Most photo adjustments can be found under Image > Adjustments and include Levels, Exposure, Hue/Saturation, and Color Balance. Adjustment Layers provide non-destructive editing and allow effects to be turned on/off or re-adjusted later. Other useful tools include iris and tilt-shift blur, lighting effects, and lens flares. When adding lighting effects, the image needs to be flattened first. Adjustments, blur tools, and lighting can be combined to dramatically alter the mood and feel of a photo from the original.

1. Adjustments

Manipulating Images with Adjustments & Lighting
A. Theinert – Becker College - 2013

2. You can drastically alter the feeling or mood of an image by making a few
quick adjustments. Most of these are found in Image > Adjustments
All of these adjustments can
produce varying results.
Each one will open a menu,
usually with sliders to change the
strength of the adjustments.
You can check or uncheck the
‘Preview’ box to see your work
with and without the adjustments
before you commit to it (although
you can always track back through the
history menu).
Some of the more useful ones for
manipulating photos are:
Levels
Exposure
Hue/Saturation
Color Balance
HDR Toning

3. Another (safer) option is using Adjustment
Layers. When using this method (instead of
Image > Adjustments) you can preserve the
original image and make changes later!
Benefits of Adjustment Layers
(instead of reg. adjustments)
•
•
•
•
Can turn on and off
Can re-adjust later
Can affect multiple layers or just 1 layer
Vector Mask! (erase to affect only parts of the layer)

4. Another useful set of tools for photo editing is the Iris Blur (new with CS6)
Choosing Iris Blur will open the Blur
Gallery.
You can adjust the strength and size of
the blur and move the center point.
‘Tilt Shift’ is another fun blur option that
works well with busy far away shots,
such as a city street or a shot with a lot of
people in it.
You can also use the blur and smudge
tools for smaller areas.

5. You can use Lighting Effects or Lens Flares to change the lighting of the image
The lighting effects gallery has several
sliders available to change the way
your light affects the image.
You can change the color of your light
and the strength of the color.
On the bottom there is an option for
‘Texture’ and ‘Height’, these options
can add interesting effects to an
image
Some of the galleries that are new to CS6, such as the blur and lighting
galleries, are slightly unstable and sometimes cause Photoshop to crash.
So try to save your work prior to adding these effects.

6. For lighting effects to affect your entire image you need to flatten the image
first. This should be done on a new copy of the file (hit that button on the
bottom of the history panel to create a new document from the current state)
When working on projects it is normal to have
many iterations of one project file, The most
updated ones being the current working files
and older ones serve as back ups
When your ready to add lighting effects:
Right Click on one of your layers and click
‚Flatten Image‛

7. You can now add lighting effects that will
affect the entire image. (Make sure to save
your work before opening the lighting
effects window!)

8. You can also add a blur to your image.
This can be used for purely aesthetic
reasons, or to bring focus to an area, or
to hid imperfections in an outlaying
area.

9. Neutral
Done with a few
adjustments &
lighting effects
Fall Setting
Summer Setting

10. Altered Image
Steps Taken:
• Crop
• Exposure Adjustment
• Contrast Adjustment
• Selected Front Splash > Inverse >
turned down Saturation
• Smudged Far Background
• Iris Blur
• Curves Adjustment
• Exposure Adjustment (again)
• Blurred front beam
Original Image

11. Altered Image
Steps Taken:
• Crop
• Levels Adjustment
• Hue/Saturation Adjustment
• Warm Photo Filter
• Exposure Adjustment
• Lighting Effects (with height on)
• Len Flare at focal point
• Brightness/Contrast Adjustment
Original Image

12. Altered Image
Steps Taken:
• Crop
• Levels Adjustment
• Select Bird outline, use lasso tool
to remove any branches covering
the bird from the selection
• (with selection active) Increase
Vibrance/Saturation of bird
• (select inverse) Saturation
Adjustment, to remove color
• HDR Toning Adjustment
Original Image

13. • Remember that you can use the selection tools (lassos
and magic wand)• To adjust only certain parts of an image; by drawing around
the desired area and then applying your adjustments
• You should feather your selections
• You can inverse a selection (Select > Inverse)
• You can add to or subtract from your current selection
• Save Often
• Some of the best work in Photoshop is a compilation
of image manipulation and digital painting. If you are
using images from the web, be sure to set your search
filters to ‘large’ images, this way you are working
with good quality photos.
• Check out the examples on the following slides for
ideas on process.