One of my goals this year is to learn more about photography. I got a DSLR last year for my birthday, and was so excited to shoot photos in RAW…except I had no idea what to do with them…. So the last few days I’ve been playing around with it, trying to figure it out. Still don’t know if I’m doing it right, but here’s a photo I processed this evening:
Mud Flats at Mont St Michel
Here is the original:
Original
So, what do you think? For the photographers/photoshop people out there, any tips?
Embrace Life. Be Inspired. 
Tip: Don’t pay for Photoshop! ;-D …… http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2013/01/grab-photoshop-and-cs2-for-absolutely-free-right-now/#comment-154390
Eh – I’ve had a copy of Photoshop Elements for several years now, just getting around to using it. And since it’s Elements, it was about $500 cheaper! 🙂
Means nothing to me as I’ve never used it. Did just try to DL the free version they’re now offering, but you can only use it on older, non-Intel based Macs. Adobe bastards! …….. Liking the pic, by the way!
Download GIMP and get the functionality for free!
As for the tips: don’t overdo it and don’t misrepresent the reality.
We tried to download Gimp, but couldn’t get it to work. I can’t remember why, if it was download issue or an issue opening the file, or what. I’m an admitted techno-dummy, but my husband is not, and even he couldn’t get it to work. No idea why….
Maybe you should try again (or an older version). It’s worth it.
Hi Sara, I think the changes you’ve made are good and increase the overall contrast to good effect.
Looks like you’ve adjusted the Levels? Did you do one Levels adjustment for the whole image?
Apologies if you know this already but you can make a feathered selection of separate parts of the image and then make separate Levels adjustments.
I found subscribing to a certain magazine which gives you a free disc with Photoshop tutorials on it very helpful. I think Photoshop can be quite intimidating to new users but if you keep at it (especially shooting in RAW) you’ll find your images improving ten-fold. Good luck.
Steve
Hi Steve-
Yeah, I’m totally new to this!! I found some photoshop tutorial videos online, and hope to make my way through those in the coming weeks.
Thanks for your input! I don’t know what I did, to be honest. All I did was open the RAW file and adjust all the sliders in that window – I didn’t do anything else in photoshop.
Pingback: Learning more Photoshop « Embrace Life. Be Inspired.
Hi Sarah,
I love that you are learning more. If you really enjoy sitting and doing some editing then Photoshop is great, but if you are taking a ton of photos, you might enjoy Lightroom 🙂 I find it extremely user friendly, and quick. Probably why its ideal for photographers. We use it for batch editing, but even just adjusting.
For the moment, I don’t want to spend any more money on software (would rather get a new lens! :D) but when it comes time to upgrade, I’ll definitely look into Lightroom. Thanks!