Black and white photography relies heavily on dodging and burning to add emphasis to certain parts of the image, to balance or contrast areas of tone, and improve the overall composition – and Silver Efex Pro’s control points let you do this in moments, without masks or selections. You don’t always need them. Silver Efex […]
Dodging and burning and why it's still needed
Dodging and burning is an old black and white technique for darkening or lightening different areas of a print while it's being developed. For many photographers this was and is an essential part of the black and white process Capturing the image in the camera is the mechanical stage of the operation, and manipulation in the darkroom is the creative stage.
Dodging and burning is a creative process that's just as relevant now that we process images digitally as it was when it was done with chemicals. It's all about enhancing the tones, the composition and the balance of a picture to create a visually satisfying image.
Dodging and burning isn't restricted to black and white, and many colour images benefit from selective lightening and darkening too – though black and white seems to withstand heavy manipulation much better.
There are many different ways to apply dodging and burning. In Photoshop you might use selections and adjustment layers or the Dodge and Burn tools. In Lightroom you might use the Adjustment Brush, while Viveza (Nik Collection) uses intuitive control points.
Use edge burning to enhance your composition in Silver Efex Pro 2
Burning in the edges of your pictures is a great way to enhance the composition because it improves the picture’s overall contrast and helps you concentrate attention on the picture’s focal point. The point is that converting your pictures to black and white is just the start, and ‘digital’ techniques like channel mixing are useful […]