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Balancing Different Areas of an Image
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The image we have been working with is only the lower
part of a larger image. It was shot in the Venetian Hotel
in Las Vegas.
The artificial sky was much brighter than the lower part
of the picture and very different in character. None the
less, we can quickly and easily balance the image.
This technique has many applications. By selecting a dark
forest on a light mountainside, one can increase the highlight
and thus the detail. Even a portrait with one side of the
face too dark, can be lightened subtly.
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Selecting the Highlights
In Photoshop there are many ways of selecting an area - marquee,
lasso, by colour range and so on. In this case I chose the magic
wand. See palette, or use the keyboard command w.
Some of the sky was entirely blown out so I clicked in the white
area. I tried several times with different tolerances set. A setting
of 48 got most of the sky and just a little of the buildings.
In order to get all the bright areas in the picture, I could
have clicked Contiguous off, but instead used Select Similar -
Ctrl+s,r.
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Invert the Selection
On the Select menu, pick Inverse - Ctrl-Shift+I.
Now everything BUT the bright area is selected.
Again on the Select menu pick Feather - Ctrl-Alt+D.
In this case I used eight pixels for a soft - but still
well defined transition between the areas.
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Balancing the Area.
Back to old familiar Levels, and by now you know what to do.
Just watch along the marquee line and make the levels within the
marquee balance the area that is excluded.
If the picture demands it once again select Inverse - Ctrl-Shift+I
and adjust the levels on the other area.
Where the highlights are burned out, all detail is lost and
nothing will bring it back. In this image it looks absolutely
fine however.
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You are welcome to join any of the following groups
in which I am an active participant, and I will be glad to answer
your questions there. While we are as friendly and helpful as
possible, please read the rules. If you Spam on any of these
groups - you are instantly gone. Everyone else is very welcome
to join and participate. It is the questions that keep the groups
going, and no one will be rude about "newbie" questions.
Even if the same question was answered a couple of days before,
we will consider "review".
For a downloadable Adobe Acrobat version of this tutorial please
go to:
©Larry N. Bolch 2002
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