Notes from Paul Mitchell’s PS & LR processing notes.

Paul Mitchell Woodland Workshop notes
Below are a few quick tips to processing your autumn woodland images.
The techniques below relate to Lightroom

• The first thing to do is correct the exposure if needed and use the shadow
  and highlight sliders to correct any detail lost within these areas.
• Whilst still in the basic development panel I usually set either the Texture or
  clarity slider to about -27. This has a pleasant ‘softening’ effect which is ideal
  for woodlands. Don’t overdo it as it will go all mushy!
• For Autumn I always recommend shooting using cloudy white balance
  (6000-6500k). This warmer white balance can sometimes have an effect on
  the neutral grey of beech tree trunks which can begin to look overly warm. I
  therefore find dropping it down to about 5000k corrects this warm cast.
  Unfortunately this then effects the yellows and oranges. I then open the HSL
  panel and increase the saturation of both the orange and yellow to counteract
  this. You can also tweak the greens to taste at this stage.
• In the Effects panel I normally add a very subtle vignette, about -16. This has
  the effect of drawing your eye towards the centre of the image. Don’t overdo
  the vignette!
• Sometimes woodland images may include a path with a pool of light at the
  far end. To try and accentuate this and even introduce a slight misty effect I
  do the following. Select the Radial filter. Zero all the previous settings and set
  the sliders to -25 Contrast and -30 Dehaze. Apply to the area you have
  identified.
  The techniques below relate to Photoshop
• Photoshop is best used for cloning out distracting elements, paying particular
  attention to stray elements on the very edges of the frame.
• One of the biggest distractions in woodland images are those small white
  gaps in the tree canopy caused by a bright sky. One of the best methods of
  alleviating these distractions is as follows:
• Create a new blank layer and set the layer blending mode to ‘darken’
• Select the cloning tool and set the opacity to 80%, making sure that
  the ‘above and below’ box is ticked.
• On the new blank layer clone parts of the main image into those
  bright gaps. I find selecting an area that approximately matches the
  surrounding area around the gaps works well.
• Once you have finished flatten the image.
  N.B. The above only works well on small areas, it is extremely difficult to clone over
  large areas of sky and the final result may show cloning artefacts.
• My dodge and burn method is as follows:
• Create a new blank layer. Go to Edit > Fill and select 50% grey
• Change the blending mode for this layer to ‘Overlay’
• Select the brush tool, set the opacity to 2% and hardness to 0%
• The foreground colour should be set to white to dodge areas and
  black to burn
• If you make a mistake just brush over the area with 50% grey again
  Sharpening
  I use a two step sharpening process. The first does the actual sharpening the second
  adds a small amount of contrast. I usually apply this just before printing my images.
  Step 1 – Smart sharpen. Amount 90% , Radius 0.8 and reduce noise 10%
  Step 2 – Unsharp mask. Amount 50%, Radius 1 Pixel, Threshold 0
  I usually set this up as an action and a second action at half the amount.
  The Orton Effect (creates a dreamy effect but don’t overdo it)
• Open your image and duplicate to create a ‘background copy’ layer
• Apply Gaussian blur to this copy layer. About a 25 pixel radius should be OK.
• Create a levels adjustment layer and type in a value of 13 on the far left,
  leave the middle box as 1 and type in 243 in the box on the right.
• Merge the background copy and levels adjustment layer and reduce the
  opacity to 19%
• Duplicate the main background image again and apply the ‘high pass’ filter
  (FILTER>OTHER>HIGH PASS) to this layer. About 4 pixels should be OK.
• Change the blending mode to this high pass layer to ‘soft light’
• Flatten all layers and you should have a pleasantly diffused effect.
• I have recorded this as an action at various strengths, from very soft to hardly
  noticeable.
  © Paul Mitchell Photography | www.paulmitchellphotography.co.uk