The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers part 23 pptx

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201Chapter 8Creating HDR Images
Continued
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step Eight:
The section at the bottom has two tabs:
Color and Curve. The Color tab has
Vibrance and Saturation controls (like
Camera Raw’s), so if you need to make
the colors more vibrant, try dragging
the Vibrance slider to the right. If you
want to take your image to “Harry Potter
world,” then add in the Saturation slider,
as well. Here, we’ll set the Vibrance at 22
and the Saturation at 26 (the only reason
we’re doing something this extreme is
because the image doesn’t have much
color to begin with). If you need to add
more contrast, click on the Curve tab
and create an S-curve. Add points to
the curve by clicking along the diagonal
line, then move them by dragging them
up/down. We’ll add the S-curve you see
here at the bottom. Also, I turned on the
Remove Ghosts checkbox (at the top right)
in case the clouds moved a bit between
shots (more on this later in the chapter).
TIP: Get That “Old-Timey” Look
If you increase the Vibrance and then
decrease the Saturation, it gives your
image that “old-timey look” (there’s prob-

ably a better description, but you know
what I mean). Give it a try, and I’ll bet
you’ll say, “Hey, that’s the old-timey look.”
Step Nine:
Now, click the OK button at the bottom
right to have Photoshop process the
image. When it’s done, you’ll see the
HDR image appear in Photoshop (as
seen here). Now, there’s something many
people don’t realize about the post-pro-
duction process of HDR images: there’s
always a second round of processing in
Camera Raw (this isn’t new—we did this
back in CS4 with third-party plug-ins, too!).
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Chapter 8 Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step 10:
Before we start the post-production
process, you have to save the file as a
TIFF or JPEG (if you want to keep it in
16-bit mode, save it as a TIFF, otherwise,
JPEG is fine) and then close it. Then
go under Photoshop’s File menu and
choose Open (PC: Open As). When
the Open dialog appears, click on the
JPEG or TIFF image you just saved, and
from the Format (PC: Open As) pop-

up menu at the bottom of the dialog,
choose Camera Raw (as shown here) to
have the image open in Camera Raw
for processing, and then click Open.
Step 11:
When the image opens in Camera Raw,
I usually crank up the Clarity amount
(which brings out lots of little details),
and in this case, we’ll crank it up to
+42 (as shown here). I also increased
the Exposure to +0.35, the Recovery
to 89, the Fill Light to 23, and the
Blacks to 34.
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Before
After
203Chapter 8Creating HDR Images
Continued
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step 12:
Next, we’ll add a dark edge vignette (this
is a very popular look in hyperreal HDR
images), so click on the Lens Corrections
icon (the fifth icon from the right) at the
top of the Panel area, then at the top
of the panel, click on the Manual tab.
At the bottom of the panel, in the Lens
Vignetting section, drag the Amount
slider all the way to the left to darken

the edges, and then drag the Midpoint
slider to the left to extend the darkening
inward from just the corners, so it’s more
even and larger all the way around.
Step 13:
That’s it (well, that’s it if you were
going for the hyperreal look). Now, these
settings worked for this particular image,
but you could open a different image,
and these settings might not work at all,
which is why on the next two pages, I’m
going to give you a few settings that
I use myself for different HDR images
when I want them to have the hyperreal
look. What I recommend is trying them
out, saving them as presets (see the
next step), and then when you open an
HDR image, at least you’ll have a couple
of starting points that are better than
the presets that come with Merge to
HDR Pro.
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Chapter 8 Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step 14:
The settings we’ve used so far are the set-
tings I use most of the time with Merge
to HDR Pro, because they seem to work

on almost any image. Around the office,
we just call them “Scott 5” (because that’s
the name I gave the preset I saved with
those settings). Here, I put them together
in one place, so you can find them easily
(don’t forget to add the S-curve, though).
Also, once you enter these, I would save
them as a preset (but of course, you
don’t have to call them Scott 5). I always
try these first: Under Edge Glow, set the
Radius at 176 and set the Strength down
to 0.47. Under Tone and Detail, set the
Gamma at 0.76 and the Exposure at 0.30.
Push the Detail all the way to 300%. Now,
for the next two sliders, I pretty much
use the same settings for every hyper-
real look: I open the shadows fully up
(setting the Shadow slider at 100%) and
clamp the highlights fully down (setting
the Highlight slider at –100%). In the last
section, increase the Vibrance to 22% and
the Saturation to 26%, then click on the
Curve tab and make an S-curve (see Step
Eight) to add contrast. Once you’ve put
these settings in, if you like the look (of
course, it depends on the image), go to
the flyout menu to the right of the Preset
pop-up menu, and choose Save Preset
(as shown here). Give this new preset a
name and it will be added to the bottom

of the Preset pop-up menu.
Step 15:
This one doesn’t look a whole lot differ-
ent than the previous one, except I’ve
learned that subtle differences between
the Radius and Strength amounts can
make a big difference. Set the Radius at
166, and the Strength at 0.39. Leave all
the Tone and Detail settings like they
were in Step 14, but then at the bottom,
crank the Vibrance up to 80%, and set
the Saturation down to 0%. Go ahead
and save that one as a preset, too!
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205Chapter 8Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step 16:
This particular one is a bit punchier, a bit
more over the top, but it’s worth trying
because, on some images, it’s just the tick-
et. Set the Radius at 370 and the Strength
at 1.84. Set the Gamma at 0.23, the Expo-
sure at –0.35, and the Detail down to
just 156%. Set the Shadow and Highlight
amounts the same as always (Shadow at
100%, Highlight at –100%). Down in the
bottom section, set the Vibrance to 82%
and the Saturation to just 10%. Of course,
I always have the curve set to an S-curve to

add more contrast. Now save this one as a
preset, too, then I have one more for ya.
Step 17:
Our last hyperreal preset just tweaks
things a little bit, but fairly often, that’s
all you need (and don’t forget, you’re
going to do some post-processing after
the fact, and with this one, you’ll prob-
ably be adding lots of contrast and
clarity in Camera Raw after the HDR
processing). Set the Radius at 83 and
the Strength at 0.43. Set the Tone and
Detail settings like this: Gamma at 0.23,
Exposure at 0.80, Detail at 270%, and
Shadow and Highlight both at 100%
(yup, I’m throwin’ ya a curve ball). This
one really pumps up the color, so set
the Vibrance at 76% and the Saturation
at 52%. Just remember: you may apply
this preset and it might look terrible,
depending on the image you try it on
(this is why you need all five of these
presets. At least one will get you in
the ballpark).
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Chapter 8 Creating HDR Images
SCOTT KELBY
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers

Step One:
Start by selecting your HDR-bracketed
images in Mini Bridge, and then choose
Merge to HDR Pro, under Photoshop,
from Mini Bridge’s Tools icon’s menu.
After a few moments, you’ll see the
Merge to HDR Pro dialog appear (seen
here) with the default settings applied.
Step Two:
From the Preset pop-up menu at the top
right of the dialog, chose Photorealistic
(as shown here). This is probably the
only built-in preset that I like (but we’re
only going to use it as a starting place).
Creating
Photorealistic
HDR Images
In the previous project, we looked at the very popular hyperreal, surrealistic
look, which is definitely a creative, artistic use of HDR, but if you’re looking
to simply expand the dynamic range of what your digital camera can capture,
without adding a surrealistic effect to it, you’ll be happy to know that getting
that look is even easier (though I recommend going through the previous project
first, so you know what all the sliders do, because here I’m just going to give
you a recipe for photorealistic HDR images).
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The HDR image using the Photorealistic preset settings
and then adding a few tweaks
The original normal exposure image
Step Three:

Now, in the Tone and Detail section,
increase the Detail amount to 65%
(as shown here). Then, in the Color tab,
increase the Vibrance to 65% and the
Saturation to 25%. A before/after is
shown below.
207Chapter 8Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
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Chapter 8 Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step One:
Once you’ve finished creating your
HDR image using Merge to HDR Pro,
and it’s open in Photoshop, start by
pressing Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to
duplicate the Background layer. Now
go under the Filter menu, under
Other, and choose High Pass (as
shown here).
Step Two:
When the High Pass filter dialog appears,
drag the Radius slider all the way to the
left, so that everything turns solid gray.
Now, drag the slider to the right until
you can just start to see the color peek
through the solid gray (as shown here)—
the farther you drag, the more intense

the effect will be (here, as an example,
I dragged 9 pixels, and you can see
a glow appearing around the edges of
the boat). When you’re done, click OK.
Although I cover High Pass sharpening in the sharpening chapter, I thought it was
important to include it here, as well, because High Pass sharpening has kind of
become synonymous with HDR editing (especially with the hyperreal-fantasy HDR
effects). High Pass sharpening is sometimes called “extreme sharpening” and that’s
a really good description of what it is. Here, I’m going to show you how to apply it,
how to control it afterward, and an optional method that I use myself quite a bit.
High Pass
Sharpening for
HDR Images
SCOTT KELBY
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209Chapter 8Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step Three:
To bring the sharpening into the image,
go to the top of the Layers panel and
change the duplicate layer’s blend mode
from Normal to Hard Light (as shown
here), and you’ll see the full sharpening.
If it seems like it’s too much, you can do
one of two things: (1) Lower the opacity
of this duplicate layer. Think of this as the
control for the amount of sharpening, so
try lowering the Opacity amount (at the
top of the Layers panel) to 75% (for 75%

of the sharpening), or 50% if that’s still too
much. The other method (2) is to leave
the Opacity at 100%, but change the layer
blend mode to Soft Light. You still get the
intense sharpening, but it’s just not quite
as intense. So, that’s High Pass sharpening,
but there’s another option, and in the next
step, we’ll look at limiting where the sharp-
ening is applied (and keeping some of the
glow around the edges in check).
Step Four:
To limit where the sharpening is applied,
press-and-hold the Option (PC: Alt) key
and click on the Add Layer Mask icon at
the bottom of the Layers panel (shown
circled here) to hide your sharpened layer.
Get the Brush tool (B), and make sure
your Foreground color is set to white.
Then from the Brush Picker in the Options
Bar, choose a medium-sized, soft-edged
brush and paint over just the parts of the
image you want to be super-sharp (here,
I’ve painted over the boat, but avoided the
water, sky, and sea grass, so just the boat
itself gets that extreme sharpening). Also,
if you pushed the High Pass filter so high
that you saw a glow around the edges, try
to stay away from the edges or you’ll see
the glow. If you do see it, just press X to
switch your Foreground color to black

and paint it away.
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Chapter 8 Creating HDR Images
The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book for Digital Photographers
Step One:
Open the image you want to add a “faux-
HDR” look to, then go under the Image
menu, under Adjustments, and choose
HDR Toning (as shown here). Before we
go on, I just want to reiterate what I said
in the intro above: while the controls in
the HDR Toning dialog look the same
as the Merge to HDR Pro controls, they
seem to be much more sensitive, so you
can’t use the same settings and get the
same effect—you have to back everything
off a bit.
Step Two:
When the HDR Toning dialog appears,
the default settings give your image
somewhat of a tone-mapped effect (as
seen here, where the image is more con-
trasty, brighter in the shadow areas,
appears to have some clarity applied,
and the colors are more vivid). This is
what I mean by being more sensitive,
because when you open a bracketed
multi-image HDR photo, with the default

settings, you hardly notice a difference
in tone at all. Now, let’s crank things up
and get the faux-HDR look from this one
image. Note: If the Toning Curve and
Histo gram section at the bottom of the
dialog is collapsed, just click on the
right-facing arrow to the left of
the section header to expand it.
If you didn’t shoot for HDR (meaning you don’t have at least three bracketed
images of the same scene), you can still do single-image toning. While it doesn’t
create the exact same result, it does create a pretty cool effect, and best of all,
it uses the same controls as the regular Merge to HDR Pro dialog does for multi-
image HDR processing. So, you already pretty much know what to do (except
I’ve found the controls are much more sensitive with just one image than they
are when applying them to a multi-image, real HDR).
Single-Image
HDR Toning Effect
SCOTT KELBY
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