Using a Neutral Density Gradient
Transforming a quite ordinary image straight from the camera is quite easy to do with just a few easy adjustments and the application of a neutral density gradient to the image; the whole process taking no more than a few minutes. The image I started out with is of one of my favourite spots in Edinburgh, Newhaven:-
As you can see this is a pretty ordinary, and not terribly inspiring shot. I know that some will say it is also badly composed, but this is the effect that I wanted to achieve. Normally there would not be a lot that could be done with this image, but, as I always shoot in RAW there is quite a lot that can be done as all of the information that the camera saw is still in the file, nothing has been discarded, as it would have been had I shot in JPG. Step 1 is to fire up Photoshop and open the image up (which opens automatically in Camera Raw) :-
Nothing too fancy was done here, I simply altered some of the Basic settings to retrieve some of what had been lost. The settings I used were:-
Exposure -0.30
Recovery 40
Fill Light 10
Blacks 10
Brightness +50
Contrast +45
Clarity +50
Vibrance +30
Saturation +15
which produced a slightly more acceptable image:-
However it still lacks that sparkle that I remembered seeing on the day. The next thing I did was to apply some noise reduction, I can’t provide setting for this step as I use Noiseware Standard, and some sharpening, using one of several actions I have for this purpose to make life a little simpler. This produced a much more acceptable image:-
This is now at the point where I am beginning to think that it is a good shot. However, it is still just a little too bright for my taste, those clouds should stand out from the sky much more, and those reflections are still quite bland. The next thing that I decided would have made a difference was that I should have shot this with a graduated neutral density filter, which started me thinking that it might just be possible to do the same thing with Photoshop, a quick look at my PS bible proved that it is indeed possible, here’s how.
First I decided to sort out the sky, so I created a new layer (Layer > New > Layer), then I selected the Gradient tool from the toolbar:-
Make sure that black is selected, then from the drop down menu at the top choose the option that allows the gradient to go from black to transparent, and that the linear gradient button is selected – this is normally the default option. Then, holding down the shift key, I drew from the top of the image to about halfway down the image, producing something like this:-
We will counter that real darkness at the top shortly, but first I went to Edit > Free Transform and pushed the bottom edge of the gradient up the image a little so that only the very top of the sky was being affected. Next I set the Layer Mode to Overlay and reduced the opacity of the layer, in this case to 50%, so that the effect is not so obvious, producing something like this:-
As can be seen this has made a marked difference to the sky, those clouds are really standing out now. But those reflections could use a little more punch in them as they are still a little bland. So, what I did here was pretty much the reverse of what I did for the sky, created a new layer, Layer > New > Layer, selected the Gradient tool (with the same settings as before, and holding the shift key down drew from the bottom of the image to about halfway up, producing something like this:-
Again I went to Edit > Free Transform, only this time I pulled the top edge of the gradient down towards the bottom a little, then set the Layer Mode to Overlay and reduced the Opacity again to 50% to produce the finished image as can be seen below.
Although this is the same image, I think most would agree that the end result bears no resemblance to the original; a bland, flat, nothing image has been transformed, with a few simple techniques, into something that can be used without any qualms at all. This now shows Newhaven Harbour much closer to how I remember it when shooting this image, maybe the composition could be improved a little with some judicious cropping from the bottom, but at the end of the day I am more than happy with the end result.
