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[Repost] My Photoshop Tutorial For Beginners

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  • [Repost] My Photoshop Tutorial For Beginners

    Just thought I would re-post my popular topic here from the Photography forum as its more at home here! Enjoy!


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    Hi Guys,

    I wrote this guide to help anyone improve their shots in Photoshop, and to show how much of a help it is to the photographer. Some people may not use photoshop because their shots may look good enough already, but this guide will show you how much better your shots may look by taking 3 minutes of your time to edit your photo's.

    This guide shows my method of editing my shots before uploading to Jetphotos.Net, some people use different methods, but this is the most effective for me, with me been a an ameture with a budget digital camera.

    For the record the Digital Camera I use is a Fuji Finepix 2600Z, a 2 Megapixel digital camera. The original image size was 1600 X 1200 Pixels and the image file size was 726.5KB. The photo was shot at 8:51AM on the 7th March 2003. The photo was taken at Manchester International Ringway (EGCC/MAN) from the Terminal 1 Cafe area and was taken through Glass. The aircraft is a VLM Fokker 50, OO-VLR arriving from London City. Below is the original image resized to 960 X 720 to show the image unedited:



    So here begins ths guide!

    Adobe Photoshop 6 Tutorial Written By Jason Nicholls:

    Open the file you want to edit weather it be a scan or RAW digital image. To start with leave the photo as it is, do not zoom in or out, the box it is in actually helps later on when you come to re-size your image. now click on the following:



    The contrast of your photo should now be leveled. Now immediately after using Auto Contrast click on the following:



    The levels (Red,Green, Blue) in your photo should now be all leveled and your photo should now look alittle more natural as the conditions actually were when you took the photo. No horrible layers of un-natural colours. If Auto Levels doesnt work use the 'Curves' tool:



    The curves tool is extremely handy when you are editing photo's taken through glass even if the window is tinted. In my case the window i shot through had a blue tint, and the curves tool got rid of this.

    Now select the middle dropper (Circled in red) and click on areas of darkness, preferably Grey or Black, the ramp is usually the most handy to use. You should visibly be able to see any layer of colour that shouldnt be there dissapear:



    Now you are ready to level the horizon in your photo. A majority of jp.net rejects are for unlevel horizons, so the following is a VERY handy tool for leveling them off. Select the following tool by clicking on the dropper tool and keeping your finger down on the mouse button, then selecting the following tool:



    Once you have selected the Measure tool set the crosshair onto the horizon on the left hand side (where land meets sky). Now click your mouse button and drag the tool all the way to the right hand side and let go of the mouse button when the crosshair is on the right hand side horizon like:



    Now click on the following menu, making sure the line on your horizon is still there. This tool will help level the horizon:



    You will now be presented by the following popup:



    This small menu shows you the exact numer of degrees that your photo needs to be rotated and in which direction to level off the horizon. Now click OK.

    Your images colours and horizon should now be level and ready to be resized!

    Now you may zoom into your image but still keep it in the box it was originally opened in. Zoom in as far as you need to get the whole aircraft in frame:



    Now use the crop tool circled in red:



    Now put the crosshairs of the crop tool into the top left hand corner of your image and drag it all the way down to the bottom right hand corner. Now click on the tick next to the top menu's. Your image should now be cropped how you like it. Now click onto the following menu:



    You should now be shown this menu:



    Enter the image size you preffer, set the image Width first, and your image should resize to a resonable resolution: 800 X 600, 960 X 720, 1024 X 768 etc etc. If it doesnt, like my example, use the following method from the menu:



    Now you should be shown the following menu:



    Change the drop down menu's to Pixels and fix the image size to the resolution you want, your image should only be out a few degrees so it shouldnt cause a problem like taking out part of the aircraft. Click ok and your image should now be resized to the resolution you want. Now lets move onto Sharpening your image. Select the following menu:



    You should now be presented with the following menu:



    The settings I have on my menu are pretty much the best for beginners, all you will have to adjust is the Amount percentage, just increase the percentage or decrease it to get the best sharpness for your photo. A good indicator of image sharpness is an aircrafts landing gear as its easy to detect and change in sharpness.

    Now you should be ready to save your image, if you know your save settings are at the minimum compression rate just click the save button, otherwise, to start with use the following save method. Go to the following method and click on Save As:



    You should be shown the following save box:



    Select the location you want to save your image to and rename the image whatever you like. Once you have done this click on the Save button. You should now be shown the following menu:



    Adjust your settings to the ones in the menu above to get the most out of your image quality wise. A good quality photo should be around 250KB+, any images below 250KB will have been compressed too much and the quality will have suffered, and pixels will become easily detected and jaggies. Now click OK and your image should now be ready for upload!

    Here is how my photo turned out:



    I hope this has helped some of you and if you have any questions/remarks about this tutorial dont hesitate to leave any feedback and I will get back to you ASAP.
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    E-Mail Me - My Photo's - My Photographer Profile

  • #2
    Very nice tutorial for beginners...
    Check out my photos at jp.net! http://www.jetphotos.net/showphotos.php?userid=613

    Comment


    • #3
      I voted "no" because I have a different way of using PS and editing my photos, but its good for people just starting out.

      -Clovis

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by Leftseat86
        I voted "no" because I have a different way of using PS and editing my photos, but its good for people just starting out.

        -Clovis

        Care to SHARE............

        If not I would recall your vote.

        Comment


        • #5
          I voted "no" because I have a different way of using PS and editing my photos.

          Never use Auto Levels or Auto Curves. Actually I would never recomend AUTO anything.

          I would not have submitted that image to start with, the plane is too far away, the white balance is off, and the focus is beyond what USM should be working with. Start off with a better in camera image, and remember.......when it comes to Photoshop work, LESS is MORE.

          Comment


          • #6
            Please delete.

            Comment


            • #7
              Yeah no auto for me. Found it really f*cks the colours and quality over. Just use your eye and tweak stuff.

              Comment


              • #8
                BA747-436 wrote:
                Please stop posting your copious rejections and try taking some advice from our members about the quality of your photos.
                Thankyou.
                that was in another forum, now i agree with bapilot his was tutorial was good, but leave you negative out of the forum. Also why dont you do your tutorial eh?
                Some people in today's society are so thick!

                Comment


                • #9
                  Well I didn't know that little tool was there ...

                  The tutorial was great, and the effort in doing it is appreciated. Perhaps if you want to know how to do something you can ask in here and the experts (Jason ) can post answers to the questions ..

                  sort of like an "ask the expert"





                  ADG
                  ADG
                  No makeovers please .....

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Wasn't meant as a negative comment mate, just what happens to my photos when i "auto" them. I think Jasons tutorial was very good and helpful for people getting to grips with photoshop. I dont use it anymore but i used to.
                    On another note, cheers for posting the tutorial anyhow Jase

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Jason. thats an awesome turorial/help! I think he deserves many thanks and congrats. for taking his time to help us. In spite the fact i have a macintosh it helped me a bunch! ROCK ON!


                      Stefano

                      VOTED YES!
                      Lufthansa is the BEST!

                      Comment

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