Alpha Photography Blog

What can I say about Photoshop? It’s such a great program, but it really frustrates me at times also.

This software has infinite photo editing and graphic design possibilities, but like so many things, it is only easy once you know how.

When I first bought Photoshop, I was so enthusiastic until I opened the program and it appeared to be in a different language - what did Levels mean? How did Layers work? Where was the crop tool?

After many hours of practise, plus some courses later, I’ve grasped what are probably only the fundamentals of Photoshop.

Here are some tips I’d like to share with you:

Always Work in TIFF!

I learnt this the hard way. Most people download JPEG image files onto their PC, and begin editing the files as is.

An important tip is that each time you edit and save a JPEG file, some resolution is lost, so you are eroding the quality of your file.

As soon as you open your JPEG file in Photoshop for the first time, immediately resave it as a TIFF file.

It will become a whole lot larger, but you won’t lose any pixels.

JPEG for Printing

This is a somewhat obvious one, but once you’ve finished editing, save your TIFF file back to a JPEG, as most labs won’t print from a TIFF file.

Calibrate you Monitor

This was covered in the previous post, but it is important to reiterate that this should be done.

Adjusting Light Levels

This is where the term “Levels” comes from. Once you have your image open, click Image, then Adjustments, then Levels from the top toolbar.

A handy shortcut for this is Ctrl L.

A small window will now appear, with a wonky bell curve and 3 dials running across the bottom.

Make sure the “Preview” box has a tick inside it (this will allow you to see the changes as you’re making them).

If you take any of these dials and drag them to the left, the image will become lighter. Dragging to the right makes the image darker.

Test out each dial and see which one makes your image look better. Generally, I like to use the middle dial the most.

Click OK once you’re happy with the result.

Colour Balance

This is always my next action. Images are effected by the surrounding lighting, and this can create undesirable colour casts.

On your toolbar, select Image, then Adjustments, then Colour Balance. The shortcut for this is Ctrl B.

Use the bars to select which colours you want to add or subtract. Portraits, generally add more red, and reduce the blue.

Landscapes - add a little green, and reduce a little blue.

Again, make sure the “Preview” box is ticked and adjust until you’re happy with the result.

Contrast

This is the final fundamental step, before I begin really adjusting an image (I’ll cover these in a future post).

On the top toolbar, select Image, then Adjustments, then Brightness/Contrast.

I find that adding 5 points of Contrast (slide the bar to the right) is enough, but gauge what’s right for your image.

I hardly ever touch Brightness.

Be careful not to overdo the Contrast as it can make the image look over-exposed.

There you go! These are the basics of correcting an image in Photoshop. Later I’ll go through how to correct some other common issues with images.

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