How to fix sky?

[brmiller]

I searched for topics discussing "blue sky" and how to take the picture properly in the first place, but alas I have several where the sky and much of a metal rooftop is washed out. I've read "Andy's Elminate White" filter technique, but didn't get anywhere with it. Something still doesn't look right. As a Linux user, I prefer The Gimp over Photoshop, but I have access to Photoshop as well.

If someone could point me to some tips (I swear I've read them before) on how to correct the sky after the fact (without substituting a "fake" one, if possible), I'd appreciate it.

Brendan

[elm54]

Hiya, It would probably help if you posted the image you are talking about..I can't help you in Gimp as Linux was too much of a diversion for me to get proficient in. So what little I can offer is in Photoshop.
With my images if the sky is "washed out " it usually means i've over exposed. Then it depends on what format the image is shot in. with a raw image there are things that can be done more easlily than in Jpg. In raw depending what you are using to process there are settings that can compensate for over exposure, by bringing down the exposure level you may be able to bring out the tones of the sky. in photoshop there is always more than one way to accomplish the same task, if you have brought down the exposure to a point where the sky is blue but the other areas are too dark you can combine the 2 images( one adjusted to bring out the color and the one with the deail but washed out color) via layer mask and with brushing out the lighter overexposed sky allowing the blue sky to show through or vice a versa brushing out the darker areas to show the other details of the image.
or combine 2 of the images using a blending method such as screen or overlay to bring about a more balanced image.
In Jpg format you can try the same methods , but the tools are not as forthcoming as "Adobe camera raw " or "FUV". I think "Breeze Browser" is helpful but I don't use it. With Photoshop and a jpg you can adjust the tones with the curves comand or the levels. both of these tools can really chop up your color balance if you are too heave in your adjustments, but if you process 2 images or duplicate you can usually blend them to come up with a decent image. If you have good contrast and defined edges , you may be able to mask out the sky and just work on that to bring out the color tones. But that usually makes the image look unnaturally lighted.
I am no where near an expert , so I hope some of these ramblings help. (if nothing else it may prompt a more consise answer from one that does know what they are talking about) ;)
For me it always makes for alot of work to try to get a photo to look like it was shot right to begin with, but the beauty of digital is that we can.

Peace
Eric
Oh yes, there are alot of tutorials on PS
http://luminous-landscape.com/
has some really helpful stuff. and a search on "photosop tutorial" will bring about more than you will ever be able to read.

PPS ....Brendan
Check out this link ...
http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/expose-right.shtml

[sjprg]

Number 1! USE a circular polorizer on the camera. Solve 98 % of the problem up front.

[brmiller]

sjprg wrote:
Number 1! USE a circular polorizer on the camera. Solve 98 % of the problem up front.
Yes, yes, yes, thank you. I have one, but I left it in my camera bag that time, and had to shoot without it. I was kicking myself over this as well.

What I was asking was about specific photoshop techniques to "fix" it after the fact. I know we should all strive to get it right in the lens, but accidents happen. That doesn't mean our pictures are worthless, does it? No. We should be able to edit them to fix basic mistakes.

I ended up being able to patch in some sky taken at the same time using the sky for proper exposure (meaning the sky looked fine, but everything else was dark). It took a lot hand-editing where trees protruded into the skyline, and I had to blot out some nasty chromatic aberration (purpleness) that the G1 is so accustomed to generating, but I think I got it fixed up good enough to print.

Brendan

[PacAce]

Yesterday I took a picture of a Red-tailed Hawk against an overcast sky so the sky was light gray and ugly. The picture was a tad underexposed so when I corrected that, the sky became almost bright white.

This is how I corrected it using Photoshop 7.

1. Create a copy of the background as a separate layer. "Layer | Duplicate Layer".

Make the background layer invisible so that you can see what your doing on the duplicate layer.

2. Select the "Magic Wand" tool and set the tolerance to 20 or 25. Anti-alias checked, others checked or unchecked as required.
3. Use the Magic Wand to select the sky. Hopefully the sky is all you get. If not, subtract anything that's not the sky.
4."Select | Inverse" to select everything but the sky.
5. "Edit | Clear" to clear everything but the sky.
6. "Select | Inverse" to select the sky again.
7. "Image | Adjustments |Channel Mixer"
8. With Output Channel set to "RED", change the Red value to 80%.
9. Change the Output Channel to "Green" and set the Green value to 87%. You may have to play around with this value to get the desired blue.
9. Click OK to exit the Channel Mixer panel.
10. "Select | Deselect"
11. "Filter | Blur | Gaussian Blur" to blur the edges of the sky. A value of 3 should work fine.
12. Make the background layer visible again.

Note that I corrected my sky BEFORE I processed the image. If you are going to correct the sky after you process the image, then you may need to use different values in the Channel Mixer panel.

[PacAce]

Here are the before and after images of the process I described above.

http://www.tanseikai.com/tanseikai/images/eos10d/blue%20sky.jpg

[RedShoesGirl]

The problem with your after image is that the bird has become a rather yukky shade of green. I do believe he should be more buff/beige colour underneath. I did some playing around in photo shop and was able to correct the bird's colour without destroying the blue sky.

RSG

[PacAce]

RedShoesGirl wrote:
The problem with your after image is that the bird has become a rather yukky shade of green. I do believe he should be more buff/beige colour underneath. I did some playing around in photo shop and was able to correct the bird's colour without destroying the blue sky.

RSG

But I didn't touch the bird at all with my approach. The color you see was from some other editing totally unrelated to correcting the sky which was done on a separate layer. I think I should have color balanced the original picture first since I notice (usually afterwards) that a lot of my pictures seem to have a very slight green tint to them. Without a true white object to compare against, I have a hard time color correcting these images because my eyes get used to the green color tint. It's like looking at a white sheet of paper under incandescent light...you see a white sheet of paper although you know it really has an orange tint to it.


However, RSG has brought out a legitimate concern. So as not to confuse the issue, I redid the BEFORE and AFTER images. The BEFORE is the resized original and the AFTER is the resized original with only the blue sky processing applied and with no further processing.

http://www.tanseikai.com/tanseikai/images/eos10d/blue%20sky%202.jpg