Nature's Light Photography Tours and Workshops
  • Home
  • Photography Courses
    • Mini Courses & Classes
    • Photography Mentoring
  • Photography Tours & Workshops
    • 5 day Mountain Adventure - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day Hunters of Light Mountain Landscape Photography - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day Mountain Masterclass - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day The Waves of Luphathana
    • 5 day Astrophotography - Babanango
    • 6 day Wilderness and Astrophotography Workshop- Botswana
    • 6 day Chasing Reindeer - An Ethnographic Photography Workshop
    • 9 day Wandering the Wild Coast - South Africa
    • 13 day Photographing the Viking Island - Iceland Landscape Masterclass
    • 13 day Photographing the Viking Island - Iceland Landscape Masterclass Nick
    • 13 day Chasing a Midnight Sun - Iceland Highlights
    • 14 day Composing the Dunes - Namibia
    • 15 day Exploring the Island Continent - Madagascar
    • 7 day Wilderness and Astrophotography - Botswana
    • The 'Where To Next' Survey
  • About Us
    • About Nature's Light
    • Photography Instructors
    • The Workshop Experience
    • Photography Tours and Workshops Calendar
    • Contact
    • Payment - Ts & Cs
    • FAQ
  • Gear Sales
    • Leofoto
    • Leofoto Accessories
    • Leofoto L-Brackets
    • Leofoto Mini Tripod & Smartphone
    • Leofoto Monopods
    • Leofoto Quick Release Plates
    • Leofoto Ranger Tripods
    • Leofoto Leveling Ranger Tripods
    • Leofoto SOAR/PRS
    • Leofoto Summit Tripods
    • Leofoto Tripod Heads
    • Leofoto Urban Tripods
    • NiSi
    • NiSi 100mm
    • NiSi 150mm
    • NiSi M75
    • NiSi Close Up Lens Kit NC 77mm
    • NiSi Circular Filters
    • NiSi Drone Filters
    • F-Stop Questionnaire
  • Blog

BLOG








Layered Editing 101

4/29/2020

2 Comments

 
Picture
Editing in layers is a principle concept for being able to work in Photoshop. In this post we'll take a look at very basic masking techniques to start down the road of layered editing in Photoshop, or any other bitmap editor for that matter.
If you haven’t already read the introduction to layers and masks, please go through and read it on this link (https://www.natureslight.co.za/blog/quick-and-dirty-layers-and-masks) as what follows requires a basic understanding of the layer and mask concepts in editing. This is a basic walk through in creating a layered edit to an image.

Open an image in Photoshop that requires an edit to a localised area of the image (editing the sky is the simplest to start with).

For the example I am going to use here, there are three ways to make the basic selection of the sky in order to edit it. Any of these will work, and all are dead simple

Method 1 (simplest method to understand) - With only the background layer in the layer palette, click on the yin-yang symbol for an adjustment layer like the Levels Adjustment. This creates an adjustment layer above the background layer with an attached mask filled with white ink.
Picture
We now want to localise the change to just the sky. The easiest, least complex way is now to take a brush (shortcut key - ‘B’), change the ink to black, and paint the area that you do not need adjusted in the image (see short video).

You can change the colour of the brush in the colour swatch at the bottom of the tools palette.
Picture
As described in the article explaining the concepts of layers and masks, black ink painted onto a mask essentially cuts through to the layer below, while white ink shows content on the layer that the mask is attached to. White Ink Reveals, Black Ink Conceals.

Watch the short video (33 seconds) below for a run through if this first method.
Picture
Method Two (slightly more complex) - For this approach follow the same steps above to create the adjustment layer and darken the sky. Instead of using a brush to paint out the area that doesn’t need the adjustment, select the gradient tool. The gradient tool is attached to the paint bucket tool (shortcut key ‘G’ - if the shortcut gets the paint bucket, hit ‘Shift+G’ to cycle the tool to Gradient Tool).

To create the gradient in the mask, set the colour swatch to black ink and click and drag on the image. Where you start the gradient will be the edge of the black ink, where you lift off/release will be the edge of the white. So if you are wanting to cut though to the layer below with black ink, you should start the gradient from the bottom and move upwards (remember, black ink cuts to the layer below, while white reveals the attached layer).

The advantage of this this technique is the speed with which the mask is created. The gradient can also be adjusted by using a brush on the same mask to remove or add to the initial gradient. The downside is that the initial mask is purely linear (a straight line).

Watch the video below for a quick (21 seconds) run through of using the gradient tool to build a mask.

Method Three (more advanced and a springboard to much more complex layering) - The principle in this method is to create a selection and then apply a mask to this selection. It’s a good idea to practice this as it forms the backbone to luminosity and other types of advanced making.

Select the free hand Lasso tool (shortcut key ‘L’ or to cycle to it, ‘Shift+L’). Draw around the area that you are wanting to select for adjustment, in this case the sky. Draw roughly so that portions of the foreground (mountains in this case) are included. You do NOT need to be accurate. In fact it’s better to have an edge that incorporates more than selected area as we are going to soften this edge and refine in the next step.

Picture
Once the selection is in place (visible with the ‘marching ants’) select the yin-yang symbol in the Layers Palette and select the adjustment you want to use. A new adjustment layer will be created, but this time the mask will be based on the selection that was made.

Picture
The edge of the mask is very obvious once you start making the adjustment. AS mentioned above we are going to soften the image using the Feather slider in the Masks section Properties Panel (if the Palette/Panel isn't visible you can find it by going to Window>Properties).
Picture

The video below is a short (48 seconds) walk though using the lasso tool to build a mask.
The advantage of this technique is that you can create quick selections around oddly shaped objects to create masks. You can then use a brush to refine these masks if necessary.

Using a combination of the three methods you can now add several adjustment layers in order to build adjsutments onto an image. Because each adjustment is on a new layer you can fine-tune each change, while making sure that the underlying original image isn't damaged in any way

Layer based editing is non-destructive and reversible!
To finish off, here are few more layers that I added to get to the final image (click on the image to get a larger view to see the Layers Palette).
Picture
With practice, layered editing is very easy. Complex images can easily quickly up having a dozen (or significantly more) separate layers for the various adjustments to be made to an image. The easiest way to see the before and after results, is to hold down the Alt/Option key on the keyboard and click with the mouse on the eye icon next to the background layer. This switches off all the layers above the background layer for a quick comparison.

Have fun, and please drop us a message in the comments below if you found this useful.
2 Comments
MckinneyVia link
1/14/2022 12:21:31

Very much appreciated. Thank you for this excellent article. Keep posting!

Reply
Brett White link
3/16/2022 15:40:38

Excellent article! Your post is essential today. Thanks for sharing, by the way.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Nature's Light
    Dedicated Photographic Tours and Workshops Internationally and in Southern Africa

    Archives

    May 2022
    February 2022
    August 2021
    May 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    November 2020
    October 2020
    July 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    November 2019
    September 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018

    RSS Feed

    Categories

    All
    Actions
    Adobe
    Autofocus
    Capture One Pro
    Curves
    DAM
    Digital Asset Management
    Editing
    Equipment
    Iceland
    Keywording
    Leofoto
    Lightroom
    Macro
    Madagascar
    Namibia
    Nik Efex
    Norway
    Photographic Technique
    Photography
    Photoshop
    Post Production
    Post-Production
    Shortcuts
    South Africa
    Travel
    Tripod
    Tutorials
    Workflow
    Workshop

Services

Short Courses
Landscape Photography Workshops
Wildlife Photography Workshops

Company

About
The Company
The Instructors

Support

Contact
FAQ
Terms & Conditions
Picture
© COPYRIGHT 2019. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Photography Courses
    • Mini Courses & Classes
    • Photography Mentoring
  • Photography Tours & Workshops
    • 5 day Mountain Adventure - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day Hunters of Light Mountain Landscape Photography - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day Mountain Masterclass - Drakensberg Mountains
    • 5 day The Waves of Luphathana
    • 5 day Astrophotography - Babanango
    • 6 day Wilderness and Astrophotography Workshop- Botswana
    • 6 day Chasing Reindeer - An Ethnographic Photography Workshop
    • 9 day Wandering the Wild Coast - South Africa
    • 13 day Photographing the Viking Island - Iceland Landscape Masterclass
    • 13 day Photographing the Viking Island - Iceland Landscape Masterclass Nick
    • 13 day Chasing a Midnight Sun - Iceland Highlights
    • 14 day Composing the Dunes - Namibia
    • 15 day Exploring the Island Continent - Madagascar
    • 7 day Wilderness and Astrophotography - Botswana
    • The 'Where To Next' Survey
  • About Us
    • About Nature's Light
    • Photography Instructors
    • The Workshop Experience
    • Photography Tours and Workshops Calendar
    • Contact
    • Payment - Ts & Cs
    • FAQ
  • Gear Sales
    • Leofoto
    • Leofoto Accessories
    • Leofoto L-Brackets
    • Leofoto Mini Tripod & Smartphone
    • Leofoto Monopods
    • Leofoto Quick Release Plates
    • Leofoto Ranger Tripods
    • Leofoto Leveling Ranger Tripods
    • Leofoto SOAR/PRS
    • Leofoto Summit Tripods
    • Leofoto Tripod Heads
    • Leofoto Urban Tripods
    • NiSi
    • NiSi 100mm
    • NiSi 150mm
    • NiSi M75
    • NiSi Close Up Lens Kit NC 77mm
    • NiSi Circular Filters
    • NiSi Drone Filters
    • F-Stop Questionnaire
  • Blog