A “Smart Object” Snowy Owl

I took this photo of a Snowy Owl a few weeks ago.  The original was a nice shot but really too dark.  I used a slightly different editing method than I have used in the past, just to see if it would work.  Here is the edited photo:

ISO 320 50mm 0ev f/4 1/640

When I was shooting the photo I increased the ISO a bit because of all the shadows.  I had my f-stop at a low number because I want to have the background mostly, but not completely, blurred.  The lens I was using is a 50mm 1.8, but I went with an f-stop of 4 to make sure that the whole owl would be in focus.  I also used a high shutter speed to stop any motion in the bird.

My original photo as you will see below is too dark.  Because I shot in RAW I was pretty sure I could fix that in my post editing.  I opened it in Camera Raw and adjusted the exposure to get a good exposure on the bird.  This made the background too bright.  So I opened my photo from Camera Raw into Photoshop as a “Smart Object”  Once I had it open in Photoshop, in the layers panel I chose -New Smart Object via Copy.  Then I double clicked on that new layer which actually opened it up in Camera Raw again.  That version I changed the exposure to make the background correct and saved that.  Once back in Photoshop, I had two layers, one with the owl at the right exposure and one with the background correct.  On the background correct layer which was on top I put a mask, then I used a black paint brush to paint over the owl.  This had the effect of revealing the correctly exposed owl that was the lower layer.  Then I merged the layers.  Then I did some sharpening and cropping.  Here is the original image:

ISO 320 50mm 0ev f/4 1/640

What do you think?  Beautiful bird isn’t it?  This editing didn’t take too long and I was pleased with the results.  Have you ever tried this method?  I think it is pretty effective when you have a photo that really needs two different exposures.  Are there other situations where you have found it useful?  I love to hear what you think below.

Cheers!

When image editing runs amuck

I took some photos last week of a beautiful backlit wildflower.  That was the quick and easy part.  I am currently taking a photoshop class, so I have been busy editing everything.  When I took the photo, I had split toning in mind. Sonel hosts a weekly split toning challenge and the theme this week was flowers.  Here is my final image:

ISO 160 50mm 0ev f/5 1/125

The “problem” with Photoshop is that you could muck around with a photo pretty much forever.  I put problem in quotes because I am quite aware that is a user induced problem; the Photoshop program is also happy to sit idle on your machine.

But back to this image.  I liked the photos I had taken of this flower, but I was wondering if I could get a more detailed result by creating an HDR image.  So, I tried it and here is the result:

ISO 160 50mm 0ev f/5 1/125

It is pretty, but I was really looking to bring out some detail in the center of the flower, so I considered this a partial success.  I then shifted my focus back to split toning.  I opened this HDR image in Bridge and converted it to greyscale.  Then I looked at my split toning options.  I decided to make the highlights red and the shadows yellow.  I still was not completely happy with the center of the flower. So, I opened my photo as a smart object in Photoshop.  Once I had done that, in the layers panel I clicked the make copy via smart object option.  I did this because I knew that I could then take my copy back into Camera Raw, adjust the exposure for the center of the flower, and then go back into Photoshop.  Then I made a mask and keep the center only of that version for my final version.  Once I had the flower looking the way I wanted, I cropped and sharpened the image.

That’s a lot of editing for a flower.  More than I really was thinking when I took the photo.  How about you, have you ever gone overboard with your editing?  What do you think of my final images? do you prefer one over the other? questions about my editing? Your comments are welcome below.