Make Light come alive in Photoshop

The first step in the photographic process is to work from the light your are given, or to create the light you need to suit your project.

The second step is to emphasize your intent with the tools at your fingertips in photoshop. Let’s review the principles I note in the lighting tutorials and see how photoshop can help us: provide a clear subject, generate complelling color and contrast, and compose the unexpected.

I hope that I can give you inspiration to take your basic photo processing one step further than you have previously considered by using subtle as well as ingenious Photoshop techniques.

S Curve Adjustment

A step up from levels, curves are a more complex adjustment of image values that allow you to re-position tonalities of your image. Do not let its simple appearance bely the elemental ability of the curve to help define the shapes in your images. Let me show you two comparative examples:

A curve with a single point, is analagous to a levels adjustment, however a curve with two points moving in opposing directions will empasize the major shapes in your image. You see the beginner doesn’t realize the difference between types of contrast - but now that you are enlightened you can begin to think about your compositions and finishing process in a more complete light. You can then realize that you may more quickly achieve your goal by shooting a ‘flat’ image, and adjusting the curves to accentuate the shapes in your image - than the other options available to you when you are shooting.

Texture Adjustment

The purpose of lighting is to reveal your subject, if your subject has a compelling texture or surface - you may want to choose a light to either minimize that (in a wrinkly face) or to emphasize that (stiching in a wedding dress). If you don’t have complete control of your light source, you can still make moves to accentuate the texture in your image. I found a method to emphasize texture without loss of detail in highlights or shadows using the LAB color space.

The Texture Contrast Adjustment, as well as several other methods are available as ONE complete photoshop workflow action to speed your activity and focus your creativity.

Stepping beyond the real

I personally feel an affinity for fine art in my image making. Making the light a real, palpable presence in the image is a fun part of my style.

While this image has a reality base, the complete presence at second glance is not possible with a single exposure in camera. I created this image inspired by the passage of golden setting sun through a weed patch. My photoshop finishing sought to enhance that experience by composing the unexpected. The bokeh in the background inspired a muted application of bokeh to the foreground. To achieve these added passages of light in the image I use one of the blending modes available to photoshop layers in combination with necessary layer masques painted in with my wacom pen/brush. A layer’s blending mode determines how its pixels blend with underlying pixels in the image. The layer modes are: (skip the info to learn the principles)

Multiply: Looks at the color information in each channel and multiplies the base color by the blend color. The result color is always a darker color. Multiplying any color with black produces black. Multiplying any color with white leaves the color unchanged. When you’re painting with a color other than black or white, successive strokes with a painting tool produce progressively darker colors. The effect is similar to drawing on the image with multiple marking pens.
Color Burn: Looks at the color information in each channel and darkens the base color to reflect the blend color by increasing the contrast. Blending with white produces no change.
Linear Burn: Looks at the color information in each channel and darkens the base color to reflect the blend color by decreasing the brightness. Blending with white produces no change.
Lighten: Looks at the color information in each channel and selects the base or blend color—whichever is lighter—as the result color. Pixels darker than the blend color are replaced, and pixels lighter than the blend color do not change.
Screen: Looks at each channel’s color information and multiplies the inverse of the blend and base colors. The result color is always a lighter color. Screening with black leaves the color unchanged. Screening with white produces white. The effect is similar to projecting multiple photographic slides on top of each other.
Color Dodge: Looks at the color information in each channel and brightens the base color to reflect the blend color by decreasing the contrast. Blending with black produces no change.
Linear Dodge: Looks at the color information in each channel and brightens the base color to reflect the blend color by increasing the brightness. Blending with black produces no change.
Overlay: Multiplies or screens the colors, depending on the base color. Patterns or colors overlay the existing pixels while preserving the highlights and shadows of the base color. The base color is not replaced but is mixed with the blend color to reflect the lightness or darkness of the original color.
Soft Light: Darkens or lightens the colors, depending on the blend color. The effect is similar to shining a diffused spotlight on the image. If the blend color (light source) is lighter than 50% gray, the image is lightened as if it were dodged. If the blend color is darker than 50% gray, the image is darkened as if it were burned in. Painting with pure black or white produces a distinctly darker or lighter area but does not result in pure black or white.
Hard Light: Multiplies or screens the colors, depending on the blend color. The effect is similar to shining a harsh spotlight on the image.
If the blend color (light source) is lighter than 50% gray, the image is lightened, as if it were screened. This is useful for adding highlights to an image. If the blend color is darker than 50% gray, the image is darkened, as if it were multiplied. This is useful for adding shadows to an image. Painting with pure black or white results in pure black or white.
Vivid Light: Burns or dodges the colors by increasing or decreasing the contrast, depending on the blend color. If the blend color (light source) is lighter than 50% gray, the image is lightened by decreasing the contrast. If the blend color is darker than 50% gray, the image is darkened by increasing the contrast.
Linear Light: Burns or dodges the colors by decreasing or increasing the brightness, depending on the blend color. If the blend color (light source) is lighter than 50% gray, the image is lightened by increasing the brightness. If the blend color is darker than 50% gray, the image is darkened by decreasing the brightness.
Pin Light: Replaces the colors, depending on the blend color. If the blend color (light source) is lighter than 50% gray, pixels darker than the blend color are replaced, and pixels lighter than the blend color do not change. If the blend color is darker than 50% gray, pixels lighter than the blend color are replaced, and pixels darker than the blend color do not change. This is useful for adding special effects to an image.
Difference Looks at the color information in each channel and subtracts either the blend color from the base color or the base color from the blend color, depending on which has the greater brightness value. Blending with white inverts the base color values; blending with black produces no change.
Exclusion: Creates an effect similar to but lower in contrast than the Difference mode. Blending with white inverts the base color values. Blending with black produces no change.
Hue: Creates a result color with the luminance and saturation of the base color and the hue of the blend color.
Saturation Creates a result color with the luminance and hue of the base color and the saturation of the blend color. Painting with this mode in an area with no (0) saturation (gray) causes no change.
Color: Creates a result color with the luminance of the base color and the hue and saturation of the blend color. This preserves the gray levels in the image and is useful for coloring monochrome images and for tinting color images.
Luminosity: Creates a result color with the hue and saturation of the base color and the luminance of the blend color. This mode creates an inverse effect from that of the Color mode.

Paint in the light

Now that you know how the layer modes operate, do you understand how you can ‘paint the light’?

Create a new layer in Overlay Mode to create a similar effect to shining a diffused spotlight on the image
Paint with white to lighten, black to darken

Continue to live by the principles

To provide a clear subject, you must provide enough that is unclear to show the subject is more important. Photographs easily suffer from clutter. Stephane Mallarme is credited with saying “To define is to destroy, to suggest is to create”. In your capture process, separate the texture from the blur and you will emphasize the subject more clearly. In photoshop, separate the two with a blur filter or overlay and you will see the sharpness in a new light. I seek to help you deliberately determine your subject and focus by providing you a set of compelling image blurs in a CD set called “Beautiful Blurs“ Photoshop’s filters cannot create the various sublties of dimension, light, and texture morphed into a beautiful patina of blur by lens elements. Therefore the best option is to shoot your own blurry images in the same shoot your capture your subject (as in the field of weeds shot). The second option, and equally as creative would be to shoot or buy a collection of images to form a library for you to draw on as you process your images. You can quickly add snap, crakle and pop to your images from this library. In the images with the yellow roses, are not the petals more compelling separated against the background bokeh and the foreground flare?

Be inspired by your location

In this bridal portrait image I produced, the contrasting texture of light is actually pulled from the marble inlay of the fireplace in the background and enlarged to fill the frame. Your inspiration is all around you - don’t forget to absorb it and pull it into your images. The light in this image is from a Canon shoe mount strobe on camera and a second held high camera right.

You can also buy some customized textures to make a library for yourself

Free Sample download of vignette effect

Free Sample download of dark texture and border

Henri Cartier-Bresson stated “The recognition, in real life, of a rhythm of surfaces, lines, and values is for me the essense of photography; composition should be a constant of preoccupation, being a simultaneous coalition, and organic coordination of visual elements.” And so again we seek to generate complelling color and contrast, but comelling not in their reality - but in their light! Light that exceeds our ability to create in camera and surprises our viewers with an imaginative touch.

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With overlay objects, I can produce an exact and precise composition of unexpected lighting elements that would be too complex to manage with the subject on a set or stage. These two hair stylists wanted eye-catching images for their business cards and the added lighting elements produce compelling color and contrast. Again I have not found the facilities of Photoshop can filter these elements into existance so I use lighting effects photographed separately to composit these final images. You can of couse shoot your own elements and build a searchable visual library to draw upon, or you can purchase a CD set of Overlay Lighting Effects to save yourself a few hours.