Topic: Please post a "troubled" image you would like us to take a shot at....

[Greg Groess]

Now it's your turn...
Please post an image or two that are giving you trouble and we'll all have a run at them to see if we can "fix" the problem.

Time to play stump the band.....

Greg

[ThomasD]

Maybe not a problem but would be nice to see what could be done of a picture like this.  Often you do not know the problems you have. Should be thankful for that:)
One remark. I love Scottland and this photo was taken during a short visit last year,
Thomas

[tguseva]

It is beautiful. Here is my try. 

[ThomasD]

Very nice What did you do?
Thomas

[Gary]

I did'nt see anything wrong with this image, I just tried adding a bit of contrast and did a small adjustment with shadow/hightlight to lighten the shadows a bit. Nice photograph.

Gary

[Greg Groess]

Since this is the first image I have really shown my corrections for an image I want to make sure that you all understand that I am not always the final answer to a color correction problem in this class and I will sometimes learn from all of you. 

In fact it is one of the primary reasons I teach the class. 

Every session I learn something new from all of you.  All that said...here is my correction for this image....I will not be posting the curves for this image since I really want you to try this too...Later in the course I'll try to post the curves I use as needed.

Steps...

1) Before I started, I saw that the cloud highlight was blown out.  It might not be in the original but the copy from the web was.  I chose the quick and dirty clone stamp solution since clouds are easily cloned.  I only covered over the hot spot.

2) Open the image in CM and used the Threshold feature to set the highlight and shadow thresholds.  Once you fix the blown highlight you can add more contrast to the image without the cloud giving you too much trouble.  We will cover thresholding in the first week so don't be too concerned about it right now.

3) I opened the shadows in the middle back of the image using a slight Dog leg move on the L curve in Lab.  The dog leg is another special move you can use to open shadows or tone down highlights.  I adjusted the highlight side of the curve until I liked the clouds.

4) I boosted the green in the middle back by using the "color worm" to pin point where on the A curve of LAB the middle background greens were.  I pinned down the red side of the curve using the "pin grid" command and adjusted only the green side of the A curve.

At this point I closed CM to apply the changes I had made to the image.
The next steps were to add drama to the sky.

5) Open the Image in CM in LAB mode and opened the mask cart.  I selected the saturation mask from the set of choices since it had the best contrast for the clouds to sky after the first round of correction.  I adjusted the Saturation mask curve in CM to make the blue sky white and the clouds black.  I copied the mask to a new layer in PS <this can be done in PSE as well we'll get to it when we cover masks> closed CM.

6) In PS I painted out the foreground on the mask using a soft brush. Switched to the image side of the layer mask and re-opened CM.

7) Using the "Glenco Sky" pin I pinned the blue sky for color and saturation.

8> Adjusted the L channel to increase the saturation and decrease the brightness of the Sky.  Closed CM. Flattened the image.

9) Un-sharp Mask in PS.  Am = 500%, Rad = 1.1, Threshold = 0 on a new layer.  Set opacity to 25%.  Flattened the image and saved.

Total time for this correction was about 15 minutes.

Please try this image yourself there is a lot to do here and plenty to learn from this seemingly easy image...
Greg

[gremurphoto]

First pass was a contrast pin(later in course,great for vegetation),then a bit of saturation in HSB.Nice pic.GregM

[kessi]

Hi all,
here is my 'troubled picture'. I took it at night while a huge veld fire swept through our mountains. I took the shot with all the wrong settings on my camera. But I still like it. I have managed to produce a credible image in PSE but would like to see if it could be even better using CM. So over to you all.

By the way, I like tguseva's manipulation of Thomas' photo.

kessi

[gremurphoto]

In Lab,a lizzard tail to outline people then a saturation boost.

[Greg Groess]

This was a good image to kick around....

I used and Inverted K channel as a mask to protect the flames and smoke....
I adjusted the K in CMYK to lift the shadows a bit.
I adjusted in LAB for L channel to finish off the brightness...and I adjusted the A channel to make the fire orange again.
Increased the saturation in LAB using the saturation slider.

I'm not sure about the smoke just yet...I might revisit it to tone the smoke down a bit....

Greg

[Greg Groess]

A comparison.....

Greg

[ThomasD]

Gremur: Nice adjustments. Like the contrast between highligt and shadow and the mood:)

Greg: Thanks for your try and comments. Not too fond of your adjustments. Picture bit flat and not the mood I remember. Sky blue does not look natural to me further I think your picture is oversharpened but that I think of many pictures published today. Hoewever your adjustments are interesting even if I do not understand half of them:( Hope in some weeks. However, pls tell me how to know when to save image in CM and then reopen it in CM to continue adjustments. Why can not all adjustment be done at the same time?

Thomas
PS Comments refer to comments on picture shown by me DS

[Greg Groess]

Usually, for me the moment when I choose to  close CM comes when I want to fix something, and the only way I can fix it is if I mess up something else. It's like the curve only has so much slack and I've pulled all the slack out of the rope so to speak.

I'll sometimes fix only 1 problem in a color space.. The shadows in the fire image seem to respond to K channel changes for me better than trying to lizard tail the heck out of the Lab L channel.  I tried both BTW...

The other times to close CM are after a mask creation so you can paste the mask to the adjustment layer and go back into CM.

I was a bit heavy handed in the sharpen...I fought that decision quite a bit but posted anyways.  To me it is always hard when you did not shoot the image to capture the feeling of the scene.  Some are easy...some are hard, it is the subjective side of this that can get people riled up a bit...

GregM's contrast is certainly something to be proud of...Again I made different decisions regarding the image...

Greg

[ThomasD]

Here is my try. Stared with som curveadjustments in Lab mode CM. Back to PSE. Selected shadows and made adjustments with levels and hadow/highlight. Duplicated layer and set screen mode.
Thomas

[gremurphoto]

Here's a picture that needs some work on the skin tones.