Bleach Bypass Look on a Landscape Image
This may be the most beautiful and interesting library ever made. I posted a couple times on Flickr with other images (see Minsk Library, Inside Minsk Library, and Minsk Library at Night) but this time I decided to process the inside ceiling which is all glass – totally breathtaking! As you can see, I caught the eye of the guard down below, but he lends a wonderful scale to the image. I had a hard time deciding what to do with the image as the original was not that bad but I wanted to enhance the light and airy feel in the image. So I tried everything I could think of and this is what I got!
First applied Topaz (see sidebar for website link) DeNoise 5 – the image was shot at ISO 1600 so it had some issues. Used the Overall Strength set to .17 and set the Shadows to .82. The layer was copied and Topaz Detail 3 was applied using the Architectural Detail II preset – this image was perfect for this preset. Next Black & White Effects was applied where I mainly applied a regular black and white preset and started moving sliders. What I think really made the image pop was the application of the Creative Effects Diffusion effect where the Softness was set to 0.10, but the Diffusion slider was set high at .91 and Diffusion Transition set to 0.61. This really made the roof lines pop without being too sketchy looking. Then Kim Klassen’s Cloth & Paper Reign texture was applied and set to Soft Light blend mode to lighten the image and add some blue tones back into the image. It was duplicated and this time set to Multiply at 24% layer opacity. Next a Levels Adjustment Layer was added to lighten the image more by moving the Output Levels to 23/255 and the midtone slider to 1.39. Next a Curves Adjustment Layer was added to lighten it even, and a bit of a vignette was painted around the edges of the layer mask. It still did not look quite right – almost blown out. That is when I tried a Color Lookup Adjustment Layer and clipped (ALT+click between the layers) it to the top texture layer. The 3DLUT File was set to Bleach Bypass.look in the drop-down, although several look rather nice. The last step involved creating a composite (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+E) on top and adding my SJ B&W Border Frame. I really like how the diffused settings made the ceiling lines look. Anyway, it was once again a lot of fun to experiment!…..Digital Lady Syd
Feeling Butterflies!
Really liked the way this image turned out and it was a fairly simple process. After setting the Lens Correction panel and Cropping the image, a Blue Sky-Heavy Green preset created from Dave duChemin’s Lightroom 3 book (the preset contains only Split Toning panel – Highlights Hue 220 and Saturation 25, Balance -15, and Shadows Hue 120 and Saturation 20) and Matt Kloskowski’s preset Focal Point (Portrait – Bottom Right) were applied. Since the first preset only affected the Split Toning panel and the Focal Point preset did not change this panel, both could be applied in Lightroom without a problem. The image was brought into Photoshop and first Topaz (see sidebar for website link) Detail was applied (Detail Setting used: Small Detail .5, Medium Detail .3, and Large Detail .3; and Tone: Brightness .03, Contrast -.16, Cyan-Red .26, Magenta-Green -.37, and Yellow-Blue .44) and Topaz DeNoise 5 (Noise Reduction slider .42 and Recover Detail slider .36).
Now the out-of-focus pink flowers looked bad, so a New Layer was created to paint in the over-exposed white spots to keep the eye from wandering to those areas. On another New Layer using a 15% opacity soft edge brush the straight green stem was painted darker sampling in the image to add a slightly darker green. Another Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer was added and the Yellow Saturation set to +40. It took a while to settle on a final result but since the Adjustment Layers are all non-destructive, it was easy to try different effects. A Gaussian Blur was applied to a Composite Layer (CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+E) created on top and using a Radius of 6.6. On a layer mask, the butterfly and foreground flowers were painted back in black on the mask. A lower 30% opacity brush was used to slightly paint back the flowers in the mid-ground left side. Next my Soft Sparkle Overlay Frame was applied but since it is a deep reddish brown, a Solid Color Adjustment Layer (Clip it to the layer by clicking ALT+Click between the frame layer and the adjustment layer) set to an off-white was used. Finally a Curves Adjustment was added contrast. Just Fun!……Digital Lady Syd
Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
How To Make Frames or Borders
Getting Rid of Those Blown Out Areas in Your Image
