WHAT'S IN THE SHADOWS?

I thought I would introduce you this week to a handy tool for those who enjoy working from photographic reference.


I know I usually bang on about how much better it is to work from life.......and it usually is for all sorts of reasons........but I also recognise that there are people who simply cannot do this, for all sorts of other reasons.  I remember having a bit of a row with a tutor about this some years ago;  he claimed that all work done from photos was abhorrent. (He also thought art instruction books were abhorrent.  He was a strange chap) When I pointed out to him that there are people who are simply physically unable to work outdoors and yet might want to paint landscapes - should they be denied this opportunity?  He huffed a lot and said they should stick to still life painting.  I thought he was being rather horrible.  Why shouldn't people paint whatever they want to paint, and if they choose to work from photographic reference - so be it.  However, it is important to recognise that sometimes, photos have limitations, and one of these limitations is that the camera cannot always expose for both the light and the dark areas of a scene at the same time, and the photograph can sometimes be rather inadequate.


I have done crits for art groups, where a big dark patch has appeared in someone's work.  When asked what it was, the person would defensively claim "well, it was there, in the photo".  In other words, they had no idea what was there.  so they just painted the dark patch - dark. 


BUT there is a useful tool for those with a computer and access to Photoshop - I use Photoshop Elements, which is the vastly cheaper version of this complex bit of software.  Elements is pretty user-friendly, and can be put to excellent use for improving inadequate photos.


Apart from the "crop" tool, which speaks for itself and will obviously be useful for composing from a photo, there is a very handy little tool which can actually show you what is going on in the shadows!  See the barn at the top of this post?  Well look at this...same photo, adjusted in Photoshop:

Well, who knew what was going on in that bottom right hand corner?  You might have been able to see it with the naked eye, but without doing some sketching on the spot, you might be unlikely to remember when you got home,  and you might be badly disappointed with the photo....and so this little "correction tool" has proved invaluable.

So here is what to do.

You take your photo into Photoshop elements, and simply hit ctrl:L to bring up the "levels histogram" box.  Here is what my screen looked like:

The little grey box is the histogram window, and there are "sliders" for both "input" and "output"   Without worrying too much what this means technically,  I suggest you try this for yourself with an image;  have a play with the sliders, and watch the magic happen.  It is really fun !!!

Here is another photo, lightened in the same way.  The photo was taken during the day, not at night, but the camera could not read the land AND the sky together and expose properly for them both, so it read the light in the sky and exposed for that, leaving the land in total darkness.  the sky looks great....but what about the land? In the lightened photo, it is daytime, and we can even see the people on the beach!

The great thing about using this easy little tool is that you can manipulate your photo to give you information which can then be used...IF YOU WISH.  If all you have is black shapes and shadows, and you cannot see that information, you end up making things up, which may or may not work.

Give it a try, it's fun.