THEEDIT
96 PRACTICALPHOTOGRAPHY
1
Adda Graduated
Fi lterto thesky
OpenyourRAWfile andin
Basictabmakeanychangesyouneedto theoverallexposure.
Webrightenedtheimageslightlywith+0.50Exposure,lifted
Shadowswith+35andaddedsomeTextureandVibrancewith
+25 each.Clickon theGraduatedFilterTool’sicon,or pressG
(Min Lightroom).SetExposureto -1.00,thenclickon theskyand
dr agdownto adda filter.Whenthefilteris drawnit’llhavea green
to p andredbottom.Youcanrepositionit by draggingon the
ce ntreline,androtateit by draggingthetopor bottomlines.
2
EditthefirstGraduatedFilterandfine-tune
You’llstraightawaygetan ideaof whethertheExposure
setting is strong enough or not. Return to it and edit it
if required, but don’t make the sky too dark all in one go. Also,
try reducing the Highlights to restore more detail in those areas.
If there are hills breaking across the horizon, you can avoid
darkening them by clicking on Brush then picking Erase from
selected adjustment (the Brush icon with the minus sign). Set the
Feather and Flow to 100 and paint over the area you need to hold
back from the original filter.
The sky can make or break a landscape image, but
th ere are plenty of ways to get better results in your
RAW processing. Kingsley Singleton shows how.
3
ways to improve
sk ies using RAW
W
HENSHOOTINGLANDSCAPES,
one of themostcommonproblems
is that the sky is too bright in
comparison to the land. This is down to
the scene having a dynamic range beyond
a camera’s ability to record in a single exposure,
so either the landscape or the sky will be badly
exposed. The best solution is to use graduated
ND filters to equalise the brightness of the sky
and the land at the time of shooting, but if you
don’t have filters with you, it’s RAW to the
rescue. The Graduated Filter Tool in the
Camera Raw interface and Lightroom lets
you mimic the effect to control the brightness.
1
Fix overexposed
skies with the
Graduated Filter
BEFORE
WHAT
YOUNEED
nPhotoshop,Elements
orLightroom
nRAWfiles
withskiesthat
needfixing
Above This shot features a sky that’s much brighter than the landscape. We could
have addressed this at the time of capture, but shooting in the RAW format and
using the Graduated Filter is a good back up.
