Tutorial: Making Images Pop (DUW: 11 Images)

[NikonUser]

Hi there,

I just learnt this technique on the "Photoshop TV' podcast and thought it was a great little trick to help make colours pop in some images. I thought I'd share it with others. I hope this post doesn't break any rules... if so please feel free to remove it.

First... Here is a before and after shot to demonstrate what this technique does:



Now to how it's done:

1) First open up your image in Photoshop


2) Next you need to convert your image into LAB colour mode.


3) Now you need to open the curves dialouge box:


4) First you need to choose to adjust only the "a" channel.


5) Now move the sliders as shown below. If you have large grid squares instead of small ones as shows hold down the "alt" key and click anywhere in the grid.


6) Don't press the 'OK' button just yet. Now you need to adjust the 'b' channel in exactly the same way:


7) Now click on 'OK'. Most of the time this effect is too strong so you will need to 'fade' it a little. Since it's not a layer you will need to use the 'fade' command under the edit menu


Fade it to whatever suits your taste/image


And that's it!!

Hope you guys like it (and that I've posted it correctly!!)

Would be interested to see before/after images using this.

Paul

[nito]

nice tips. Thanks

[marcotrov]

It proves there is always more than one way to skin a cat Thanks for the explanation Paul.
cheers
marco

[NikonUser]

It proves there is always more than one way to skin a cat Thanks for the explanation Paul.
cheers
marco

How else would you achieve this? I tried with the levels, curves and saturation tools in RGB but couldn't get anything that would look nearly as 'smooth' (for want of a better word) as this.

Interested to see if the same effect can be done in other (less involved) ways!

EDIT: Also... is there anyone who can explain to me what is happening in the adjustment of the 'a' and 'b' channels? Seems to work ok but I have no idea what it actually is doing to the image

Paul

[Alex]

Yes, lab mode gives much greater flexibility than RGB in many cases. You can also play with the L curve to give it more POP.

Alex

[blinkblink]

Excellent post. Thanks. More like these please.

[huynhie]

Cool,

looking forward to trying it out.

[ABG]

Great tutorial Paul. Thanks for sharing.

[birddog114]

Do we still need the workshop if this rate of tutorial going up high?

[TonyH]

Very good tute Paul...... Thanks!

[gstark]

Do we still need the workshop if this rate of tutorial going up high?

I would say yes.

There is nothing that can equal a hands on session, especially with somebidy as good as Matt K leading the troops.

[phillipb]

Thanks Paul,
I just tried it, the only thing I did different is that I used "screen" instead of "normal" in the last step (fade) and converted back to RGB at the end to be able to save as jpeg.

Here's the result.

Original





Enhansed

[NikonUser]

Do we still need the workshop if this rate of tutorial going up high?

I would say yes.

There is nothing that can equal a hands on session, especially with somebidy as good as Matt K leading the troops.

But for those of us who can't make it to those hands on sessions... please post heaps of easy to follow tutorials

[NikonUser]

Thanks Paul,
I just tried it, the only thing I did different is that I used "screen" instead of "normal" in the last step (fade) and converted back to RGB at the end to be able to save as jpeg.

Here's the result.

Original




Enhansed

Apart from the massivly blown red channel I like it!

Here's another example. I just ran it on a few images and it seems to work quite well on a lot of landscapes.

[Matt. K]

Thanks Paul
Here's another way to achieve a similar result. Just set the USM parameters as shown here and EDIT/FADE UNSHARPMASK to suit.

[radar]

Great tips,

thanks guys, now I'll just "translate" it to bibble/gimp.

André

[leek]

Thanks Paul,
I just tried it, the only thing I did different is that I used "screen" instead of "normal" in the last step (fade) and converted back to RGB at the end to be able to save as jpeg.

Philip, Sorry to say that while the method seems to work for the original landscape, your enhanced photo doesn't look very natural... IMHO The colours of the bird look far better in your original image... While the background leaves could do with a POP, this could probably have been achieved with a slight modification to the curve...

[Steffen]

thanks guys, now I'll just "translate" it to bibble/gimp.

André, bibble can't do this sort of stuff, after all, it's not an image editor but a RAW converter. It doesn't support decomposing into LAB (or anything else for that matter).

The GIMP does however, and channel manipulations in LAB mode work just like in PS. I'm not quite sure what they mean with "fade" in PS speak, though.

Cheers
Steffen.

[beetleboy]

Trust MattK to come out with the classic "Reverse USM" - nice one!

The master, pulling the classic moves!

Liam =]