HPE III Tools help

[Bob Polk]

Looking for directions on using the Shadow and Highlight tools
Bob

[Bob Polk]

Anyone?
Bob

[DannyRaphael]

Bob:

Richard Lynch, author of HPE and who moderates this forum, knows this stuff inside and out. He usually checks in fairly often, but it could be at the moment he's stuck an airport trying to get back home or ???

He'll definitely reply when he can. He's one of the good guys.

~Danny~

[Richard_Lynch]

Sorry, tool specific questions are better asked in the forum dedicated to the tools and book--and I've been on a small hiatus. One needs a break from 100 hour weeks at some point. However...

One of the things about the free tools is that they assume to some extent that you already know what they are for. part of the reason for this is that they are not covered in the book...the other part is these tools were requested by people who have read the book--and were created after publication. So while you can download and use them, there isn't a lot of support built in. It will probably be built in to the next version of the book. i don't mind answering questions...

The Hightlight Mask tool masks highlights (keeps highlights from change) and the Shadow Mask tool masks shadows (keeping shadows from change) based on image luminosity. This would be useful in a situation where you want to work on the shadows or highlights independent of one another. It is also potentially helpful when you want to combine exposures...for example if you exposed the same scene for the highlight in the image and the shadow, you can align the exposures in a single image and then mask out the area the second image was exposed for. So, say the highlight exposure is placed over the shadow exposure...the shadows would be blown out in the highlight exposure, and masking the shadows would reveal the shadow exposure below.

This can also come in handy when you have to target highlight or shadow to attempt to bring out detail.

You can do this same type of masking with the Blend mask from the book -- but with a far greater level of control.

OK? let me know if you need more.

[Richard_Lynch]

Originally Posted by DannyRaphael

Bob:

Richard Lynch, author of HPE and who moderates this forum, knows this stuff inside and out. He usually checks in fairly often, but it could be at the moment he's stuck an airport trying to get back home or ???

He'll definitely reply when he can. He's one of the good guys.

~Danny~

Danny, thanks for the vote of confidence...I'm interested in who the 'bad guys' of digital imaging are. I would imagine they would be quite dangerous dennisons with Harley Davidson-like computers. In a way that rogue appearance has an appeal...

I do wish there were more hours in the week for this, though!

[Bob Polk]

Much appreciated. Love them tools. We have an Elements Class on the MSN Group "Photographics" every Sunday at 12:00 EST.
Bob