In my last post I showed how to use the Adaptive Wide Angle filter in Photoshop CS6. For the example I used St. Stephen’s cathedral. I decided to post the final image today which I converted to black and white. I made that choice because I took this after the blue hour and the sky is completely black. I used one of my favorite plug-ins, Nik Silver Efex Pro 2.0. I really like the ease of picking from one of the B&W presets in Silver Efex and then modifying the options and sliders to my liking. For this image I chose the Fine Art Process preset and the only thing I modified was that I added a Film Type to accentuate the contrast; Kodak ISO 32 Panatomic X. I like how this turned out in black and white.
Let me know your thoughts.
I really like some of the new features in Photoshop CS6, it seems like when you think Adobe can’t make Photoshop any better, they do. I have found the Adaptive Wide Angle filter very useful for a lot of my images of architecture, both interiors and exteriors. Since I don’t own a tilt-shift lens, my photos of architecture end up with converging walls and tilted buildings because the lens isn’t level vertically and horizontally. In the past I used the Lens correction feature, the Transform tool and Puppet Warp, to correct the horizontal and vertical issues, but those didn’t always work out as well as I would have liked. With the new adaptive wide angle filter, it’s very easy to fix all of those issues.
Check out the video where I go through how to correct an image of a church in Budapest using this great new feature. This is my first video tutorial, so I’d like some feedback for future videos.
Thanks for stopping by!
Looks like there are going to be some amazing new features in the upcoming release of Photoshop CS6. The video shows a couple of really neat features around content-aware.
I recently came across a Photoshop shortcut, I can’t remember where I learned of this little gem, but I’m grateful I found it.
Basically, if you make a selection and then click the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the layers panel everything will be masked except your selection. If you hold the alt key on Windows or the option key on the Mac the opposite will be true, your selection will be masked and the rest of the image will not.
I get excited about the smallest things. 
Until next time!
Jim
You’ve just come back from a great trip and have a boatload of photos to process. You’ve narrowed your cache down to a few really great shots for further processing and you want to make certain that the viewer’s eye focuses in on a particular part of the photo. One way to do this is to shallow depth of field and direct the viewer’s eye in Photoshop.
The photo was recently taken in Cambodia by a friend of mine, Linda I’Anson. You can see more of her great photography here:
I really like the subject and the way Linda composed this photo, I just wish the depth of field was shallower. My eye keeps wandering back and forth between the statue in the background and the darker statue in the foreground. The statues seem to be competing to gain my attention. I can tell by the focus in the photo that the statue on the left was the intended main subject and emphasis of the photo.
Photoshop to the rescue!
One way you can create the simulation of shallower depth of field is by using a blur filter in Photoshop. Basically, I want to reduce the prominence of the statue in the background and make the focus the statue on the left, as initially intended. Using a blur filter will also give the photo more dimension.
Original –
Modified –
I probably could have added even more blur to the statue in the background, but as you can see it really gives the photo depth and causes the statue in the foreground to pop. Since the statue in the rear is brighter, I also added a burn layer so it is not as prominent.
How did I do it you ask? Well, it is really rather simple. First I made a copy of the layer by clicking on Layer | Duplicate Layer…
Then I added a Layer Mask. You can add a layer mask by clicking on the icon that looks like a front loading washing machine in the layer palette, or from the Layer menu (Layer | Layer Mask | Reveal All).
Now add the blur. In the layer palette, be sure the image in the layer is selected. It should be outlined with box as you see below.
On the Filter menu, click Blur | Gaussian Blur…
A window will appear similar to the screenshot below. Now adjust the radius for the amount of blur to obtain the effect you are looking to achieve. At this point the entire photo will be blurry, but don’t worry, we’ll fix that in a moment.
Click OK. Now we want to mask the statue in the foreground so the blur is hidden and the statue is sharp. To do this we paint on the image with black with the layer mask selected. Remember this, black conceals, white reveals. Be sure the layer mask is selected or you will end up painting over your image!
Now select the brush tool, set the hardness to 50%, make sure black is selected and start painting over the section of the image where we want to conceal the blur we applied earlier. If you make a mistake, you can switch to white and go over the area to reveal the blur again.
In Linda’s image you can see the mask that was applied revealing the foreground statue sharp and the statue in the background blurred.
If you want to apply some feathering and reduce the hard edge of the mask. you can blur the mask, but I’ll leave that to another lesson.
Until next time – Jim
