Ok Photoshop Gurus,

I shot 300 plus images over the weekend and most of the outdoor pictures look really harsh (for lack of a technical description). I suppose my camera settings had something to do with this:
Exposure: AP
ISO: 100
F/5.6
Metering mode: pattern
W/B: Sunlight

What can I do in Photoshop to correct this harsh appearance? I promise to shoot in auto mode next time :)

Greg

Harsh (http://home.earthlink.net/~advancedpt/images/P1291269.JPG)

Please post an example photo and I'm sure you'll get fixed up!

Bart

There is a link is there. See Harsh.

Had a quick look. The Red channel is pretty well blown, the Green is not too good, so maybe you'd need to patch up with the Blue channel. (Channel mixer layer, blending Luminosity, Monochrome 10%R, 20%G, 70%B). Not too good, but it's a start.


Rô

Oh geez, I missed it before.

I did a pretty straightforward fix. I'm using Paintshop Pro X, but I think the tools have almost the same name in Photoshop. First did the histogram adjust tool and did a midtones compress and lowered gamma as well (see attachment). Doing this often makes the image look a bit oversaturated and this image was no exception. So I did a hue/saturation/lightness adjustment layer and turned down the saturation about 25%.

Here's the result:
http://home.comcast.net/~zumbari/unharsh.jpg

Bart

Thanks guys

I used both technics and blended Bart's layer in luminosity too.
I think that's as good as it's gonna get. Agreed, it's shot, but it's a bit easier on my eyes now.

Greg

Unfortunately I have WAY too many of these during baseball season as a sports photographer with 6 part time photographers... I have to correct the images quickly and painlessly in Photoshop with an action. This action is a 5 second wonder provided by Noel Carboni's Actions (http://actions.home.att.net/) and work pretty slick.... Noel does the work and I reap the benefits! perfect!

Here is the result in a small image (http://takeyourbestshot.com/ManipulationPage.htm)

Here is the full size 2MB image (http://takeyourbestshot.com/Images/ManipulationImages/P1291269_retouch.jpg)

I selected the luminosity by going into the channels pallette, Comand / control click on the RGB channel (top most channel) to get the selection....then copy the info from the original image onto it's own layer and set the layer mode to multiply. In this case I just duplicated that multiply layer to double the effect.

-Also desaturated the yellow just a bit.

Hope this helps!

-Mike

Here is my try, I'll explain if you're ok with it.

UnHarsh (http://images.picpile.com/uploads/381813239.jpg)

no matter how much you correct for contrast, histogram, curves, etc, etc, there are two problem areas in this picture that cant be corrected in a 'normal' quick fashion, and that's the blown out white areas. the gentleman's forehead and the little girl's face are both 'blown out white'. the only way to get those back close to right would be some hand work putting back in some detail.

craig

Well I converted the file to lab. The blown out areas where at rgb 255. I used a curves adjustment layer. I lowered the luminosity of the photo to a max brightness of about 235. I then rotated the a and b channels counter clockwise to increase their saturation.

To limit the changes to to the blown out areas I used a blending mode where these changes would only effect parts of the picture with a luminosity higher than about 230.

I did not need to touch up specific areas.

Simply looking at the image it appears that too much contrast was applied. The histogram also points to an over compression. It is likely that your camera's contrast setting was set too high. A large part of the faces have been blown out so I agree with Craig that it would same some work to restore some detail and texture. However, you can bring the image into a more acceptable range and restore color in the blown out areas.
I converted the image to LAB and flatten the Lightness channel by moving the 100 point end of the curve to 94 and the 0 end of the curve to 6. You wll still have a straight line. More flattening will reduce contrast and effectively reduce the saturation. To restore some color in the blown out ares, add a new blank layer. With the eyedropper, sample a good color which is just adjacent to the blown out area. Using a soft brush, paint over the blown out areas. Then change the layer's blend mode to color. Brushing color back into a white space in this manner is only possible in LAB color space.
I have attached a sample that took 2 minutes to do.
Regards, Murray

duplicate layer, change blend mode to color.
on background layer (original image) use the channel mixer, red channel, reduce red and increase blue.
on background layer, (original image) use a curves adjustment, rgb = reduce highlight end of curve, red = s curve, green = opposite curve as used in rgb, blue = opposite curve as used in rgb.

I saved an action -> http://videosean.gotgeeks.com/i/PS/DeHarsh.atn
and a bigger jpeg with a swiss cheese maske to show original in holes -> http://videosean.gotgeeks.com/i/PS/P1291269x.jpg

I like the noel carboni version a little better - the logo on her shirt came out and the highlights on the faces are a better hue - but figured I'd post something that wouldn't take too long using only the built-in CS stuff. Mainly adjustment layers. If all images had the exact same problem in theory this action might work for them ;)

I duplicated the layer and looked through the channels to try to pick out the ones with most info. In the faces I burned into the blue channel and for the clothing into the green channel. I then set the layer to luminocity blend. I created a new layer set on color blend and colored in the sections I had burned. I applied a little blur where necessary and ran USM on the lumiocity layer. I didn't color correct which would probably be best on the original layer.

Hey, a big fat thank you to all of you who's efforts have helped me with my images. I hope to have my photography skills up to par someday soon. Until then, I am learning new tricks to salvage what I would have normally deleted, and I sincerely appreciate your help.

Greg

Shoot RAW next time if you can also. That will save you a lot of headaches...
If your camera has RAW and you have cardds.. Shoot RAW for sure!! :bawling:
Snook

I've never shot RAW b4, but I'll give it a try..thanks