Lighthouse
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I shot this lighthouse image in the German coastal town of Warnemunde. Though I was happy enough with the composition, the hard afternoon light makes for a rather flat scene that’s kind of boring. Using a single Photoshop tool, though, it was possible to produce a much more dramatic image. This tutorial will explain how I did it. |
My first thought was to improve the contrast on the lighthouse itself. Through a Levels operation, I could dramatically increase the contrast of the lighthouse, but I usually find that when shooting old brick textures, it’s nice to enhance some of the mottled, changing tones in addition to increasing the contrast. Also, I wanted to be sure that my lighthouse Levels adjustment didn’t alter the sky. To protect the sky, and to achieve the mottled look that I wanted, I used a Levels adjustment Layer with a Layer Mask.
I created the following mask using a technique described in Chapter 13 of my book Complete Digital Photography, Third Edition.
(In addition to this mask-creating technique, you can learn all about Adjustment Layers and Layer Masks in Chapters 11 and 12 of the book.)
With the mask created, adjusting the tower’s contrast was a simple matter of a gamma adjustment using the Levels adjustment layer. One nice thing about this mask is that it protects the brighter parts of the lighthouse, meaning the Levels adjustment is constrained to the midtone and shadowy bricks. To add additional mottling to the lighthouse surface, I painted into the Layer Mask using varying shades of gray, to apply more or less gamma correction to varying parts of the image. The result was an image with better contrast in the tower.
Though I liked this better, it still wasn’t as dramatic as I was hoping. Fortunately, the sky has some slight stirrings of a storm. Unfortunately, those clouds are practically invisible in the harsh afternoon light. From experience, I knew that increasing the contrast of the clouds would not only make them more dramatic, but would bring out a little bit of their natural color. So, once again, a Levels adjustment layer and corresponding Layer Mask were created. This time, the mask would serve to protect the tower and the grass.
With this mask attached to my Levels adjustment layer, a simple adjustment to the white point, black point, and gamma yielded a final result more to my liking:
Levels is one of Photoshop’s original tools. Though the latest versions pack a lot of other powerful, important features, it’s good to remember that sometimes the basic Levels and Curves controls are all you need.
Comments
10 Comments on Lighthouse
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Frank M. Tirocchi, Jr. on
Tue, 12th Jul 2005 6:08 am
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Bob Curtis on
Sat, 8th Oct 2005 3:41 pm
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Ben Long on
Sun, 9th Oct 2005 12:20 pm
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AEIOU on
Mon, 31st Oct 2005 3:21 pm
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paul g on
Mon, 13th Mar 2006 2:24 am
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Ben Long on
Mon, 13th Mar 2006 7:43 pm
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Shawn on
Tue, 14th Mar 2006 3:33 pm
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Bryan on
Fri, 2nd Jun 2006 8:12 am
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Sarah on
Tue, 26th Aug 2008 9:15 am
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Pete on
Sat, 12th Dec 2009 6:11 am
I am a 54 year old maintenance worker, who has recently purchased a Canon S60 digital camera. I have had a Nikon FE 2 camera for about 20 years, but never took full advantage of it’s capabilities. I have also purchased your new book and a copy of Photo Shop Elements 3.0. Since I have just started reading the book, I can’t critique it, though what I’ve read is informative and helpful. I’m am hopeing to learn enough with your help, to rescue my Nikon from the camer bag; and give it the justice it deserves. P.S. Where is the spell checker.
I am curious as to why you did not straighten the light house? This is very bothersome to me, but it might not be to others.
Hi Bob, this was mostly just a composition experiment. The lighthouse in the image was straight, but the ground was crooked. I framed the shot to straighten the ground instead of the lighthouse. Not sure what I think of it either, but it served as a reasonable example for this discussion. Thanks for the feedback!
Actually I think that the last step of adjusting the levels is one step too far… the grass on top of the hill got black and the picture has an overall artificial look now… but: nice explanation. thx.
I came to this site because of interest in Ben Long’s book Complete Digital Photography…I actually had hoped to find a…table of contents….and it may be here I just did not find it…what I found, and here lies my concerns….is Mr. Long’s book leaning toward everything Mac…or can a confused beginner learn from his book? thank you, paulg
Paul – great idea on the TOC. Don’t know why I didn’t put one up sooner. You can now see one here: http://www.completedigitalphotography.com/aboutcdp2e.php, and I’ve also posted a sample chapter for downloading. The book itself is really platform independent. The tutorials are built around Photoshopand so will work just fine on the Mac or Windows. There’s separate coverage of each platform where necessary. Thanks for the feedback.
I like the askew composition of the lighthouse, myself. That is the beauty of the shot. I do agree that the last adjustment layer to the clouds was a bit much. Now it give the grass and lighthouse more of a “cut-n-paste” feel over the background. I would suggest softening the mask and knocking the levels down a bit….back towards normal. All and all good shot and comp!
Ben,
Although I like the image I thinik the last finished image is a bad example of a professional job as the tops of the grass are black from the contrast curve you applied to the sky. Needs more work!
I like it. The Leaning Lighthouse Tower of Germany =). Very nice… it took me a while to see the differences between the before and after images, but I really like the effect.
The light effect is meaningless in a picture where something weird is shown, only my opinion
Tell me what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!
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