Before

Original Photo.
[ Photo by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

After

Brighter result with some red & blue colors added to the photo.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

STEP 1

If you follow my previous tutorials, the first step is always duplicate a new layer from the original photo for editing. Click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog & name the layers as “L1″. You may click the ‘eye’ icon to make the original layer invisible.

STEP 2

Firstly, we increase the brightness of the photo. Make sure Layer “L1″ is selected & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ) & make the curve as shown in the above illustration & click Ok. Next, change the Channel back to Blue & adjust the curve to add blue to the photo. Click OK to apply the adjustment.

STEP 3

Next, duplicate a new layer again from the original photo & name it as “L2″. Raise the layer “L2″ by moving it to the top of the layer stack, simply click & drag layer “L2″ to the top.

Now, make sure Layer “L2″ is selected & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ) again. This time, we are going to add some red to layer “L2″. Change the channel to red, make the curve as shown in the above illustration & click Ok.

STEP 4

Now, add a layer mask to layer “L2″. Right click the layer “L2″ & select “Add Layer Mask”. In the “Add Layer Mask” dialog, select “Black (full transparency)” & click “Add”. Layer “L2″ is now become invisible.

STEP 5

Select layer “L2″, make you are selecting the layer mask. Click the “Blend Tool” under the Toolbox Window, make sure the foreground color is white. Under the “Blend” dialog, make sure the “FG to transparent” blending mode is selected.

Now, move your mouse to the photo, click & drag to draw a straight line to blend a white fill [FG] on the mask. Repeat this until you satisfy with the red color. The white color on the mask makes the layer “L2″ visible. In fact, it blend equally into layer “L1″ from top to the middle of the photo.

STEP 6

That’s it. Ok, the final tweak … which I always like to do: Use “Adjust Color Curves” again to improve overall contrast. The “S” shape is always the starting point for contrast adjustment. Have fun !

Before

The photo look darker originally.
[ Photo by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

After

Final brighter result with Lens Flare fffect.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

STEP 1

Click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog to duplicate a layer from the original image. Name the layers as “L1″. You may click the ‘eye’ icon to make the original layer invisible.

STEP 2

Make sure “L1″ is selected & follow the menu go to Filters > Light and Shadow > Lens Flare. In the “Lens Flare” dialog, move your mouse to the preview area & click on the sun as shown in the above illustration. Click Ok to process the Lens Flare effect.

STEP 3

Next, duplicate the layer “L1″ & name it as “L2″. We want to make the photo looks brighter. Make sure “L2″ is selected & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ) & make the curve as shown in the above illustration & click Ok (you may repeat the step until you satisfy with the brightness of the photo). The photo looks better now, however the sun is too bright & over exposed. Don’t worry, we are going to fix it.

STEP 4

Raise the layer “L1″ by moving it to the top of the layer stack, click & drag layer “L1″ as shown in the above illustration. This makes layer “L1″ as the foreground of the photo. Next, add a layer mask to layer “L1″. Right click the layer “L1″ & select “Add Layer Mask”. In the “Add Layer Mask” dialog, select “Black (full transparency)” & click “Add”. Layer “L1″ is now invisible, we have just masked out the whole layer.

STEP 5

Select layer “L1″ & make sure you are selecting the layer mask. Click the “Airbrush Tool” in the Toolbox Window & make sure the foreground is in white. change the brush type to “Circle Fuzzy (17)” & make the brush bigger by adjusting the scale. Now use the Airbrush to paint on the sun & surrounding area.

STEP 6

The final tweak … Select layer “L2″ & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ) again, adjust the curves to improve overall contrast.

Before

Original photo before any color adjustment.
[ Photo by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

After

After the color adjustment.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

STEP 1

The first thing to do is to click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog to duplicate a layer from the original image. This will preserve a copy of the photo that can be used later on. Name the layers as “L1″. You may click the ‘eye’ icon to make the original layer invisible.

In fact, we want to create two layers. One “L1″ to show the leaf & blur background & another one “L2″ to show the Tree Trunk. In this way we can apply two different type of color adjustments into two difference layers.

STEP 2

Make sure “L1″ is selected & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ). Change the Channel to Green & make the curve as shown above. This will give the leaf more Green. Next, change the Channel back to “value” & make the curve a “S” as shown above to improve the contrast of this layer. Then click OK to apply the adjustment.

STEP 3

Now, add a layer mask to layer “L1″. Right click the layer “L1″ & select “Add Layer Mask”. A “Add Layer Mask” dialog pop up, select “Black (full transparency)” & click “Add”. We have just masked out the whole layer “L1″ to make it invisible. In fact, the layer shows on the Image Window now is the original image.

STEP 4

Leave the layer “L1″ for the time being, Select the original image layer & click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog again to duplicate another new layer from the original image. Name the layers as “L2″. Make the layer “L2″ visible & we are going to adjust the color for Tree Trunk.

STEP 5

Select the layer “L2″ & go to “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ). Change the Channel to Red & make the curve as shown above. Next, change the Channel back to “value” & adjust the curve to improve the contrast. Then click OK to apply the adjustment.

STEP 6

At this stage, all the color adjustment is done & we will be working on the masks. Mask works in this way: Black color gives a full transparency to the layer & white gives a full opacity.

Select layer “L1″, make you are selecting the layer mask. Click the “Blend Tool” under the Toolbox Window & change the foreground color to white. Next, press Ctrl+G ( Menu : Windows > Dockable Dialogs > Gradients ) to open up the Gradients Dialog. Under this dialog, select “FG to transparent”.

Now, move your mouse to the photo, click & drag to draw a straight line. Repeat this until you satisfy with the color. We are changing the mask color from black to white & this is why the background is turning green, part of the layer “L1″ become visible.

STEP 7

The next task to do is to make the leaf color green. Click the “Paintbrush Tool” & change the Scale to 3.00. Zoom in & paint the leaf slowly, paint the whole leaf. Eventually, you are painting on the mask & not on the photo itself. You may change the tool to “Airbrush Tool” or make the brush size smaller when you are painting on the edge of the leaf.

FINAL TOUCH UP !

There you go, this is the final look. You may revisit each layer “L1″ & “L2″, and adjust the contrast further, use “Adjust Color Curves” … by now, you should know how to do it. Have fun !

Before

@ 210mm, ISO-400, 1/60 sec, f4.8
[ Photo by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

After

After the color adjustment.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

STEP 1

As usual, click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog to duplicate a layer from the original image & keep the original image as it is.

STEP 2

Select layer “L1″ & call up the “Levels” dialog ( Menu : Colors > Levels ). Move the left slider until it reach the underneath of the graph. In fact, this improve the contrast of the photo. You can apply this technique to almost every photo.

STEP 3

Call up the “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ). Make the “Value” curve look like a “S” as above. This improves the contrast even further.

STEP 4

Call up the “Adjust Color Balance” ( Menu : Colors > Color Balance ). Select the “Midtones” & move the green slider to the left until it reach -30 or even further. This will bring up the Magenta color.

DONE !

That’s it. The photo should have better contrast & color now.

Before

Original sunset photo before the color adjustment.
[ Photo by ceonyc / cc by-sa 2.0 ]

After

Sunset photo after the color adjustment.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / licensed as per original photo ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

Sunsets are beautiful, however most of the time, camera fails to capture the beauty. Sometime, the interesting part of photography happen in the darkroom, and today’s darkroom is our computer.
Unlike photoshop, GIMP2 do not have adjustment layers. So, what we can do in GIMP is to duplicate the background layer & use Curve to adjust the color. So open up the photo & get it ready for editing in GIMP.

STEP 1

Click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog to duplicate a layer from the original image. We keep the original background layer at the bottom of the layers stack, this is to allow us to get back the original photo quickly just in case if something goes wrong on the working layers. Name the new layers to “L1″ if you wish.

STEP 2

Call up the “Adjust Color Curves” dialog ( Menu : Colors > Curves ). Change the Channel to Red & make the curve look like as above. As you can see from the above image, we have brought up the red color in the sunset.

STEP 3

Call up the “Adjust Color Curves” dialog again. Make the “Value” curve look like above. This will then darken the photo slightly.

DONE !

That’s it. In fact we can further apply layer mask to the layers. Anyway, we discuss about layers mask for another tutorial. Have fun!