Tue, Jun 21, 2011
This is a little trick from way back in the day. I assume most people are doing their adjustments in RAW in Lightroom or Aperture. But there are those times, when you’ve finished your RAW conversions and are doing and album, or retouching a photo and it’s just a bit dark. Going back into the RAW at this stage is just a pain in the neck for me.
When I want to lighten up a photo in Photoshop, there are a few ways to do this – levels, exposure, etc. Most of these ways are linear. In the example photo, I would instantly lose the highlights. The great things about curves, is that it is super easy to bring up just the mid-tones, which is where most photos need to be lightened. This preserves both the highlights and the shadows.
Before Curves
After Curves
Learn From This Video
How to work curves, how to make a quick action to bump exposure, how to use this action in Work Flow and Album Builder
About Fundy
Andrew Funderburg has written 287 articles on this blog.
Father, husband, photographer and creator of Fundy Software residing in the Portland, Oregon metro area.
