Rick Sammon’s Seven Steps for a Better Image
February 29, 2008: Just the other day, a listener asked me how to combine two versions of an image in Photoshop. He wanted to adjust one version for the highlights, another for the shadows, and then use the best of both.
I gave him my advice, which I’m sure wasn’t as succinct or helpful as this tutorial, published in PC Photo, written by Photoshop guru and friend of The Digital Photography Show Rick Sammon. Rick walks you through how to double process your image and combine the two versions into one final masterpiece.
Rick makes the procedure as simple as possible by suggesting you use the erase tool to let the bottom image on your stack show through on the top image. If you’re an advanced swimmer, you might want to use a mask instead.
Masks are more forgiving than the eraser tool because you can always expand or contract your selection by painting in the opposite color. And if that discussion of masking has you confused, (it confuses me, and I wrote it!) Rob Sheppard gives a better explanation of basic masking technique on page three of this article, also from PC Photo.
Thanks, PC Photo!
Scott
March 1st, 2008 at 8:10 am
New listener and relatively new photographer here.
Thanks for the great info. I’ve made a habit of listening to you ramble about “fertography” just about every day at work now for the past week or so. Thanks for all of the effort that goes into each and every episode. I’m looking forward to the next photo contest so I can get my hands on a free Wacom.
Rick Sammon’s seven step was very informative. I’m looking forward to using it the next time I shoot landscape.