TRY THIS if you struggle SELECTING HAIR in Photoshop: Use the CLONE STAMP TOOL instead!

When it comes to Photoshop, selecting hair is without doubt the area people struggle with more than any other. Adobe has put an incredible amount of work into making selections quicker and easier, but even Photoshop has its limits; try selecting dark, frizzy hair on a dark or busy background and you'll know what I mean. Here I show how I use the Clone Stamp Tool together with a selection instead. It saves time, gets great results, and it's saved me more times than I can remember, because sometimes we just have to cheat.

WORTH THE RISK? Taking Photographs over the SEA with my Drone

On the first day with my new drone, the DJI Air 2S, I dared to fly it out over the Atlantic Ocean in Cornwall to photograph a lighthouse, a photograph that simply wouldn't have been possible without it. It was scary, but the results were incredible. This video takes you behind the scenes on the photo shoot, and then through the retouching steps in Lightroom for some of the coastal images I came away with.

Look Up Tables (LUTs): THIS is what you're doing WRONG! How to MAKE, SAVE, EXPORT and EDIT

A few weeks ago I shared a video on my YouTube Channel showing how to install and use Look Up Tables (LUTs) in all versions of Lightroom, per it Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, Lightroom Mobile and Lightroom on the Web.

Following on from that I did get a few questions asking about problems using LUTs in Photoshop with error messages being thrown back and images being made to look, well, awful.

So, here’s a video I’ve put together to show how to Make, Save, Export and Edit LUTs without any errors.

Enjoy

I'd previously shared a video showing how to install and use Look Up Tables (LUTs) in every version of Lightroom: Lightroom Classic, Lightroom, Lightroom Mobile and Lightroom on the web. Following on from that, I had a few questions about problems using LUTs in Photoshop, with error messages being thrown up and images being made to look, well, awful. Here I show how to make your own LUTs by saving and exporting them correctly, how to make them editable, and what to do if it all goes wrong.

Photoshop Layers and Selections Webinar with Rocky Nook Publishers

Thursday of last week I presented in a webinar hosted by my publishers, Rocky Nook all about my latest book, The Photoshop Layers and Selections Workshop.

It was so good to see so many people tune in LIVE and also to see the numbers of folks that had signed up to be sent the recording.

If you missy it and fancy checking it out, Rocky Nook have also now posted the webinar on their YouTube Channel that I’ve now added below…

At the end of the presnetation we went through a Q&A and one of the questions posted asked about the new selections and masking function in Camera Raw and Lightroom, and in particular about using the Color Range option…

Susan asked…

“Can you only subtract one colour point at a time or can you click multiple times on slight variations in the color in the same subtract operation?”

Originally I answered that I ‘thought’ you could only do one at a time however a friend of mine Trevor Ager messaged me to say that you can actually add more by holding down the Option (Mac) / Alt (Windows) keys and clicking.

Hope you enjoy the video.

Cheers,
Glyn

CROP your images BIGGER: 3 Right Ways and 1 Wrong Way

Composition is so important; it can make or break a photograph. Here I go through three ways to alter the composition and make an image bigger using the Crop Tool in Photoshop, so your pictures look their very best on screen, in print or on social media. The three are cropping combined with Content-Aware Fill, cropping combined with Content-Aware Scale, and Merge to Panorama, and at the end I show how I made the fake skirting board you'll see in one of the pictures.

TRY THIS if you need BIGGER BACKGROUNDS in your Photo Shoots

If you ever place a background behind people when you're photographing them, whether that's an individual or a group, there'll be times when it just isn't big enough. Here I show how to use Photoshop to do all the hard work of blending images together to fake a bigger background. It's simple and fast, it can save the photo shoot, and it saves you money too.

FINALLY! Look Up Tables (LUTs) in Lightroom (Install, Use, Manage)

Colour Look Up Tables (LUTs) are a brilliant way of colour grading your images in Photoshop, adding mood, atmosphere and your own style, but what if you do more in Lightroom, or Lightroom is all you use; can you still use them? The short answer is yes. They do need to be installed first, though, and although it's a simple process, it isn't just a case of clicking an install button. There are a few steps involved as well as a hidden keyboard shortcut, and this video goes through how to install, use and manage them. For Lightroom (Cloud), you need to navigate to the folder where Camera Raw has previously stored your LUTs. On a Mac that's ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CameraRaw/Settings, and on Windows it's C:\Users\[user name]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\CameraRaw\Settings.

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Autumn / Fall Effect: Transform your Landscape Photographs

It's my own fault that I didn't manage to grab a single autumn photograph in 2021; I spent every opportunity photographing down on the coast in Devon or over the border in Cornwall. Autumn is a magical season for photography, with the landscape covered in burnt oranges, reds, yellows and browns, so until the next one comes round, here are a couple of ways to fake it using Photoshop. The first uses a single adjustment layer and the second uses one of the Neural Filters. Once you've seen them both, you can decide which one you think works and looks best.

TRY THIS and get PERFECT PRINTS Every Time! (Lightroom + Canon Printers)

Printing can be incredibly frustrating, and costly, when it doesn't turn out right. You can follow all the advice about calibrating your screen and using paper profiles, and still the print doesn't look good or match what you see on screen. The good news is that it might not be down to anything you're doing wrong; it may actually be an issue somewhere with the software or the printer. If you print from Lightroom using a Canon printer, in particular one of the newer models, this video shows how to fix it, and the fix is easy.

DO THIS for Super Sharp Eyes (FAKE IT in Photoshop)

In this latest video (which is under 7 minutes long) on my YouTube Channel I go through a Super Fast technique for faking the look of detail, texture and sharpness in eyes.

Of course nothing beats getting it all ‘in camera’ but for whatever reason that just didn’t happen and the eyes are lacking punch, this works an absolute treat…

Nothing beats getting super sharp eyes in camera, but what if, for whatever reason, that just didn't happen? Sometimes the eyes are in focus and yet there's no detail or texture, and they're lacking punch. All is not lost. In under seven minutes I go through a super fast technique in Photoshop for faking the look of detail, texture and sharpness in the eyes, and it works an absolute treat.