Quick Retouch: Cayman Sunset
Was reorganizing some of my storage last night and came across this sunset shot from a trip to Grand Cayman a while back and decided to revisit it and focus on some of the new retouching methods I’ve learned since then. I still clearly remember the day as one of the best sunsets I’ve seen, because the sky looked like it was on fire. Caribbean sunsets really are the best. Here’s a brief step-by-step on how I did it:
Lightroom Adjustments
- Straighten horizon
- Reduce the ‘Blacks’ slider to eliminate any black clipping in the histogram.
- Increase the ‘Recovery’ slider to recover some lost detail in the highlights, eliminating as much white clipping as possible.
- Adjust white balance
- Export to Photoshop
Photoshop CS3 Adjustments
- Create a ‘Curves’ adjustment layer to increase overall contrast.
- Create another ‘Curves’ adjustment layer only affecting the sky to add a bit more contrast to the clouds.
- Added a ‘Photo Filter’ adjustment layer, with a warming filter, to warm up the scene a bit.
- Dodged and burned a bit in the clouds and the suns rays to bring them out a bit more.
- Flatten image, convert to LAB color.
- Use the ‘Apply Image’ to give the color a bit more punch. Settings: Soft Light blending, ‘B’ channel. (The ‘B’ channel in LAB mode controls the yellow to blue spectrum)
- Convert back to RGB
- Duplicate background layer, use High-Pass Filter for sharpening (4px). For those not familiar with the high pass method, Leggnet has a great write-up.
- From there I set the high-pass layer to soft light, flattened the image, save and brought back to Lightroom and VOILA.
Sorry I didn’t get the chance to do screenshot throughout the process, was kinda late last night when I did it and I was jamming to get through it. As always, if you have any questions, hit me up in the comments. Oh and if you like it, don’t forget to add to your faves on flickr 
Hosted flawlessly on a (dv) from (mt) Media Temple
Powered by FireStats
Your tips are great!
I’ve really bought into the idea of heavily utilizing LightRoom’s Developing features since there is seemingly more power to edit RAW files in LR than 8-bit converted files is PSCS3, (the verdict is still out for me with 16-bit files in PS, but the files become so HUGE, plus it really taxes my CPU with every action).
Anyway, once I export into PS to further edit with all of its groovy tools (LAB color mode, further Levels and Curves, masking stuff, etc.), I like to leave a path for editing back in LR and being able to utilize those changes in the previously exported PSD file.
If I make a change in LT, what I do is re-export the RAW file, and then in PS convert it to a smart-object layer (like I do in the previous file), then drag the smart-filter from the original file onto the new file’s layer and export the layer (layer-flyout) to a layer file. Then on the original file I Replace layer (layer-flyout) with the one I just exported. Anyway, it keeps a sort of bi-directional editing flow between LR and PS.
Also, back in LR, I apply the lens vignetting to the PSD file.
Time will tell if I continue this method, or go back to editing in PS more as I did in the past.
Is there a reason you don’t do more “Developing” in LR? I’m still trying to decide just how much to do in LR and would be interested in your thinking on the subject.
[...] The bf’s sweet Caribbean sunset pic made it into Flickr: Explore! Thanks to me, of course. We were visiting my brother when he took it Nonetheless, I’m proud. Learn how he did it here. [...]
Beautiful photo. I love the silhouettes of the boats.
Wow, that’s a beautiful shot!
As a much less experienced photographer, I would love it if you could post your “original” shot. I would love to be able to compare and contrast the original to the finished product.
Thanks for a keeping this cool blog!
Nick
Fantastic shot and very kind of you to share your technique!
With some of the recent comments by Matt K. about settings for moving an image from Lightroom to Photoshop, I am curious what your setting for Color Map and Bit-depth are ?