Before & After #130

This game is to help those of us who are trying to learn new tricks when it comes to editing.

Here's the breakdown of the game. I will post a picture that I choose, resized to exactly 1024 pixels maximum on the long side. Outside of being resized it has to be unedited...meaning no adjustments to any levels, it has to look like it did as it came out of the camera.

The game will last 48hrs and whoever can produce the best edited image (as judged by me) will be picked and it'll be their turn to post their unedited picture for all of us to take a crack at.

The participants must have their "Image Editing OK" turned on and they must provide at least a simple breakdown of how they edited the image, some entrants are a little vague on this point, please give us all details so we can learn and share tips. For instance if you use the unsharp mask tool or Smart Sharpen, provide us with the adjustments you used so others can try them out.

You can post multiple images, but the first image you post will be the one that is judged - all other images will be considered for knowledge and tip use only.

Also, please keep all comments, be they positive or negative, to yourself until after the game has ended.

If you happen to be the winner of the game please start the next one with the title of the game and the following number. For example…the next game should read "Before and After #131".

This is all about having fun so have at it!!!
Any edit, over-the-top creative or subtle, is encouraged!

This game will end on Monday, November 17, 2008 at 7:00pm Mountain.

I've been helping my sister correct some of the photos she took while on vacation in Costa Rica. Here's one of them (posted with her permission) - let's see what you can do with it!

Semi-straightened with PT-lens
crop
curves black, mid, white.
Smart sharpen
cool filter on sky
warm filter on building

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I did a quick search before I started this because I wasn't sure if it did snow in costa rica... the page I looked at said it had a winter/rainy season.... what I read quick gave me the impression that their winter just means that they get a lot of rain...BUT because I have gotten at least 6 inches of snow today and they say we should get another foot tomorrow... I figured I could share some of this snow with costa rica! haha


EDIT****

After I uploaded it and went back to look at it I realized I made a BIG mistake. Instead of saving the original photo I saved Monty's and turned that one into a blizzard
I'm so very sorry... since I did spend the time on it I was going to leave it as a "just for fun entry" - anyone can tell me if they want me to take it down.
Kicking myself for making such a silly mistake...

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No harm No foul by me Kim!! You helped hide my mistakes!!

ok first of all i cropped it so the clock was centre
added a threshold layer and marked with the color sampler tool the darkest and lightest areas, deleted the threshold layer.
went into curves and clicked in the shadows and then clicked in my darkest area i selected earlier and then the same with the highlights with the brightest and then finally midtones with a grey area.
Chose measure tool and used the area above the statue as a guideline, straightened image.
i wanted to add some drama to this shot, so i selected the sky area and created a new layer from it, i then went to filter and render and then difference clouds and then reduced the opacity to 50 percent and then changed the blending mode to hard light.
then i added a gradient map layer an clicked ok, then added a channel mixer layer and then clicked monochrome and then reduced the constant down to -8 and then reduced red to-75 and put the green to 25 and the blue to 30.
Unsharp mask at 75, 2. 3. Saved image.
Took it into lightroom
highlight recovery 30
blacks 12
clarity 76
vignetting -100
midpoint 35
saved the image
opened again in photoshop, used the blur tool to go around the edge of the building and
make the transition of the clouds and building look more realistic.
Cloned out the sign in the front
dodge and burned some areas of the building
added a frame and ...........

Hi

This shot has been taken with Tilt-Shift lens

Corrected vertical and horizontal line ( cs3 Wrap Command )
After that used some filters and layers due main shot
Added another photo in background from Place Command

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I'm going to hand this one to DonJuanMair. Great job. Very dramatic!

Monty, good_boy - great efforts at fixing the distortion. I did the same thing. I also liked how you were able to really brighten up the colors, Monty. And, the sky with the rays of sunlight was a nice touch, good_boy.

Kim, your fake snow looks really good. Do you mind telling me how you did that? It might come in handy with winter/Christmas pictures coming up!

Looking forward to the next one, DonJuanMair!

Thanks suzy! I actually liked the distorted angle of the building, straight it looks blah to me, I have to say something about this thread I think ppl are way too vague on what they're doing, I thought this was to help others learn new photoshop techniques......
Ill have a new one up tonight!

the new one is up!

Congrats DanJuan!

suzyb wrote in post #6707926
Kim, your fake snow looks really good. Do you mind telling me how you did that? It might come in handy with winter/Christmas pictures coming up!

Sorry, I read this and was going to come back to it after work yesterday and forgot! The action is called "Snowscapes by Dave Seeram" I can't remember where I got it from - did a quick search on yahoo but couldn't come up with anything. It was a freebie action. I have the zip file still if you want me to email it too you. It has a "gentle snow" and "blizzard" - I used the blizzard for this one.