MAY 2017 | +:0 51HACK #3:
ADDING INTERESTING
TEXTURES TO ENHANCE
A SCENE
With this image from Swakopmund, Namibia, Triston recalls how the
weather was overcast with the occasional drizzle. There was none
of the blue sky with ø uffy clouds that he was hoping for, but he still
managed to get an image of a yellow-billed kite ø ying just above him.
The shot was of course severely underexposed as his camera
automatically reduced the exposure to compensate for the
predominant background of white clouds, but Triston took the image
into Lightroom to make a proper picture of it.
First, he used the Radial tool in Lightroom to highlight the kite and
increased the shadow details to 97, revealing all the details of the
bird’s wingspan. Triston also used the brush tool within the Radial
Tool to erase the space outside the bird’s frame so that the effects
only applied to the bird itself.
Next, he selected the Aged Photo effect under the Lightroom Color
Presets to give it an old-fashioned sepia look. Bringing the image into
Photoshop for further editing, Triston then added a new layer and
selected Render under the Filter Panel and chose the clouds option.
To make the clouds look as if they were in motion, he then applied the
Path Blur ÷ lter under the Blur Gallery option in the Filter Panel.
Finally, Triston blended the clouds layer with the background layer
using the Soft Light effect under Transparency. As there were parts
of the clouds that merged with the bird’s body, Triston also applied
a vector mask onto the clouds layer, allowing him to mask out the
clouds on the bird’s body.
After ÷ ne tuning the contrast, highlight and shadow details of the
image, Triston further reduced the saturation by a little so the
overall effect would be more subtle. Now the yellow-billed kite is
ø ying against a more interesting background!