guide to the six most useful layers; and a glossary of the most useful shortcuts. This guide condenses most of the tools and techniques you’ll use every time you import a new roll of pictures. CREATIVE CLOUD PLANS CHOOSE THE PLAN WITH THE COMBINATION OF TOOLS AND STORAGE YOU NEED PHOTOSHOP CC FROM £9.98/$9.99 PER MONTH WINDOWS, macOS Photoshop is the software of choice for most professional and non-professional photographers. Beyond…

» Photoshop has many types of layers and adjustment layers available, but there are six that you’ll find you need to use again and again. Learning how they should be used may seem a little daunting for beginners, but once you’ve got to grips with them, you’ll find they play a part in the creative process of almost every image you make. 01 LEVELS This should be the first layer you add to an image, because it fundamentally alters the tonal range of the entire image. Create a Levels Adjustment Layer, drag the Black point slider inwards until it touches the left hand edge of the histogram, and drag the White point slider inwards to the right-hand edge. This remaps the tones of the image to make more of the…