Porthleven power lines in Lightroom: one LUT, three graduated filters. How a series of tools and effects can be used in combination towards an overall ‘look’.
Featured posts
Welcome to the Life after Photoshop archive of 'Featured' posts. These are favourite articles or tutorials that appear in the carousel at the top of the home page.
Photo retouching: how it works, cloning, healing and erasing explained
Photo retouching is one of a handful of basic and necessary adjustments for photos that photographers will rely on repeatedly to correct flaws or faults ahead of any creative adjustments or ‘looks’.
Perspective correction explained
Perspective correction is not necessary for most photos, but there are times when it will make the difference between an image that looks professional and one that just looks amateurish.
BAN adjustments… Basic And Necessary image corrections to do first
BAN (Basic And Necessary) adjustments are for fixing obvious flaws in your photos. They will help you decide if images have the potential to be ‘keepers’ and prepare them properly for creative effects later.
HSL color editing and how it works
You’re probably used to digital images being in the RGB mode, where the full range of colors is generated with red, green and blue color ‘channels’. But most photo editing programs offer a color editing mode based around the HSL (Hue, Saturation, Lightness) color model, and this is where it gets really interesting.
How to highlight a color and then suppress the rest
Color is great, most of the time. But sometimes colors can fight with each other or just undermine the mood you’re trying to create. This is where an understanding of how your software’s color controls work can be a big advantage.
One subject, six different LUTS: choosing a ‘look’ for your images
I’m a big fan of LUTs (lookup tables). They are used in cinematography to give movies a specific ‘look’ but they’ve now crossed over into stills photography, where they are used for everything from vintage effects to film simulations.
The Detail Extractor in Analog Efex Pro is like a magic bullet for contrast issues
Analog Efex Pro, part of the DxO Nik Collection has an excellent tool that’s easily missed but lies at the heart of many of this software’s striking analog film effects.
There may be more in your RAW files than you think! See this in Capture One
You might assume your RAW processing software shows you everything captured by the camera, but that’s not always the case. Where the camera is applying digital lens corrections, there may be more ‘image’ outside the regular image area that you wouldn’t normally see.
How to customise Analog Efex Pro presets
Analog Efex Pro, part of the DxO Nik Collection, has some great vintage film effect presets, but you don’t have to use them exactly as they are provided. It’s very easy to customise and adapt these presets to give exactly the kind of look you want.