Giving image graduated fade at bottom--LR or CS4?

What's the easiest way to give an image a faded (graduated?) effect at the bottom? I did one using LR3 and the gradient tool but it seemed kind of difficult (for me, anyway) so I was wondering if CS4 might have an easier method or even another way of doing it in LR3?

Are you trying to fade the color (saturation) or the exposure or the opacity? Can you post an idea of what exactly you are trying to achieve?

Kirk

Or perhaps a "post crop vignette"? Or a fake T&S effect?

kirkt wrote in post #11422321
Are you trying to fade the color (saturation) or the exposure or the opacity? Can you post an idea of what exactly you are trying to achieve?

Kirk

The opacity.

Yeah, Michelle, be a bit more specific, and also, could you explain what the Lightroom gradient could not do for you?

In Photoshop you can open an Adjustment Layer that applies the overall "end result" fading then use the mask to apply a gradient over that "look", whereas in Lightroom/Camera Raw you'd take the opposite approach and design the gradient to gradually apply the faded look, but I'm curious as to what difficulties you had with the Lightroom gradient.

tonylong wrote in post #11424727
Yeah, Michelle, be a bit more specific, and also, could you explain what the Lightroom gradient could not do for you?

In Photoshop you can open an Adjustment Layer that applies the overall "end result" fading then use the mask to apply a gradient over that "look", whereas in Lightroom/Camera Raw you'd take the opposite approach and design the gradient to gradually apply the faded look, but I'm curious as to what difficulties you had with the Lightroom gradient.

I've never used the gradient tool, so I had to just keep experimenting. I had seen a post somewhere on POTN where the member showed a pic of their CD label, and it looked so nice; the image gradually faded towards the bottom, where the photog then put their client's session info and the photog's logo or co. name. That's what I was trying to imitate. This is what I ended with from LR3:

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Well, what steps did you finally take? Is there a way you could post a screen shot that shows the gradient and the settings dialog you ended up with?

I'm partly asking because this could help others who want to learn about these tools in Lightroom, and also we could get some insight and maybe helpful suggestions!

Of cours, like I said earlier the "traditional" approach would be, in Photoshop, to use an Adjustment Layer, a mask, and a gradient -- you might want to try that out and compare with what you did in Lightroom and see what is the easiest and best, although I myself am kind of a die-hard for squeezing as much as I can out of Lightroom and this could be a cool experiment for us all!

If I were to try and do what you are talking about I would probably use photoshop and then just select the lower part of the image, do a huge feather and delete the bottom. Then the image would fade from the top to the bottom. The background would be transparent. Then I would put that image on the CD cover template and add the text at the bottom.

If you want the image to fade to "paper color" (white) all around, you could use "Post crop vignette":

In Photoshop: Open a blank layer and paint the gradient from the bottom up, like this ...

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