We tend to think that manipulating images to create unrealistic notions of beauty is a recent phenomenon thanks to Photoshop and celebrity culture, but it turns out that retouching photos in order to mislead people has been around for well over a century.
If you were inspired by the majestic beauty of Washington State’s North Cascades in the first leg of our Pacific Northwest Escape (you can read all about the adventure here), wait until you see the magic of Oregon’s coastline through our lens.
Making your images more eye-catching and appealing is almost always a worthwhile goal, but how can you achieve that? One way is to take pointers from cinema where such metrics are crucial to the success of a picture.
Color is one of the most important aspects of photography. It's good to know what your settings should be if you're planning on printing or publishing to the web. This video explains the difference in a simple way.
There's a lot of time-wasting traps you'll encounter when editing images in Lightroom, things that'll send you down a rabbit hole for hours on end. Find out how to avoid them and what to do instead.
This week, I got a chance to connect with Blackmagic Design to discuss some best practices when approaching color grading video footage through DaVinci Resolve Studio.
Post-production is core to most genres of photography, though it is more important to some than others. Portraiture is one of the most intricate areas of retouching with tricky tasks like skin retouching. Watch as one photographer talks you through his entire portrait editing workflow.
Adobe Photoshop is unfathomably complex with so much nuance, it would be difficult for any person to ever say they have mastered the software. In this brief video, you'll learn how eight of the blending modes are different from the rest and in the same way, and just how powerful they can be.
I've been a satisfied user of the Nik tools suite going way back to 1995 before Google bought, then dropped it. In 2017 DxO rescued the popular suite of editing tools, and they've never been better.
The ideal situation is to take a photo that requires no editing whatsoever. But those shots are few and far between. In most cases, it's important to edit photos in order to develop them properly, but how long is too long when it comes to image editing? I'll be taking a look using Lightroom.
Most photographers try their absolute best to avoid ISO noise in their photos and some spend an age trying to rid their images of it in image editing software. But it's not as much of a problem as you think and here's why.
There's plenty of dumb stuff that people say when they get into photography. So, let's dispel some of the common myths that are floating around.
Datacolor has released a brilliant new bundle to help you manage your colors and deliver better results. The new SpyderX Create Kit includes the world's fastest display calibrator the SpyderX Pro along with several accessories including the ColorReader EZ.
As a long-time user of Silver Efex, I wanted to answer the question for myself: is the update to the Nik Silver Efex Pro plugin alone worth the upgrade? So, I downloaded the latest version of the Nik plugin suite from the DxO website and gave it a test drive. Here are my initial impressions.
Adobe Photoshop is such a deep and impressive tool, that most things can be done within the software. While you may (and arguably, should) want to get it right in-camera, sometimes you don't have that option. Here is a great tutorial on how to fake the colored gel look.
Ever wonder how film works? A recent video from SmarterEveryDay covers this topic in great detail describing how film works.
When it comes to tools designed to help you edit, the main factor for me is time. Yes, I want tools to make things easier and more intuitive, but at the end of the day, those features must help save me time. The Loupedeck Live does all that and more.
The weather isn’t always pleasant for landscape photographers. Have you ever tried to take advantage of extreme weather conditions?
The latest Lightroom Classic update has just landed, and there are a fair few features and functions that will benefit many professional users. But what about the average Joe who uses Lightroom occasionally for their own hobbyist snaps?
Some of the most dreaded jobs in image editing and retouching have become significantly easier in the last few years. These newest Photoshop features simplify several such tasks and can speed up your workflow.
For most things retouching, Adobe Photoshop sets the pace and has been the industry standard for decades. However, as alternative software improves and innovates, there are some features that Photoshop doesn't have that would improve it.
If you're looking to make a portrait a little more interesting or give it a little more character, here is a tutorial on how to add natural-looking freckles quickly and easily in Photoshop. The brushes used in the video are also provided free of charge.
The amount of high-end television and film on display in recent years is unparalleled. One show that got a lot of attention is the drama mystery, DARK after it was added to Netflix. Its acting and plot are both brilliant, but the cinematography is utterly superb.
Whether you’re shooting 8K video or are just coming back from a shoot with 1,000 images to sort through, your digital asset management strategy has to be on point. Over the last few years, technology and standards have advanced quite a bit, and it’s easier than ever to create a powerful, versatile, and safer approach to storing your files, but it can also be confusing. This guide will take a look at the standards you have to know when upgrading your storage.
The art of creating an appealing and memorable, moody portrait is often in the post-production of that image as much as it is in the lighting. In this short video, you get some tricks for getting the most out of your shot when you're creating a moody edit.
With its latest line of M1 devices, Apple has really shocked the market. Laptops such as the Apple MacBook Air are demonstrating performance that is on par with more expensive computers. Now, the Apple M1 iPad Pro is demonstrating incredible performance.
Formula 1 photography requires some specialist gear, and the equipment used during post-production by this seasoned professional is fascinating, allowing him to deliver images as quickly and efficiently as possible.
It’s no secret that the orange and teal look is popular in movies and photos but getting that look without using LUTs, can seem like a mystery. Unless of course, you know exactly what steps to take in post-production. In this article, you’ll discover the secrets to getting the orange and teal look.
Apple’s Thunderbolt Display was discontinued in 2016, and we haven’t seen anything quite like it since.
When Adobe Lightroom separated into two clients, there was a lot of confusion over which was the right one for each person. In this video, we get some insight into the differences between the two.
Skylum's Luminar has had quite an impact on the editing market, with AI features for landscape and portrait photographers that have left some of the competition scrambling to catch up. Wanting to stay ahead, a new version of Luminar, called Update 3, will be available free for current owners today.
If you're dogmatic about being a photographic purist, then this video might be too much to handle for you. If, on the other hand, you're open to new ways of creating and experimenting with Photoshop, then this will be right up your alley.
Vibrance and saturation perform pretty similar (though different) functions, and it can be difficult to tell the differences between them at times, but there are certain situations in which one will give you better results than the other. This excellent video tutorial will show you the difference between the two and how to use each of them to get better colors in your images.
If you have ever struggled to color grade your videos to look more like your favorite Hollywood blockbuster movies. Then you will definitely want to check out this color grading tutorial in DaVinci Resolve 17. The best part is you can download DaVinci Resolve for free, so let’s get started.
One of the best and most complete solutions to post-processing is somewhat of a well-kept secret. Zoner Photo Studio X is growing in popularity and it's easy to see why.
Have you ever seen a complete 360X180 degree panorama on Facebook and wondered "how do they do that?" Today, I'll teach you.
With the latest batch of updates, Photoshop has added a new feature to its array of neural filters: depth blur. Very much in beta, this tool has potential, but there’s clearly a lot of improvements required before it becomes worth using.
Focal blending: is this a technique you use, or is it one that you consider cheating?
Just when you thought your brand new super-spec gaming machine was powerful enough to handle anything, something new comes along to dash your hopes and monster rig dreams. A recent video from Intel demonstrates an AI tool that "enhances" graphics to look photorealistic. The implications of this could be incredible for gaming and photography industries.
When it comes to editing your landscape images, having a practical approach to what changes you should make can be hugely beneficial. But how can ACDC guide you to the right decisions?
Are you excited about finally resuming your wedding and events photography, but the editing stage is giving you flashbacks to countless hours spent in front of your screen? This is where ImagenAI might come in handy! Take a look at this review.
The Canon EOS R5 is a landmark camera from Canon. It's the first full frame mirrorless camera to shoot 8K raw video along with 4K at an impressive 120 frames per second. What we're really impressed with is how well this camera produces color. This is why in our latest video, we show you how to get the best color and image quality out of the Canon EOS R5.
Plugins for software were once considered something of a gimmick, but are now closer to a staple. Here are some of the best plugins for Final Cut Pro X that might just increase the quality of your video productions.
Mastering light can mean many things, from the manipulation of natural light through to how to setup multiple strobes for a specific look. However, there are a few more niche techniques that are both incredibly fun and rewarding. One of these is light painting.
Adobe Lightroom has become more and more powerful over the years, devouring some of its sister software's territory, Photoshop, in the process. This landscape photographer still has to use Photoshop for these six adjustments, however.
Atmosphere in images is both important and difficult to attain, particularly when the weather isn't obeying your desires for interesting conditions. Here is a tutorial on how to create your own fog brush for Photoshop and turn a bland image into something more moody.
Good photography is much less about the gear you don’t have and much more about using the gear you do have.
One of the neatest capabilities of modern editing software is the ability to automatically replace skies in a convincing manner with just a few clicks, something that used to be a rather tedious and involved process. Nonetheless, there is still a lot of creative control over the process and things you can do to improve the final result. If you are using Luminar AI, this excellent video tutorial will show you everything you need to know.
Anyone familiar with Karl Shakur's work is aware of his creativity, extreme attention to detail, and recognizable style. This video he produced during the COVID shutdown takes a quick dive into how he achieves his consistent color grading and clean aesthetic using Lightroom and Photoshop (although I was able to accomplish all of these things using Capture One Pro).
Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom are tremendously deep editing suites that have been developed over so many years, it's hard to keep track of all the features. Here are some of the lesser-known tools courtesy of Adobe themselves.
