Good morning! Hoping for some expertise ;) I was shooting Friday night at a circus in low light conditions. Had the ISO bumped up pretty far to let some good light in. Needless to say, I ran the Rugged Maniac on Saturday and my husband was taking pics for me, in the same mode I was using at the circus! I know a lot of the pics aren't salvageable, but I am hoping to save some. They were shot in RAW. I have access to an older version of PS (maybe PS3). Does anyone know if PS can do anything to help with over-exposed shots like that? If so, how do I do it? I have nearly zero PS skills.
I appreciate any advice, I could kick myself for this mistake!!!
If the shots are severely overexposed with the highlights blown completely to 255,255,255 white, that is no detail on any of the three color channels, there is nothing for an editor to work with; even if you lower the exposure on these details, all channels will be equally "compensated" so nothing will emerge from the area. If not all three channels are blown, a raw editor like Lightroom or Camera Raw can often do some recovery.
If the blown pieces are small and have well defined surrounding detail, light sources for instance, a context aware healing or clone tool can work some magic. The context aware facilities in PS 3, however, are really almost non existent, sorry.
@sassyinma I forgot to mention where you can try this recovery. Camera Raw and the basic panel, but there won't be too much available to you with an old version, so in PS, go to Image | Adjustments | Shadows/Highlights and move the sliders there around. The results will probably be only mediocre though.
You can do more with Adjustment Layers but the process is more complex because you have so many options even in PS3. Go to Layers | New Adjustment Layer and pick something like Hue/Saturation or Exposure and move the sliders around. If you feel adventurous, try Levels (pull the top black points down to start) or if really adventurous, Curves, note how the histogram is pulled to the right, and grab the top point and pull it down, and place some other points on the curve, especially at the mid-tone level to "lock" the lower tones that are correct. Good luck and have fun...
Hey, this won't help necessarily, but if the photos have any detail at all, have fun and ETSOOI! Try increasing color channels, go for blur effects, crank up contrast, drop the shadows, increase the whites... and you might still have something interesting... just more abstract?
@sassyinma
I've done that recently, and ETSOOI is you're friend in these situations.
Here's an example of one I posted here. I can't remember how I edited it, but I don't remember doing too much to it.
I guess this probably won't help much, but I'm hoping to provide some encouragement factor, even if just a tiny bit. :)
@adambralston@zosimasy Thanks so much! Now I just need to sit down and find the time to play with the photos. I'm afraid to try and they will all be a complete loss! I appreciate you all taking the time to chime in
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If the blown pieces are small and have well defined surrounding detail, light sources for instance, a context aware healing or clone tool can work some magic. The context aware facilities in PS 3, however, are really almost non existent, sorry.
You can do more with Adjustment Layers but the process is more complex because you have so many options even in PS3. Go to Layers | New Adjustment Layer and pick something like Hue/Saturation or Exposure and move the sliders around. If you feel adventurous, try Levels (pull the top black points down to start) or if really adventurous, Curves, note how the histogram is pulled to the right, and grab the top point and pull it down, and place some other points on the curve, especially at the mid-tone level to "lock" the lower tones that are correct. Good luck and have fun...
I've done that recently, and ETSOOI is you're friend in these situations.
Here's an example of one I posted here. I can't remember how I edited it, but I don't remember doing too much to it.
I guess this probably won't help much, but I'm hoping to provide some encouragement factor, even if just a tiny bit. :)