Skillfull run

Hello all i caught this run of one of my players this last weekend, i know the photos arent technically the best (the first one OOF) but i thought its a good depiction of the type of ball control this young lady has. its been a joy to coach her. No editing done except exposure adjustment and resize

First the recieves the ball out of the air

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Vlad, first is oof, and they all need some horizon correction and midtone contrast added. One thing you might do when you get really bright sun like this is to add a soft light layer in PS, then adjust opacity accordingly. This can bring back a lot of color and contrast. Alternatively, you can do this in ACR using clarity and vibrance sliders. and elimiate the extra step in PS altogether.

what do you mean by a soft light layer? sunlight like this is a daily thing for me...my midtones never seem to be there

VladDracule wrote in post #5492665
what do you mean by a soft light layer? sunlight like this is a daily thing for me...my midtones never seem to be there

if you are familiar with layers in photoshop, simply duplicate the layer, then set the blending mode to soft light and adjust opacity as needed with the slider. as mentioned, ACR has a clarity and vibrance slider that essentially adds soem color pop and midtone contrast as well and would eliminate the need for the sl layer if done well.

namasste wrote in post #5492798
if you are familiar with layers in photoshop, simply duplicate the layer, then set the blending mode to soft light and adjust opacity as needed with the slider. as mentioned, ACR has a clarity and vibrance slider that essentially adds soem color pop and midtone contrast as well and would eliminate the need for the sl layer if done well.

That's interesting, I've never tried that. With soccer shots in bright sunlight (gotta love the 1:00 starts) I almost always end up using shadows/highlights for highlight recovery and it does a nice job. In fact I have an action that creates duplicate layer, converts to smart filter, then opens the shadows/highlights dialog. It also sets the blend mode to luminosity so the colors don't get weird.

Ocron wrote in post #5492854
That's interesting, I've never tried that. With soccer shots in bright sunlight (gotta love the 1:00 starts) I almost always end up using shadows/highlights for highlight recovery and it does a nice job. In fact I have an action that creates duplicate layer, converts to smart filter, then opens the shadows/highlights dialog. It also sets the blend mode to luminosity so the colors don't get weird.

interesting as well Sean. I do use shadow/highlight but usually just in my main layer and even then, very sparingly. I start the soft light thing after suing a soft light layer and high pass filter to sharpen which has made a huge difference in my final images. I may try your shadow/highlight tip and see if that works better than main layer. Thanks.

from my experiance the shadow/highlight shadow needs to be used sparingly...if its used aggresively you lose more midtones

the softlight layer works brilliantly thanks for the tip!

VladDracule wrote in post #5493255
the softlight layer works brilliantly thanks for the tip!

glad it helps Vlad. It's amazing what some little things can do to help negate the fact that conditions aren't always ideal.

VladDracule wrote in post #5492948
from my experiance the shadow/highlight shadow needs to be used sparingly...if its used aggresively you lose more midtones

Do you see this if you do it on it's own layer and set the blend mode to luminosity? I typically set the amount slider to somewhere between 1 and 5 since even a little makes a big difference. In extreme cases I could go as high as 15. I'll have to try the soft light method after this Sunday's game, assuming we actually have some sun which hasn't been the case the past few weekends.