Blocked Shadows

AndrewR · #1 08-22-2005, 08:28 AM

Can Somebody please help! I was attending an equestrian event this week and I was selling photos but unfortunately out of the thousands that were taken the young lady in the pic wanted to purchase this one but unfortunately for me as you can see its not one of my best, I also have thousands of other photos that I am sorting trough but this is going to take the longest so if anyone can gladly help It would be so much appreciated.

Also If you could let me know how you got to your results that would help so much. So thanks again to everyone who can help.

Flora · #2 08-22-2005, 10:52 AM

Hi Andrew,

Not an easy picture to fix since parts of the shadows are 'blocked' ....

Anyway ... I had a go:

* Used Brightness/Contrast to decrease the overall contrast.
* Levels to increase the highlights and midtones a bit.
* Selected the horse and used Hue/Saturation to decrease the reddish light cast on his coat.
* Selected the girl's face and arm and used the Levels to darken the midtones a bit and add a bit of colour
* Neat image on the shadows.
* USM to lightly sharpen.

Hope this helps.

Kraellin · #3 08-22-2005, 01:40 PM

very nice, flora!

i went a bit different, though. it's hard to tell, in a pic like this, what the true colors of the horse are. i kept seeing brownish-red spots here and there and couldnt decide if this was natural or a result of the photo, but i chose natural and left them in and even highlighted them a bit. i wish i'd been able to see the actual horse.

included in my attachments are the layers shown. along with what you can see, there was also some spot touch up with a soften brush, and a sharpness brush. i softened the grain in the horse's coat, but sharpened the girl's face.

i also cropped the pic and then enlarged it by 150%.

Craig

Flora · #4 08-22-2005, 03:58 PM

Great Job Craig!!!

I also had doubts about the horse's colour ... What made me opt for the 'reddish light cast on the shinier parts of his coat' was the fact that in the original there is a similar reddish cast on the girl's face .... but I wouldn't bet anything dear on it!!

Kraellin · #5 08-22-2005, 09:50 PM

thanks flora,

but in looking at mine again, i think maybe i overdid it. i was pushing hard to get some more detail out of those dark areas and i think i overran things a bit.

Craig

AndrewR · #6 08-23-2005, 03:19 AM

Thanks alot both the horse is actually a very dark brown but unfortunately the light inside the arena was just tinted orange hence the colour of the photo. I will try both your methods and see what I can get.

Thanks alot again.

dbuckle · #7 08-23-2005, 05:59 AM

I did this with Studio Artist and finnished it in PScs.

Cassidy · #8 08-23-2005, 06:31 AM

I copied the initial layer and used screen and then repeated before flattening to bring out the detail. To sharpen the detail further (after merging the prior layers), I copied the layer and ran the highpass filter over it in overlay mode. I then dropped the saturation a little and using a sample from the girl's face, just colourised it slightly to remove the dark orange tinge on the nose and under the eyes.

krishna · #9 08-23-2005, 09:15 AM

I tried in ImageJ. Used Gamma filter correction of 0.7. While goind beyond this value I felt that picture colours start fading.

--
Krishna

Kraellin · #10 08-23-2005, 12:40 PM

Quote:

...the horse is actually a very dark brown...

interesting, and that's what i meant about the heavy shadows being deceiving.

Craig

Shalford · #11 08-23-2005, 02:55 PM

Generally lightened the photo, using a gradient mask.
Selected and saved selection of the horse.
New colour tint layer - as dark a brown as possible.
Desaturated the grey and bright brown patches on the horse.
Flattened image - touch of burn here and there.

Steve

Kraellin · #12 08-23-2005, 03:00 PM

steve,

from what andrew is saying, excellent on the horse!

Craig

goose443 · #13 08-23-2005, 03:41 PM

I tried to bring out more of the tones using curves but I think I ended up inverting part of the curve. Something came out totally wrong.

Panpan · #14 08-23-2005, 04:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by goose443

I tried to bring out more of the tones using curves but I think I ended up inverting part of the curve. Something came out totally wrong.

That's a lot of inversion, Goose! A little more and we could have seen behind the wall.

Pierre

Kraellin · #15 08-23-2005, 10:17 PM

umm, goose, i think you need to rotate your monitor about 180 degrees.

Craig