"How to enhance your picture using Photoshop"

[jiro]

Hi,

I have recently been asked by a lot of members from all forums how I take pictures...and what kinda camera I use....etc..

And every time, I tell them...."It's not the camera...it's how you take the picture and what you do with it after you took it."

Since our photo geek member pugwash has already posted many threads about "how to take good pictures"....I'm going to mainly focus on what to do when you want to enhance your picture.

I know...I'm no pugwash or by-tor but I'm doing this for all those people who are struggling with their photo technique.

I'm not going to cover the advanced level technique which i'm not even too good at....

It will be mostly basic technique which will come in very handy for many members.

A lot of members already know how to take good pictures....but at the same time a lot of them don't seem to know how to enhance their pictures when it's needed.

So...here I go~!

If you're a photoshop friendly members like pug or by-tor.....you probably don't wanna read all this crap I'm about to write~

First of all, you will need a program called "Photoshop"

Latest version is Photoshop CS but I'm using version 7.0 which is slightly older version than CS...but it still does the job.

Already have one? good! Don't have one? Go get it, it's worth every damn penny....or borrow from someone you know if you can.

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Jiro's "How to enhance your picture" Part 1 -Basic-

Have you ever took a picture and the color came out all off and wrong?

.....yes, we all have...haven't we...

This is probably the most common and most basic enhancement you can do when that happens.

Here we have a picture of beautiful Daytona...

See anything wrong with the picture above?.....yes...color is off.....way off....not even funny....

The most simple solution to fix the color in most cases are the "Auto Color" function under the Image Tab.

Image -> Adjustments -> Auto Color

BAM~!

See how much difference that simple button makes???? HUGE~!

Next, I want that black dial to pop out a little more.

Click and hold on the "Lasso Tool" and change it to "Magnetic Lasso Tool".

And carefully, go around the area that you want to select.....

Let's get the right contrast first...

Image -> Adjustments -> Auto Contrast

Now, let's get that level adjust to make the black dial pop out a little.

Image -> Adjustments -> Levels...

I will go ahead and change the first input level from 0 to 20.

All done.

Here are the "before" and "after" comparison pictures...

*Before*

*After*

Cheers~!

[jiro]

Oh, and here's another very easy to use tip that should come in handy~

It's called "Dust & Scratches" Filter tool

ya, "dust & scratches" filter tool comes in very handy when there's unwanted dust or little scratch on the dial or etc...

Here's a little tutorial of how to use "Dust and Scratches" Filter Tool in case some of you guys are wondering what it is...

Here's a close up shot of my 005...and there happened to be some dusts on the dial.

First, select the necessary area and go to...

Filter -> Noise -> Dust & Scratches...

I usually use 4~5 radius to remove small dusts like these while leaving the threshold to zero at all time.

Notice that little white dust is gone?

Repeat the same process on all the neccesary areas.

But this time you don't have to click on filter, noise, dust&scracthes...

Just select the area and press "Ctrl + F" to repeat the last Filter Action. It will save whole lot of time!

And Here's the result after getting rid of all the dusts on dial.

Neat~ eh? LOL

And of course, you can always take it a little further and do those steps in part 1 of my crappy tutorial to enhance it a little bit.

Here's a shot of before being photoshopped for better comparison~!

Cheers~

Edited September 13, 2007 by jiro

[jiro]

Here are some of the results by using same method on tutorial part 1~ enjoy~

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Edited September 13, 2007 by jiro

[Dizzy]

excellent post!!!!!

I've always used the auto levels and auto color but my pictures still dont look as good as yours

My 'after' pics look like your before pics.. but im learning!

cheers

Lonnie

[scoobs1971]

Thnx! Very informative

[cornerstone]

Great article - thank you!

[Pugwash]

Jiro,

Thanks for posting this here. It's a great article.

[section8]

Great article, thanks for posting! I still need to reinstall PS after my new PC build - I should do that this weekend and start practicing this. I still need to get one of those cheap light boxes too off the bay.

[jiro]

Thanks guys! and thank you pug for letting me post on your section~!

[section8]

Decided to play around with this quickly tonight, my results:

Before

After

[TWP]

Nice work Jiro. An excellent tutorial. My photos will look even better now.

[jiro]

Thanks prince but isn't your photo already look awesome??? hehe~

@section8: nice job my friend~ after shot shows more clear dial of the fiddy~ just play around and try new stuffs and you will soon get there in no time!

[section8]

this works good with lume shots too:

before:

after:

[brolex]

Hooly [censored], thank you soo much!

Thats amazing, and I never use photoshop.

Your awesome