Cleaning Images in Adobe Photoshop--Snapshots
by Rolando Gomez
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I wanted to share something I learned “hands-on” from Adobe Photoshop expert, Jim Rich, of Rich & Associates. Jim is the author of a really impressive book, Photoshop 6 Color Companion. The title of this book is misleading—it’s not dated by the version of Photoshop it originally targeted. The contents of this book is applicable to Photoshop 7 and probably future versions as well—I highly recommend this book, published by the Graphic Arts Technical Foundation Press (GATF).
Jim taught me a technique found on page 80 of his book on how to save valuable time when working with images in Photoshop—whether your original image comes from a digital camera or from a scanned slide or negative, this technique—snapshots—is invaluable and I use it on a regular basis to save me countless minutes when “cleaning” up my images for publication.
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Snapshots is a four-step method and easy to remember. Keep in mind, you can use this snapshots techniques for many things, including adjusting levels, sharpness, color, saturation and other corrections—on any area of the image without wasting time with layers, layer masks, lasso tools, rubber stamping or the magic wand. I tend to use this method mainly to ensure my subject’s eyes remain sharp in an image.
Let’s take the common “soft-eyes” of your subject. Soft-eyes are a scanning problem inherent of the natural film curvature while scanning. With the snapshots technique, soft-eyes are not a problem, and can be fixed in a few seconds.
First, open your file. |
Open image file in Adobe Photoshop.
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Second, go to filter->sharpen->unsharp mask.
A dialogue box opens with unsharp mask defaults, set the default amount to 75 percent, radius to 1 pixel, and threshold levels to zero or one. Click ok.
You’ll notice the whole image now has the unsharp mask applied to it, sharpening the image overall. The eyes are sharper now, but the model’s facial skin is no longer as soft as it first appeared. This is where snapshots will save your image.
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Step 1, apply effect over entire image.
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To correct this, go to your history palette. If your history palette is not on your desktop, normally found on the right in Photoshop by default, go to window->show history.
Once you’ve located your history palette, find the bold arrow-button on the right of the palette, click and hold until a menu appears, then go to “New Snapshot.” |
Step 2, take new snapshot.
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When you release the mouse, you will have another dialogue box popup and enter the name “unsharp eyes” in the box, then hit ok. It’s always best to label your snapshots by the effect wanted for better workflow management, as you can have more than one snapshot in a working file.
To Continue, Click on Page Two Below
To order Photoshop 6 Color Companion just click here! |
Step 2 cont., label your new snapshot.
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©2002 Rolando Gomez
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