
But this shot needed a little work done to it to lift it out of the doldrums.
The photo was taken with the Nikon 70s and was in RAW format as well as jpg so I was able to open the picture twice in the Abobe RAW workplace. The first time I opened it I corrected the exposure for the background and the second time I increased the exposure, added some fill light and a little more black to correct the most important part of the photo, the koala in the fork of a tree.

Then I clicked on the other image with the darker background and pasted (Ctrl + V) the koala selection onto it. Using the magnify tool I selected around the back foot of the koala to zoom right in to that part of the animal. Then the "V" key on the keyboard was tapped to make sure I did not have any selection or crop tool selected ("V" gives you the "Move" tool) and reduced the opacity to about 30% in the layers palette. Using the arrow keys on the keyboard I moved the koala layer until the hook on the toe was exactly over the one on the image below.Next I clicked on the Add Layer Mask in the layers palette, Chose a soft edged brush and painted away all the bright leaves from around the tree trunk and koala.
Once I was satisfied that there were no tell-tale bright bits to show that I had copied and pasted I "applied" the mask and then sharpened the koala and tree using "Smart Sharpen".
A blank new layer was added above the koala and selecting a shadow colour from the tree branch I painted over the very bright branch behind the koala's head to dull it down. I reduced the opacity and changed the blending mode to "darker color" and when I felt nothing more was needed the three layers were flattened.
and here is the final image.

AJ
No comments:
Post a Comment