ArticlesSoftware TechniquesPhotoshop Gradient Tool: Blending Images

Photoshop Gradient Tool: Blending Images

By jean miele | Published Mar 10, 2013 | Software Techniques

Tagged with: photoshop photoshop-tutorial software-technique

This image was created from two separate photos, using Photoshop’s Gradient tool.

Photoshop's Gradient tool may not be on most users' lists of go-to editing options. But it should be. In combination with layer masks, the Gradient tool lets you create natural-looking composite images. In this tutorial I'll show you how to combine a compelling foreground element with an interesting sky to create a seamless, believable landscape image.

In an upcoming article we'll explore how to use the Gradient tool to modify layer mask-enabled adjustments to brightness, contrast and toning. But first things first. Here, I'll show you how to make two separate images blend seamlessly into one.

When two is better than one

If your instinct is to resist the whole notion of composite imagery because it feels like 'cheating', you should know that the idea of combining pictures together has a long photographic tradition. Swedish photographer Oscar Gustave Rejlander pioneered the photomontage a.k.a. 'combination printing' in the 1850s! In addition to solving the problem of capturing both sky and foreground on the low-latitude, blue-insensitive emulsions of the day, many 19th century masters appreciated that combination printing is a wonderful way for photographic artists to realize their personal vision, just as painters do.

Here our goal is to seamlessly blend the two images below into a the single image shown at the start of the article. Since we're combining two images, you may be wondering why I don't just use the Quick Selection tool to cut the sky out of one image and paste it over the existing sky in the other image.


Here I have an interesting foreground: a weathered, abandoned and tiny 19th-century New Mexico homestead. The total living space couldn’t have been more than 100 sq. ft.! The problem here though is that the sky isn’t so exciting.	This image has a luminous, dramatic sky, but no real focal point for the eye to rest on. Neither of these images really succeeds on its own – but combined together (as seen above) they’re lovely.

The problem is that masking or silhouetting the horizon line is much harder than you may think. The roofline won’t be a problem, and the soft edges of the mountains at the horizon are do-able, but those tree limbs and leaves will be a source of heartbreak! Chances are, even after hours of careful work using Channels, Image Calculations or the Pen tools, something will still look 'funny' around those trees.

So let’s just skip all that. Using the Gradient tool in a layer mask is fun, effective, and best of all, speedy. Of course, there are some projects that need a complex silhouette, but when you're blending things like sky and clouds, using a gradient is not only easier, but produces better results.

Layer masks and gradients explained

The concept of layer masks can be hard to grasp, even for experienced Photoshop users. So before we go any further, here’s a good, simple way to think about them. Masks have only one job: they hide stuff. A mask on a pixel layer makes it possible to hide parts of that layer without destroying any pixels. By using masks instead of the Eraser or History brushes, you can always change your mind about any edits because you're never deleting pixels, only changing their visibility. Better still, you can restore the visibility of any hidden items even after the image file has been saved, closed, and reopened.

When a layer mask is white, it reveals the layer to which it is attached. A black layer mask does just the opposite. It hides the layer to which it is attached. But of course, a mask does not have to be filled completely with black or white. And that's where gradients come in.

When making a gradient inside a layer mask, the thing to remember is that a black-to-white gradient means 'hidden-to-revealed' or 'invisible-to-visible'. A white-to-black gradient means exactly the opposite: 'revealed-to-hidden' or 'visible-to-invisible'.

Gradient tool options

When you select the Gradient tool there are two options you need to set: the gradient's colors and its shape.

You can set the Gradient options to display as thumbnails or in a list view, at a choice of sizes. You can even opt for a text-only view to save room if you're working on a small monitor.

In this tutorial we'll be using the Black, White option to fill in the layer mask. These are the colors we want to use to hide and reveal parts of the layer. The Black, White option is, by default the third item in the Gradient flyout menu shown above. Note that if you set Photoshop's foreground/background swatches to their defaults, (keyboard shortcut: D), then choosing the Foreground to Background option in the Gradient flyout menu will give the same effect.

You also want to make sure to select a Linear Gradient in the options bar. In a followup article on gradient masking, I’ll be using both the Radial and Reflected Gradients. (If anyone can tell me a practical use for the Angle or Diamond Gradients, I’d love to hear from you.)

Once the Gradient tool is selected you can decide the shape of your gradient. You can apply it as a straight-line (linear), radial or reflected blend (shown here). For this tutorial only the Linear Gradient will be employed.

I'll be honest, it takes a little practice to get the hang of using the Gradient tool and its options, but the idea is pretty straightforward. The Gradient tool (unlike a Gradient Fill or Gradient Map Adjustment Layer) is similar to the Brush tool. As with brushes, the color black in a mask hides stuff; white makes it visible. And as I'll demonstrate later, gray partially hides a layer.

Here's where gradients differ though. You create one by click-dragging. A longer click+drag results in a more gradual transition, a shorter click-drag creates a more abrupt transition. To experiment with the Gradient tool I suggest creating a new, blank canvas (File>New) and drawing different gradients on the white Background layer. It’s a great way to make sense of this very useful tool.

Continue to page 2 of our Photoshop Gradient article...

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Total comments: 208

Thank you so much for acknowledging that making a really convincing mask for sky replacement is not fast or easy. This is an excellent tutorial, made even better by your honesty about the tedious alternative.

0 upvotes

Light in two pictures above comes from a totally different angle.
But who really cares about that? :)

0 upvotes

Many thanks Jean - looking forward to part 2!

Comment edited 20 seconds after posting

0 upvotes

Really good, indeed. Thank you.
What do Diamond Gradients serve for? To draw diamonds, I suppose... :)

0 upvotes

Thanks! Great article - simple and short really good

1 upvote

Very nice tutorial, thanks a lot Jean! It worked great with Gimp as well, using the same technique. Also, I've noticed I had to horizontally flip the sky so the shadows of the beams of the house go the same way as the rays of the sun.

0 upvotes

I'm guessing that people here who are saying 'this isn't photography' never spent hours and hours dodging and burning in a hot, stuffy darkroom.

Tools change. Art remains.

0 upvotes

Thank you Jean for your useful example of using gradients in a mask. This is an easy method to deal with a common problem.
I preferred the original sky though. What I did was to duplicate the original background layer and then use the Multiply blending mode. This was a little too much so I reduced the opacity to around 65%. Then I used your straightforward example to add a mask with a gradient. For the gradient I reduced the opacity to 30% and applied gradients several times to mask the grass and cabin as well as the clouds on the upper left partially. Then I added an adjustment layer to saturate the dry grass and cabin in the foreground. In the mask for this adjustment layer I used your method again to mask the sky from the top down to just allow the cabin to get saturated. This was way better than using selections or painting in a mask. Thanks again.

0 upvotes

You are very welcome, Martin45. Thank you. It's fantastic that you were able to integrate using a Gradient in a mask; that was my goal in creating the tutorial. And your "variation on a theme" sounds just great. Jazz improv, right? ; )

0 upvotes

Improving photographs working on levels, curves, contrast, saturation, filters, lights, shadows, gamma, as well as using HDR techniques, photo stacking, etc.., is deontologically appreciable, because the final result, however, isn't a fake: only a picture improved.
Techniques such as the one here illustrated, however, leave me puzzled because goes beyond the Photography and entering the creative montage. Which often has a great artistic value.
But that's not Photography.

4 upvotes

says who?

1 upvote

Ciao, Giuseppe. Thanks for commenting. You're not the first one in this thread to say "that's not photography" or some variation on that theme. Personally, I think “photography” is a BIG word. I doubt Sir John Herschel could have imagined that the term would grow to encompass such a vast range of uses, processes, media and intentions when he popularized it in 1839. From the beginning, our beloved "painting with light" was diverse and ever changing, and has grown into a spectrum that spans art, documentary, family snapshots, advertising, pornography, scientific research, and a thousand gradations and variations between. It includes nearly a hundred distinct photographic processes (so far!), ranging from daguerreotype to Hipstamatic, and is presented on an impossibly wide array of media and substrates, including glass, metal, paper, and LCD, to name just a few. *more below*

2 upvotes

If photomontage isn't a part of photography, that's bad news for me, and a bunch of other people. Pretty sure Jerry N. Uelsmann (as Amadou mentioned earlier) is a photographer. Not to mention Carleton Watkins, Gustave LeGray, Henry Peach Robinson… and W. Eugene Smith. Smith, unarguably one of the icons of photojournalism, wasn't above creating the occasional photomontage, as evidenced in this recent NY Times Lens blog entry: http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/03/w-eugene-smith-i-didnt-write-the-rules-why-should-i-follow-them/

The way I see it, we all love photography, and there's room in that word for all of us, regardless of the kinds of pictures we like to make.

2 upvotes

Thank You so much Jean for the fantastic article .
And all you " anti-photoshop talibans",what about all great wildlife photographers,no fakes at all,or the great guys at Magnum for long,long time ago.like Robert Doisneau with his legendary "Kiss by the Hotel de Ville"; fake or not?
When humans or animals are directed and manipulated by the photographer,is the result then just a poor fake ?

0 upvotes

Do not get me wrong.
I assumed that creative manipulation has a great artistic value, often even more than in documentary photography.
But it's another thing.
It's therefore necessary to understand what we are talking about: creativity or photojournalism?
In the first case it's ethically permissible to use any tool. No limit.
In the second case, It's ethically allowed the use of calibration tools, but not "manipulation".
It was discovered that some photographers, trying to emphasize the famous tsunami a few years ago, have created photomontages using pieces of Niagara Falls.
This is unethical.
The newspapers, now more than ever, in the digital age, they are very strict in this respect.

0 upvotes

- continue from -
And I do not mean just photojournalism social or war reportages. Even the landscape photos are discarded without hesitation by newspapers such as National Geographic, if counterfeit beyond what is a simple calibration.
The case of the legendary Robert Doisneau photo "Kiss by the Hotel de Ville" is completely different. We discuss it if the kissing couple is casually on site, or it's a couple in a pose. But even in the latter case, technically, no question of a montage.
Infact, one thing is to create a scene or a situation. Another thing is to remove people with rubber ...

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P.S.
Jean, It's obvious that my comments were related to the purposes of the technique, not to the the "technique itself". Your tutorial is a masterpiece and I will be the first to use it!

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Heck, back in the fifties we took the two negatives and printed what we wanted out of the first negative, and then added the sky from the second negative. You probably had to make maybe a half a dozen prints before you got a good one. But that's the way we did it back then and no one griped.
Also way back beffore they had panchromatic film we used orthochromatic film that was color blind Practically insensitive to red - NOT BLUE.

0 upvotes

Is there anyway to add this to my favorites or bookmark this article within DPR? I don't have time to read the whole thing but am very interested in the subject, since I needed to learn how to do this months ago!

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Sure, aja2. There are a few possibilities. I use both Evernote and Instapaper to save things for later reading. (There are also many other services like these.) Another possibility is to simply "print" the browser page as a PDF, and save it to your hard drive. Whichever method you choose, you'll need to save page 1 and page 2 of the article individually. Glad you found it helpful enough to want to refer to it again : )

0 upvotes

Just had to laugh at the many, many pompous comments about PS being a cheat, or about how many "better" ways this could be done. I remember when these same pompous jerks used to work at camera shops, making beginners walk out, enthusiasts feel stupid...Now most of those shops are out of business. Wonder why?

2 upvotes

The reason camera shops went out of business was that people had no reason to keep going to camera shops. When was the last time you needed a roll of film, spare (disposable) batteries, a photo album and to pick your prints? And don't forget the stop bath and a spare bulb for your slide projector.

0 upvotes

Thanks! Great article - simple and short!

2 upvotes

Many thanks for a very helpful and informative article.

2 upvotes

Thank you for explaining the basics of gradients used with masked layers...it is always helpful to see these techniques explained in simple terms using sample images this way.

2 upvotes

I know more than a few people who I see and hear complaining about Photoshop - who are folks who have not embraced it and therefore, cannot use it to its full advantage. Back in the times when Photoshop didn't really exist and everybody's photos were based on how well they came out of the camera, these guys were kings. Now with post processing and other tools, they have lost that status somewhat. 3 photos layered into 1 to produce a shot that looks better than the single frame. Lets compare.

The guy doing the layered piece of art is making something that looks better (perhaps?), and still requires a camera to create it. Making great images is a lot of fun. Not much complaining from this guy.

The guys doing the single frame shots that I'm referring to get to prattle on about how bad Photoshop is and how if there was a contest like the old days when you had to use a camera and not Photoshop, they'd still be the best.

Ego.

Comment edited 2 times, last edit 5 minutes after posting

5 upvotes

Steve, your comment puts me in mind of responses encountered in my camera club, and always from old school members with limited computer skills.

One factor has to be intended end use of 'created' images, and if for competition use, if the rules allow radical image manipulation, then a person disadvantages themselves if they refuse to encompass that option in their images.

The PSNZ (Photographic Society on New Zealand) uses this flickr stream to host winning exhibition and salon entries, and the images show a slight predominance of heavy Photoshop use, but there are still enough straight photographs to satisfy the conservative shooter.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/psnz/

Our professional body the NZIPP shows an even greater percentage of heavily manipulated images in its annual Iris Awards

http://www.nzipp.org.nz/nzippweb/Default.aspx?tabid=422

It seems to me that you ignore these image manipulation tools at your peril!

0 upvotes

Quite a bit of narrow minded thinking from people who feel that their way is the only way to be a photographer.

Really, I think the biggest issue at play is EGO. Thats a hard thing for people to admit to. The point of photography? I always thought it was to create images. A camera records reality the way a camera sees reality. Not the way it really is. We override the camera in such a way that the camera produces things closer to OUR vision. How is that different than Photoshop?
You can use white balance on board the camera to produce a total lie as easily as a layer mask can.

I do not condone dishonesty in image making; I do condone interpretation and artistic license. It seems that there are too many ego driven people stuck on the idea that the best image makers are the ones who can do the best using just a camera. The point of this game is to make great images, right?. Why limit yourself to just a camera in the art-making process? When so much more is out there to use?

3 upvotes

Jean Miele is a great photographer known for highly artistic images. So, I would know to look at this with some suspicion of license. Personally I draw the line on composites. Composites compromise the power of photography, shifting the emphasis from a photographer's reaction to the subject to mere artistry. As for the subject example? The final may be marginally better than the original graphically, but in terms of meaning it adds nothing. In fact, knowing it a composite of separate scenes diminishes the image.

2 upvotes

I agree that there is a certain purity of viewing experience when we know that a photographer caught a special confluence of elements and did not alter reality. If this is the type of photography you most admire, enjoy! However, to disparage other types of approaches, in this case composites, and sniff that such are, as you bizarrely state, "mere artistry," paints you as pompous, rather than embracing. Photography appeals to so many because it is offers so many ways of expressing oneself. Embracing some does not require us to belittle others!

Comment edited 2 times, last edit 15 minutes after posting

0 upvotes

Yes, I enjoy a "confluence of elements". I also enjoy abstract photography and accept some well done composites in that realm. I have no problem with composites for advertisements, illustrations, or art, but almost all have absolutely no place in photography that includes documentary intent. It is important that general perceptions are considered. Viewers in general are very receptive to photographic illusions, abstractions, exaggerations, etc created in an artful way. Viewers even tolerate outright manipulation when it makes a point, or when it is meaningless. But show somebody a photo of something they care about and you better watch out! You better be sensitive and not twist it to meet your ego. Or you won't be trusted.

0 upvotes

One of the best uses of layer masks is selectively combining different exposures of the same scene to achieve a natural looking HDR image, without the overblown look of HDR software and tone mapping.

1 upvote

If done proerly, HDR can yield pefectly natural results. And an image properly tonemapped for a natural look appear more natural than an image pieced together in layers.

It's a matter of skill, and a matter of intent. And very much a matter of opinion.

There are times to strive for a natural look and a time for a more surrealistic look. This has been true not only as long as photography has been around, but as long as art in any form has been around!

Unskilled artists tend to be a bit heavy handed when applying special effects. But in the right hands, heavily tone mapped images may bring a beauty and interest to a scene that would otherwise be dull and boring. It takes as much skill to apply a heavy special effect without over doing it as it does to apply the effect to make it appear natural.

I revisited some of the images I had pieced together from bracketed shots and layers, and tonemapped them in HDR. They look more natural via HDRI than through layers.

Comment edited 50 seconds after posting

0 upvotes

"an image properly tonemapped for a natural look appear more natural than an image pieced together in layers"

I couldn't disagree more with this.

0 upvotes

You can't possibly make that statement and maintain credibility. You might have admired any number of pictures without realising they were tone-mapped. One of the biggest problems with HDR is that the worst examples are the easiest to spot. Apps like Photomatix have advanced enormously over the years, and it is much easier to photorealistic HDR nowadays - even if you are not very good at it.

0 upvotes

I certainly can. How can you get more photorealistic than an actual photo? The image in this example is just two photos pieced together in layers... are you saying it's LESS realistic than a tonemapped image of the two? That's ridiculous.

0 upvotes

The more Photoshop you use the less photographer you are... I use Photoshop only for creativity and extreme problems. I still use Capture NX for 99% of my photos.
It's sad to reach a point when you don't know if it is a photograph anymore...

2 upvotes

That sounds very much like what they were saying about Eduard Steichen 115 years ago!

The painters said it wasn't art and the photographers said it wasn't photography.

Your opinion on Photoshop simply defines how you prefer to approach photography and is not an accurate description of all photographers.

Long before digital photography existed, we used to say that clicking the shutter is only the start of the photographic process. There's alot that takes place after the exposure is made that must be done for the photographers vision to be realized.

I could argue that if all one is doing is making a few tweaks in tone and color, that it's really no different than a snapshooter who drops the film off at the minilab and lets someone else finish the process. That would be an inaccurate statement but no less accurate than saying that using more photoshop makes one less a photographer.

Photography is a two step process, one is what happens before you take the shot, and one after.

2 upvotes

So you use Photoshop correctly, and everyone else uses it incorrectly. Got it.

0 upvotes

I started life as a photographer in 1965 and have been cheating ever since.hot water on part of a B+W print to bring up detail,a dab of fix to stop development in one spot,shading,printing from multiple negatives.
I love what Photoshop lets me achieve.I no longer worry about how to prop something up in the studio,blemishes on products can be removed etc.
Photoshop is the perfect tool to compliment digital images.

0 upvotes

Why not invert from left to right (mirror) the dark sky image, so that it works with the direction of the shadows on the structure? The main problem I see with this, is that to me, it is not a believable composite, because first, the building is so bright it looks like it's in broad daylight, but there's this dark sky over it, and second, the point where the skies may be lightening up is on the left, while the shadows imply a light source from the right.
I understand it's just an example and the point of the article is otherwise, but I feel that while we're on the topic of making "believable" composites, light source, light intensity and contrast, and direction of shadows still have to be all taken into account, to make it work. And this is part of the job with such an undertaking.

1 upvote

Feel free to download the jpegs from page 2, and try it yourself. That's why we're providing the practice images :-)

2 upvotes

The original dramatic sky is great, too. Leave it alone, as well. ;) No big foreground focal point is required other than the gentle arid nodule already there.

If this was all just a hypothetical test, fine. But I hope people don't over-think their original visions/moments, which is the heart of photography.

0 upvotes

The brighteness on the right side of the sky makes the image seem less ominous. That might have been fixed with just a tonal adjustment, but since the point of the article is about blending images, that would have defeated the purpose of the article!

0 upvotes

I haven't scrolled through all the comments below, but the combined photo is a bit silly-looking, because the sun is now behind the dark clouds (as evidenced by the original foreground), yet we still have the strong-lined shadows on the building from the original sun high and to the right.

The homestead's original sky is great. Leave it alone.

Over-processing turns a photo into a painting or at least 'photo art'. Label it as such.

Comment edited 11 minutes after posting

0 upvotes

I've used layer masks for blending for some time now, but have always used feathered brushes set to 10% of black or gradients of black to transparent, so the introduction of white is new to me, will give it a go.

Thanks for an interesting article.

0 upvotes

Thank you so much for sharing, nicely explained. Hope you will be posting some more.

1 upvote

Gimp has an excellent youtube channel to help the Gimp user accomplish almost anything.

2 upvotes

Photoshop Elements has an excellent youtube channel to help the elements user accomplish almost anything the program is capable of doing. Excellent article though helping me expand my knowledge of a seemingly endless learning process with Photoshop. I do what makes me and the customer happy and that is all that counts in my photography, everybody is an artist in their own way

2 upvotes

Who says "blending images is a sin"???

Light up the darkroom: since the first 'camera oscura' to paint with perspective, even before, painting the walls inside a cavern, man are "cheating" "the real world" again and again...

2 upvotes

A good article. There will always be various ways to achieve better results; explaining the technique was the point.

And ‘cheating’? Even purist photographers are never able to fully represent reality. Would that mean everyone ‘cheats’?

In camera we: crop, rotate, use focal length, DOF, compression, distortion, shutter speed, expression, props, shadows, viewpoint, film, exposure, blockers, lighting, reflectors, masks, filters, etc.

In the darkroom we: dodge, burn, mask, filter, diffuse, solarize, graduate, spot, colour balance, vignette, bleach, and even do composites (you know, a house and a different sky) by multiple exposures and sandwiching negatives.

In Photoshop we: do all of the above and more.

All the above distort what is reality. Am I to believe that those ‘photographers’ here who accuse people of ‘cheating’ do none of the above?

Photography - Painting with light - You do not have to like what is created, but love that we have the ability and freedom to create...

1 upvote

Have you actually ever tried doing composites in the darkroom?

I don't think you have. Because you'll know how bl00dy hard it is and how much skill it takes to do it successfully. And it's usually a one-off. You can't repeat exactly what you have done previously..

In Photoshop its click, click, click, drag, drop, click, click, click. Done. In minutes. In the darkroom you can work for MUCH longer than that.

You say in the camera we... In the darkroom we.. Yeah, sure, but those things actually exist. You are confined by physical and chemical realities. Not so in your fake photoshopped world.

Have you tried, say, removing that small annoying seagull that just happen you fly into your shot ruining your sky. On a colour RA4 print it's impossible (apart from actually 'airbrushing' over it). In a B&W silver gelatine print, well, give it a go! All you digital freaks get off your ar5e and give it a go with a real B&W print.

Photoshopography: Painting with pixels that don't exist!

2 upvotes

Hi there Wye,

Your opinions are strong. It is good to find someone with such passion, and nothing wrong with it, especially if it really is what you believe. I looked at your website too, and I have to say you have some wonderful photos.

I especially noted your section that included, "Photos of Wales taken on the iPhone 4S and processed on the iPad2."...

I guess you don't mind heavily processed photos afterall, but maybe only if done on an iPhone...? But I must say, a bit of a disappointment after you showed such passion against such things...

1 upvote

"Have you tried, say, removing that small annoying seagull that just happen you fly into your shot ruining your sky. On a colour RA4 print it's impossible (apart from actually 'airbrushing' over it). In a B&W silver gelatine print, well, give it a go! All you digital freaks get off your ar5e and give it a go with a real B&W print. "

That's actually patently false, as part of my film photography classes was exactly replicating digital darkroom techniques in an actual darkroom - and yeah, we did actually remove stuff and composite photographs, both B&W and RA4 through frame splicing and clever use of masks. Is it easy? Nope. But it's doable - and, furthermore, people have been doing these very things since forever.

2 upvotes

To Easycass

Thank you for your comments. My iPhone 'stuff' is peculiar and exclusive to the iPhone. I do enjoy working with the iPhone and iPad and do it in such a way as to make it obvious that the images have been modified. It's fun and a tonic for the jaded. It's blatant iPhoneography as they call it. I would NEVER pass it off as 'authentic', not that I possibly can. As the iphone 'work' is in its own pigeon hole, I may remove that gallery. Is it really 'photography'?

I don''t actually mind people modifying images, making panoramas, montages, blends, composites etc. IF they make it clear that this is the case. My whole point is passing such work off as an original one frame shot when in actuality it isn't.

That, my friend, is my whole issue.

I totally respect people who say things like "this image is a composite made from three frames" or "I removed...", "Changed..."

It is a question of honesty and integrity.

0 upvotes

To AluKd

If I wasn't in such a hurry I would have chosen better words. I should have said "largely impossible", for some workers, it is because they can't achieve the level of skill required.

Tell me, removing said hypothetical seagull from an 10x8 inch RA4 print, how long? Chances of success on first go? How much space and equipment required? How much time would you have to put in to pull it off convincingly?

I can teach one of the office girls (most of whom do not like IT) where I work to remove said seagull from a .jpg in 15minutes maximum.

As you say, it's doable, but with what kind of skill and effort?

Before digital, Newspapers had teams of guys who whose sole job it was to touch-up photographs from film. Airbrushing was an art using real airbrushes not the photoshop tool. They were highly skilled people made redundant by a bit of software that anybody can use.

Photoshop can do much, much more, much quicker, with much less skill. You have never had it so good (or bad)!

0 upvotes

@Wye Photography:

Sounds to me like you're mixing two different things in your rather passionate posts, so:
What is your issue? "Authenticity" or "too easy in Photoshop these days"?

I don't care if the seagull's removed in Photoshop, or if it's removed on a "real" print. The later takes longer & more skill, but the result will be the same: seagull removed.

As for authenticity: there is no such thing. Take, for example, Robert Capa's "Death of a Loyalist Soldier". People still argue today whether the image was staged or not.

PS: Keep your iPhone pictures up. They're nice – and after, all iPhone photos ARE "photography", which is "painting with light" in a black light-tight box. Doesn't matter if it's film or a sensor involved ;)

0 upvotes

@Wye

You're whining because a faster, more accurate procedure has supplanted the darkroom where results were difficult to achieve and hit and miss?

You have no idea how to use Photoshop and like most of the old duffers on here are reacting out of fear of what you don't understand.

Click, click, click. indeed.

0 upvotes

@JakeB

Sorry laddie, but I have been using photoshop PROFESSIONALLY as a Graphic Designer since version 2.5 Currently I run CS5.5

Old duffer eh! Well, this one being ex-Army is probably more fit than your are.

I think when this computer/gadget fetish runs it's course people will want to return to a simpler, unfiltered, humble way of making images.

You rely on a plethora of software engineers and programmers for your images. I don't. When I think about it, you don't actually make your images, Abobe's code-heads do.

Comment edited 11 minutes after posting

0 upvotes

"You rely on a plethora of software engineers and programmers for your images. I don't."

Unless you built your camera from the ground up, you do too.

0 upvotes

@Irata

My issue is expressed in my comment above yours (I hope it was clear). The ease of it doesn't bother me per se, I was making the comparison that in the 'old days' faking, composites etc took really skill and a lot of hard work. Photoshop isn't hard work, it's easy.

Perhaps I have been using PS for too long. I went through all the stuff like I see and read here. There comes a point when you become sick of it all. Sick of all the computer generated un-reality. Perhaps you'll come to that point one day.

Like you, once I didn't care how the seagull was removed. Now I do. I suppose I've around digital media too long.

For me, authenticity is important, as is honesty, integrity and being genuine. Personally, I think Capa staged it, Alexander Rodchenko faked it a lot. That's not genuine. It's lying. Some people are like that. I am not.

Thanks for your comment about my iPhone pictures. I don't know where that sits with me yet. I'll take your comments aboard. Take care.

0 upvotes

@Alukd

That's true. I could build my own camera though, it's not that hard. I have given it some thought actually. Building my own camera one day. I have already mixed my own developer, made Cyanotypes, that's a little start.

I like to see you write your own version of Photoshop! LOL.

0 upvotes

Not that hard, actually. I mean, that's pretty much what Knoll did with PS 1.0. It's certainly doable.

Making your own digital camera from scratch, though, that's much harder ;)

On the other hand, I've built my own film camera, already. It's a cakewalk.

0 upvotes

Hello again Wye,

I do understand your desire for a personal authenticity, but as you say, I think as long as people do not try to pass any modified image as something it is not, then we are happy.

Believe it or not, I am with you, and prefer unaltered images as much as possible. I used to think the only image that came close to be straight fromn the camera at least, was a positive slide, no printing, no cropping, only the film, ASA, aperture and shutter to get it right. I do allow myself a bit more latitude these days... Though sometimes I still can't bring myself to straighten a horizon in PS!

But I guess I have learned to appreciate there are many forms of photography these days, many ways to poduce 'the image', and so long as 'it works', I try not to judge 'how' they made it work...

Ps...
I too think you should keep the iPhone shots on your website. I really liked them. Whether they are photo-like or painterly, for me it only mattered that I enjoyed looking at them...

0 upvotes

To Easycass and AluKd

Many thanks for your comments, I appreciate them.

It will be very interesting to see how the technology, software and the direction photography takes actually pans out in the next five or so years.

AluKd, when I said 'build my own camera', I did actually mean a film camera (I do shoot film, and more recently). If you feel so inclined, please send me details of your self-made-camera, I will be very interested in that.

May your Light always be wonderful!

0 upvotes

@Wye Photography,

I'm still a little confused... The first paragraph in your last reply to my post is contraticting in itself I think. ("The ease doesn't bother me..." <--> "Photoshop is easy").

Anyway... more importantly, about the seagull being removed: I hear what you're saying, but my point is: apart from your very own photographs you'll never know if there was a seagull in the first place – both with analogue or digital.

Personally, I keep retouching to a minimum: colours, contrast, maybe a little d&b. All those things could also be done in the analogue world (I used to work as a C-Type printer): different film stock (Kodak Portra vs Agfa Ultra for example), printing on different papers (Fuji negs on Kodak paper or vice versa),...

So, unless I took the image myself and/or porcessed it myself, I'll never be able to tell if it has been manipulated – and besides that: manipulation starts with focal length, camera position and angle, and the moment we press the shutter.

0 upvotes

How to merge three images together; using Gimp

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXVaEQbzKyc

1 upvote

I bought a fish yesterday. So i'm a fisherman, the expert one who can take any fish he wants!
I'm not a photographer and i don't say it's cheating. But i prefer to differentiate Editing and Designing from Photographing.
Thanks for useful article. It can help my terrible photos seem better.

0 upvotes

A well-written and helpful tutorial on how to use the gradient tool, but I agree with the comment that for the images used, that tool might not be the best choice. Here, it might be simpler to paint the mask with a 100%-opaque black brush in most of the area above the subject of photo 1. The only area requiring something less than 100% opacity is the area immediately above the subject. Because both photos have sky in this area, a seamless blending can be achieved in this area by feathering the brush and playing with its size and opacity. Once this is done, photo 1 can be moved around to achieve the most desired look. Still, the purpose of the tutorial was to illustrate how the gradient tool works, and in this regard, it well succeeds. Thanks.

0 upvotes

Thanks for the kind words, and the feedback. A friend of mine, Brian Reed (from Hawaii and Sweden) is a great photographer and a musician. He once told me he thinks Photoshop is like Jazz Improv. Within the form there's room for a vast range of approaches, styles, and interpretation. And the analogy extends further: Photoshop is - literally - a keyboard ; ) instrument. It seems like there are almost always three ways to do the same thing in Photoshop, and this case is no different. Masking with brushes, feathered selections, Gradients - or a combination of all three… these are just variations on a theme.

9 upvotes

Well done for producing a good result and for sticking your head over the parapet.
I would liken Photo$hop to a jazz improvisation played by a pub jazz band on plastic instruments with half the keys missing. Capture NX and the Gimp are far more effective and lower priced tools (gimp is free) for the sort of manipulations that you're doing.

3 upvotes

Hi, I already commented on this technique but want to add my contribution to the issue of photographic realism. There is plenty of scientific evidence about the amazingly complicated way the eye-brain system "perceives" images, a personal mix of physiology, neurology and psychology influenced by the other senses, and how profoundly different it is from any technological means. It varies significantly from person to person or with the same person at different times. The conclusion is that there is no "realism" between the subject and the print no matter what we do. "Pure" b&w is even more abstract than color. From the camera side, we have the choice of letting the processing engine turn out an arbitrarily developed jpeg or processing the raw image ourselves. I am safe from this mess because (my) fine art photography, by definition, has no practical application but beauty and enjoyment. The only fundamental rule to follow is to be honest about what we are doing.

3 upvotes

Totally cheating as you're creating something new out of two separate images so its not photography and more in line with art/graphic design. Whats next on DPR, how to design sales flyers?

1 upvote

Actually, I am glad it is being done. More and more people who have the money to invest in art such as wealthy second home owners, luxury real estate developers and interior designers are coming to me for real hand made prints done in a real darkroom to meet these needs. Less and less people want photoshopped garbage because it is not hand made and is worthless from the outset.

0 upvotes

Except of course, this sort of stuff was done in the old darkroom days.

1 upvote

Oh it's definitely handmade. And my sales of "Photoshopped garbage" aren't going down at all.

0 upvotes

I have owned Elements 9 for 3 years and don't use it at all because of the steep learning curve. And this seems to offer the same problems. I can follow every step of the tutorial, but again the author assumes that we know what we are doing and leaves us with 3 images; a Photo 1, a Photo 2 and a Gradiant mask. Then he quits! I suppose to many it is trivial how to then combine the 3 but to someone new to Photoshop it isn't.

So I have 3 images with no know way to combine them. Frustrating and precisely why I won't take the time to learn the software, it is completely counterintuitive. Likely a great tool but only for those that have the hundreds of hours needed to learn it properly.

2 upvotes

Following the instructions on page 2 of the article will give you the two images combined. If you can't do it because you've not followed the article correctly, not learning it is just laziness.

On the other hand, if you don't want to learn, no-one can blame you for that. But there are plenty of beginner level articles out there.

0 upvotes

Thorbard

I am not sure that you are right. I am myself also a PSE user (and not a Photoshop user), and for me too it is not evident how to do the job with PSE....But of course, this is not at all a critics towards the tutorial,....which never claimed to be an Elements tutorial.

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0 upvotes

I have owned and used CS3 for several years for basic operations and I thought I would like to know more about the clever stuff and that this piece would be useful. I worked through it concientiously but I did find it difficult to follow. My guess is that if you found it easy to follow, you didn't need the instruction in the first place because you already know your way around pretty well. In the end I too was left wondering how to end up with a combined image because what I did end up with was not very good to look at. I guess I will just stick to the relatively simple stuff that I know how to do, until intructions are produced for those of us who need guidance, not for those who already understand but are just looking for something to criticise, or to show that they know an even better way.

1 upvote

It's a great technique - I'm not hung up on issues of "cheating". But I also don't like techniques that result in images that look fake. When I look at the composite, I see strong shadows on the building from an overhead sun that obviously isn't there (yes it would be out of the frame, but couldn't be there with those clouds). Still a useful article, but it would be better with a photo that shows why you would want to do it, not just how you do it.
I think the author has some fascinating stuff on his own website, very different from anything I've done and very different from the landscape shot used in this article.

1 upvote

I fully agree - an <exercise only> is fine. (The original shots can stand on their own.)

0 upvotes

Thanks! I've been wanting to learn more about the gradient tool, and you've done a really nice job of explaining its potential and how to get using it for more stuff.

I just read some of the comments about this, and apparently there are a lot of people who don't realize that many people use Photoshop for stuff other than photo optimization. The technique in this article can come in very handy when one is making composite illustrations for publications and other creative endeavors. Nothing wrong with photo manipulation either, as long as it isn't presented as being out-of-camera results. The article is of potential use to many people, and I thank the author for it.

Comment edited 8 minutes after posting

3 upvotes

Very helpful article. Thanks!

I am not at all a "purist" as far as the "composites are not art mindset / camp". YMMV and my 2¢

I've been struggling with getting decent composites with winter trees in the foreground. As the author points out, that's a difficult compositing task. "Refine Edge" and "Color Range" haven't been coming out all that well. Neither has the Fluid Mask plug-in.

While this could be a case of "a poor craftsman blames his tools", I'm hoping that the Gradient mask approach you describe will not only be simpler, but work better.

4 upvotes

It's not you. We've all been led to believe that silhouetting two pictures together in Photoshop is easy. In fact, it's one of the hardest things to do, especially when there's fine detail, like tree limbs. For some reason, maybe it's just human nature, I notice that even photographers with lots of darkroom experience reach for a selection tool first when they're in Photoshop - even though that's an approach that wasn't really available to most of us in a traditional wet-darkroom. (I actually tried using litho film and pin-registration a few times, but I think most people just stuck with the old fallback: cardboard.) Counter-intuitively, I think it's possible to get much better results by blending images together, rather than trying to cut them out. This approach emulates the way we used to approach burning & dodging in the darkroom: feathered and blended edges, created by moving the cardboard as we exposed the paper. The Gradient tool seems made for this.

1 upvote

Complex composites are a matter of mixing techniques. Gradient masks are awesome as a rough starter - you can get most stuff out of the way with a few clicks, with very good results.

You can then focus on the foreground elements - I usually go about it by painting on the same mask with a digitizer, what gives you a lot of control and precision. You can reduce the Flow and achieve semi-transparency of borders, what helps mixing the layers. Takes time and a lot of effort, sure, but the results are top notch.

You can do something similar with Poly Lasso, painting with the mouse and a lot of elbow grease, as well.

One of the things most people tend to miss, though, is the value of applying global effects to all the layers. Whenever you apply the same effect to all the layers of a composite, you make them aesthetically closer. For instance, something I usually do is apply small hue shifts and grain.

Comment edited 4 minutes after posting

0 upvotes

This thread is full of miserable people.

12 upvotes

Thanks very much for this, I have done the same thing a variety of ways but this is nice and quick and smooth, much easier to do with the right image. As a landscape photographer I meet this challenge often. Here you are in this great place with a wonderful foreground and a drab, dreary sky, but today is the day you are here and tomorrow you have to move on. I keep a file I call "Big Sky" with just images of different types of skies that I use for just this occasion. Fake? Don't be silly, were Van Gogh's landscapes fake? Marshall McLuhan said: "Art is whatever you can get away with." I have lived by that maxim for a long time now. If I made it, it's my work, and stands on it's own.

Comment edited 1 minute after posting

8 upvotes

Alex, I love your "were Van Gogh's landscapes fake?".

I really believe that both sides have valid arguments....It really depends on what one is interested in when looking at photographies.

And I really believe that the Tutorial will be useful for a lot (of course: not all) dpreview Website users.

2 upvotes

Pity the comments section has been swamped by an irrelevant discussion.

But regarding the technique itself, I'm sorry but using the gradient tool is poor advice. You can just about get away with it in this particular case because there is a conveniently detail-free straight band just above roof height in both images, but in general you won't have this. The wiser and more versatile technique would be to marquee or lassoo the area to be revealed and refine the selection to create a soft edge before filling the selection with black/white as applicable. Or in many cases it's quick and convenient to select first then create the layer mask from the selection. You can then fine-tune by painting with a soft brush, or whatever suits, directly onto the layer mask.

There are applications for using gradients on layer masks, but this isn't one of them.

3 upvotes

Agreed, this technique has the limitations of a split neutral density filter and works best with straight, simple horizons. I most cases, landscapes are more complicated and require the techniques mentioned by Steve.

1 upvote

Well I just used this in a project I'm currently working on (I'm a 3D architectural visualization artist) and it works perfectly well, thank you very much for this tutorial.

3 upvotes

So some people call this cheating. And why should I care ?
Nice article.

6 upvotes

A general question about Photoshop and Photoshop Elements Tutorials on the dpreview Website.

I wonder whether for the dpreview Website, helping/educating via Tutorials Photoshop-Elements (PSE) users can (at least) make as much sense as helping Photoshop users.

On one side, I guess that the dpreview Website attracts more sophisticated semi-professional and professional Photoshop users than it attracts the less sophisticated PSE users.

But on the other side, less sophisticated PSE users could benefit more from tutorials like this one than the sophisticated Photoshop users (who are probably in their majority already well aware of techniques similar to the ones that are described in this Tutorial). Also, there are probably more PSE users than Photoshop users.

I am curious to learn, whether you too think that tutorials for PSE users could make sense on the dpreview Website...and curious to see if we will see in future such tutorials on the dpreview website.

Comment edited 3 minutes after posting

1 upvote

Dear Robert,
In short, you can use this Tutorial to do the same thing in Photoshop Elements.

In more detail:
I checked with Adobe Online support. ( Hey I could chat to a person and got a meaningful reply instantly, I am impressed! ) Photoshop Elements has Layers, Layer Masks, Gradient Tool and Blending of Layers. This means you can do the exact same thing shown in this Tutorial with your Photoshop Elements. The written documentation I found on PSE was sparse to say the least. Your best bet is to google on Youtube the following:

a) Layers
b) Masks
c) Gradient Tool
d) Blending
Combine these search words with Photoshop Elements and the version number you have. Pick a tutorial that works for you. Once you know how to do these 4 things in your PSE you can download the two images from this tutorial and retrace each step in your PSE copy. Good luck!

( to avoid any confusion, I am not associated with dpreview other than I like it very much. I hope you find my post useful though )

Comment edited 4 minutes after posting

4 upvotes

Dear Hubert

Thank You very much. Yes, indeed your Post is helpful. I tried a Google Search with the keywords you had recommended and i got useful results (...but I have not yet tried to use the found descriptions - this will come).

I too love very much the dpreview Website. In fact, I bought my photo equpiment based on recommendations or reviews found on the dpreview Website: my beloved Nikon D5000 camera, my 18-200mm Nikkor DX lens, my Lumix LX 5 compact camera and probably soon my future Fujifilm X20 compact camera.

Its a pitty, that Switzerland and China are so far away...

Thanks again

0 upvotes

Hi Robert, you make a very good point. I am a part-time pro fine-art photographer, quite proficient in PS, and do some teaching. To make a long story short, I do recommend my students to begin with PSE. It has been stated by many experts that you can run many photo businesses with Lightroom (image management) and PSE (image processing) without getting into PS. I would add that, if you learn ACR well, even LR alone would often suffice.

1 upvote

Useful article for most people. But reading some peoples posts here is amusing and also a bit saddening that some people "don't get it"
As long as you are not claiming it is a documentary picture, there is nothing wrong with enjoying producing any picture that pleases you. Using paint or software.
Cheating would include asking someone to pose for a picture or changing the exposure value in the camera. It's all manipulation, and should be stopped!
I recently used the same technique with the Gimp application to move some clouds lower in the frame. As it was taken from the same picture do the "anti-manupilation Nazis" accept that or not?

4 upvotes

Dear Jean and dpreview,

Thanks so much for a well thought out and concisely explained Article. It promises to solve a problem nagging me since long. I am very much looking forward to part 2.

I live in Guangzhou, south of China. Lovely place except there is smog most of the time, which can render as bad as plain white (non) sky in a shot. Your technique -- if I can get it to work-- promises to be swift enough to make images work which otherwise I would not even try to shoot or trash later on anyways. I can't thank you enough for this inspiration!

Comment edited 6 minutes after posting

5 upvotes

Thank you for your comments, Hubert. As a landscape photographer, I've always wanted to go shoot in China. In fact, I just saw a beautiful exhibition in New York this week by Chinese photographer Wang Wusheng. (His photographs were made far from where you live, in Northern China.) These are a wonderful example of "straight" photographs that are absolutely transcendent. For me, the question of what makes some photography exceptional is always interesting. Most other dichotomies seem kind of beside the point.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/27/photographer-wang-wusheng_n_2534810.html
I hope you'll find part 2 useful!

0 upvotes

Cheating or not, I'd prefer the original image... Why the sky shouldn't be interesting? It doesn't sound flat or imbalanced at all!

Comment edited 1 minute after posting

0 upvotes

I liked the original too, certainly didn't find it too terribly uninteresting but, degrees of subtlety and/or need for more drama are subjective things, good with all that too. Always glad to see tutorials on PS, this was a pretty quick read and I am always looking to expand my knowledge, hear how others approach things.

0 upvotes

Same thing here. I'm not sure the second sky is better. The original has more contrast between light and dark areas and would be a great candidate for selective toning to make it look more dramatic.

0 upvotes

Dpreview has EVOLVE to Devian Art !

0 upvotes

Did you meant: http://www.deviantart.com/ ?
I am curious what you want to say. Can you elaborate?

0 upvotes

People seem to confound two different concepts: manipulation and edition aren't necessarily the same thing. One has the potential to alter the perception of reality, the other just enhances the image. The latter can be used freely: it's a matter of taste. The former, however, imposes ethic boundaries. Unless you wanto to make an abstract image and have no pretence to show it as a literal description of a scene, manipulation is OK. If used wrongly, it can become a lie. Moreover, it poses the question whether a given image can still be considered a photograph.

1 upvote

While I agree with you to some degree, it isn't as black and white as you make out. Where does "manipulation" end and "editing" begin? Which category does HDR fall under? Photoshopping out a tiny distracting element in the picture? Using a linear gradient filter to bring out a sky? Is the latter okay if the filter is on the camera, but not if it's in Photoshop?

1 upvote

I agree. I enjoy looking at both kinds of images but I think it would be better if a photographer mentioned when an image is a composite. The boundary between editing and manipulation is getting thinner and thinner though.

0 upvotes

It's hillarious to see all these anti-photoshopping comments popping up:) How many of you 'purists' have your cameras set to 'auto-everything'? Isn't that Photoshop (in camera) creating the perfect exposure for you? Are levels and curve adjustments cheating? Is 'manual' the only guilt-free option?

2 upvotes

As usual those people without grain of fantasy and creativity. they like to measurement dots per mm and non-stop tech talker. I can't blame them. That is all they can do.
Why I should to care about what are you looking for? A lot of people using camera for different aim. Photographer not a fisherman or hunter to FIND something to pleased you. Do what you want. Other people going their way.

And please, if you wedding photographer or reporter that is not yours game. (but how about make up for bride : ))) That is cheating!!

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1 upvote

I believe you've gone a little too far here, Maloy. Sure thing, postprocessing, whether analogue or digital, can be over-the-top sometimes, as has always been the case since photography was invented. The kind of thing you describe would surely be over the top for most of us, as would altering a piece of photojournalism etc. But when it comes to fine art photography, post-processing is part of the creative process. And it can even mean "seamlessly joining" a couple of source images. This has nothing to do with the digital age, by the way. Take a look at this fantastic photograph, for example:

http://fotomuzeum.hu/fotografiak/balogh_rudolf__parbaj_a_pusztan_

This is from 1930. To make the print the photographer used two images - the actual scene and, lo and behold, a picture of a more interesting sky. Just like in the article above. Except he did the "seamless joining" in the darkroom. An actual one. I don't think it makes this image any less valuable or indeed any less "true."

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5 upvotes

For reference, this is an enlargement from the original negative, without the dramatic sky "pasted" in:

http://fotomuzeum.hu/en/photography/balogh_rudolf__parbaj_a_pusztan

A fine shot to be sure, but much less interesting than the final one.

0 upvotes

Can you not tell the difference between photojournalism and fine art photography?

0 upvotes

That's pretty sad then.

Comment edited 22 seconds after posting

0 upvotes

Whatever floats your boat, but, Photoshop covers a multitude of photographic sins. It is the godsend of the crap, impatient and cheating photographer who can't be bothered to wait until conditions are right to take that genuine shot in one frame.

7 upvotes

You must be way more brilliant with Photoshop than me. I found it do be faster most of time to do it in camera than to do in Photoshop :-)

4 upvotes

Yes and no, it will cover some sins but the guy manipulating in PS may spend as much or more time if he is to make his image all that convincing and usually one with a trained eye can still tell. Ultimately the best images will be ones which were good in the camera and very carefully and skillfully tweaked in PS I would think. If one wants fidelity to the actual scene photographed, no lens, sensor, white balance setting, etc combination will likely perfectly yield that anyway. I draw the line at manipulating a photograph for the express purpose of trying to falsify a historical event. Everything else I would label "artistic license", subjective stuff... some like subtly, some need "wow" or high drama... indeed as your comment started, whatever floats one's boat...

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2 upvotes

Total comments: 208