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I like the limited depth of field on a wide-angle close-up of these flowers. It gives the photo character and a lot of depth. I used a full-frame fisheye up close to get the dramatic look of the background trees in the photo. Too bad the color and tonalities don’t match that drama. Neither Levels nor Curves can do the optimum job correcting this sort of photo. There’s an easy fix, but you need to have a rudimentary understanding of layers. Layers scare a lot of photographers, but they’re worth the effort of learning. This is such a simple use of layers, that it might be a good place to start.
Figure 3
You need to add an adjustment layer. Which one doesn’t matter because you’re not using it for its adjustment capabilities, but for its blending-mode possibilities. Choose Levels to start because it’s one you can use for added adjustment if needed (Figure 1). I like to use the adjustment layer icon for selecting such a layer—this is the black-and-white circle at the bottom of the Photoshop Layers palette. You also can get adjustment layers from the Layer menu.
Figure 4
When the Levels dialog box appears, click OK without changing anything. You’ll probably see a big gap in the Levels histogram on the left side, indicating no blacks (Figure 2). You don’t need to make any adjustments for blacks at this point. That will come. You end up with a Levels adjustment layer in your layer stack, but it isn’t doing anything at this point (Figure 3).
Figure 5
Now go to the layer blending modes by clicking on or to the right of the word Normal at the top left of the Layers palette (Normal is the default for blending modes). A drop-down menu appears with a long list of words. It would be nice if you could turn off all except the key modes for photographers, but you have to search the whole list for what you need. Choose Multiply, which is near the top in a group of modes that all make a photo darker. This immediately turns your photo dark and instantly dramatic (Figure 4)! It even brings the blacks in line where they should be on most photos (you always can check by using Levels in another layer). The layers are talking to each other and the underlying photo is being intensified. This is a bit like sandwiching two pale slides together to get one with more density (Figure 5).At this point, the image is close, but maybe a little two dark. This is easy to correct. Go to Opacity and change the density of the layer (Figure 6). In recent versions of Photoshop, you only have to click on the word Opacity and drag your cursor left or right to change opacity. When your cursor hovers over Opacity, it changes to a hand with an arrow, indicating this control.
Figure 7
Figure 8
Another option is to use the layer mask. Layer masks aren’t the easiest to learn, but try this, and you may find it helps you master a great feature. Be sure you’re on the layer mask by clicking the white box in the adjustment layer. Then pick a large, soft, black brush with a low opacity (Figure 7). When you paint black into a layer mask, it blocks the effect of the adjustment layer—a low opacity gives less blocking. White allows the effect, black blocks. You can change the color (using the foreground color), painting effects in and out as needed.
In this photo, I painted a low-opacity black over the flower and the lower part of the image. I also did a little on some shadows and painted back white on a hot spot (Figure 8). The result is a more dramatic photo because I haven’t tried to reduce the multiply effect from the whole image, only on specific areas (Figure 9).
This technique works well with skies. Often, skies record weak compared to how we see them. In the first shot of Split Rock Lighthouse on Lake Superior’s North Shore in Minnesota, the image is adjusted properly for how the camera interpreted what it saw. The sunset sky is a little weak, however.
I added an adjustment layer and chose the Multiply mode again. This made the whole image too dark, so I painted black across the bottom of the layer mask. The key to using a layer mask is to start with a large, soft brush, change its opacity as needed and then go back and forth between black and white to get the effect you need (Figure 10).
Figure 10
Now the sky is much more evocative of what I saw at the scene. This is like using a graduated neutral-density filter, but it’s more flexible and it increases contrast. You still need the grad filter, though. You must capture some detail in the image file for Multiply to work. This is important to remember—you can’t add detail where none exists with this technique. If the contrast range of the light is too great, you need the grad filter to bring it down to a level that the sensor can handle. ALL IMAGES: Olympus EVOLT E-330, Olympus Digital Zuiko lenses, Gitzo 6x carbon-fiber tripod, Really Right Stuff ballhead
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