Time for a quick tutorial
Tutorial might be too pompous. Let’s call it “a closer look at my workflow for contrasted landscapes” instead.
Anyway, @intmatt messaged me about the recent landscapes that I posted wondering how I made them (if it was gear or editing).
I’m not a gear-oriented photographer at all. All I want is a camera with nice enough image size, good enough in low light and that will produce images that are reasonably sharp. But in truth, give me any camera, including an analog camera or a phone/drone jpeg-only camera, and I’ll be confident in the results I can create with it.
“It’s not the camera”, etc, you’ve all heard it before.
Before we get to the editing, a word on my exposure habits, hereunder you’ll find a screenshot of the out-of-the-camera raw file opened in camera raw. I tend to underexpose digital photographs because I want to be able to save as much highlight as possible. Depending on the shooting conditions and the image I want to get, I’ll then work towards bringing the low lights / shades back to life.
Conversly, when shooting film, I’ll tend to overexpose my shots for the same reason (but at the other end of the spectrum).
Digital & film positive : you cannot save what is burned but you can push what’s underexposed
Analog negative : you cannot save the grains that didn’t receive enough light, but will be able to easily salvage slightly overexposed films.
Very simple, couple of minute process on camera-raw that consists in pulling down highlights, pushing shades and blacks, choosing the clarity level, and white balance. With this test-file I went for warmer tones.
Other tabs I will always use are detail and camera-calibration. With detail I usually sharpen the image a lot while applying noise reduction at the same time, which results in well defined edges and smoother surfaces.
In this example, I’m going for high-contrast landscape so I keep the processing rather dark. I usually keep things simple.
Though for more thoroughly edited images, I export two or more different settings that I merge in photoshop. That’s how I approach HDR for instance.
I do not bother with tripods as excess of gear is an absolute pain.
Once in photoshop, I will use adjustment-layers whenever possible, because of their non-destructive and re-editable nature. For this type of image, I optimise the exposure by creating a curves adjustment layer. I usually “pinch” the curves, making the light more intense and the blacks slightly washed out.
I then use the brush tool (0 hardness - low opacity) on the layer mask to prevent undesired white-burning, as I want to prevent the loss of detail in the sky.
I might do this step first, or later but it’s usually never at the end. Using the spot healing tool, I clean the image of any and all distracting bits. In this case, roots, leaves and debris in the field, as well as a whiter spot in the clouds. Before I do this, I duplicate the image layer to keep a backup of the original, just in case. It’s a good habit to have once you work “destructively” (altering the image itself).
The important thing to notice with colour is that it plays an important part in the contrast of an image, especially when you create definite colour zones.
A rule of thumb that is invaluable to get results is : bluer in shades, yellower in highlights and less red in general (but with midtones you gotta do a bit of trial and error). Don’t go +30 -30 on me now. Most of the time a 0-10 change in colour value will do loads to improve your images (if the white balance is good enough to begin with, that is).
I often approach colour corrections in several steps : the first being a general-image correction and the following ones focusing on certain areas that still require improvement.
On the following image, the highlighted layer focuses on the lower and middle part of the image
While in next one, I aim at correcting the sky and clouds that were too green/cyan to my taste. To avoid changing the lower half of the image, I used the gradient tool in the layer mask to create a smooth transition between the two edited zones.
Once colour is done, all that is left is achieving a satisfying lighting and contrast. For this end I’ll use another curve layer, only look at the parts of the image I want to edit and ignore the rest. Once I’m happy with the effect on the zone I’m working on, I will black out on the entire layer mask and then bring back with a white brush (0 hardness-low opacity) the parts that I wanted edited.
I finish it off with a contrast adjustment on which I use gradient tool because I only wanted to give more contrast to the lower third of the image (the line of trees).
This was a 10 minute editing. But nothing stops you from experimenting more. Some of the images that I posted recently have maybe about 10-15 adjustment layers on them, when I try to achieve unnatural colours, for instance.
