highlight recovery ???

[Singletracklovr]

I only have PS 7 is there away to recover highlights?
I have tried adjusting levels with limited success.

Thanks for your time and expertise.

[Singletracklovr]

Oops, Forgot the example. What I'm trying to recover is the gooses white cheek.

[readingr]

Did you use RAW to capture the pic, If yes then you should be able to capture more detail in the white by altering the exposure.

If you used JPEG then I doubt if you would capture much more.

Roger R.

[GB1]

I haven't done much RAW editing yet but have heard what Roger's mentioning, that you can recover a lot more in them. It's been my experience that with digital JPEG images, the latitude is very slim and if it's blown out, it's gone.

[Singletracklovr]

I did use RAW but had to convert to jpeg and resize to post here.

Roger are you saying to readjust the the EV to something darker, like -0.5?

[readingr]

It depends on the editor your using. PSE has it down as exposure, Canon, is a exposure graph, but your right, RAW conversion normally allows +-2EV of adjustment.

The clever thing is that you can create two images and then merge them for better results without using ND grad filters for instance.

Hope that helps.

Roger R.

[Singletracklovr]

The clever thing is that you can create two images and then merge them for better results without using ND grad filters for instance.

Hope that helps.

Roger R.

I think I follow. Make a duplicate layer, go very dark and then overlay it.

thanks for tip.

[Medley]

No, actually he's talking about editing the Raw image twice, once for the highlights, and once for the shadows, then combining those two separate images.

Did you sharpen the image that you posted? I ask because the white area at the edges is completely blown out- you can't recover any information there. That makes it harder to recover the middle section, as it creates a kind of shadow effect that draws more attention to the edges.

- Joe U.

[Singletracklovr]

Hi Joe,
Yes I did try a new sharping process where you make a new layer, use Hi pass filter, overlay and adjust the opacity to control the level of sharpen. I over did it, didn't I?
I don't think the sharpening blew the cheek out though.

Here is the original photo just resized from RAW with no other PP

[xystren]

From what I can tell, it does look like there is some detail within the cheek so I would imagine from the RAW file you should be able to merge two different exposure to get the detail that you are looking for in the shadows and highlights.

[readingr]

Joe hit the nail on the head, from the RAW editor make a copy for the highlights and a copy for the shadows and then merge the two using layers in the editor of choice. Then remove the content usint the eraser or use layer blending to get the desired effect.

Roger R.

[Medley]

OK, I've tried adjusting your resized Raw image. There's still a lot of information in the white area, but it looks like combining the two Raw images would be the best way to go about this. I can make the neck area look decent with the Jpeg image, but it throws the rest of the pic off, tonality-wise.

- Joe U.

[Singletracklovr]

Thanks Roger and Joe. I will give this a try.

[SARtech]

Hi!

I hope you don't mind. I just found your post now and took a crack at it.
Do you have a selection tool in your photoshop? I only have photshop Elements and I have it. I just selected that part (the cheek) with the selection wand and then darkend that part that I selected. I also used the same process to darken the front of the face and top of the beak a lttle. In each case I used a little of the unsharpening mask also. (I don't know why they call it that. It actually makes things look clearer)

Kristine

[Singletracklovr]

Hi Kristine,
I do have a selection tool, a laso, and magicwand. They didn't bring back the detail I was hoping for.
I also tried overlaying a highlights and shadows copy and the sponge desaturation technique.

None gave me what I was looking for so I kinda gave up on this one.
Learning my cameras limits has been a real experience.
Under expose and I get noise in the shadows. Over expose and I get this goose.

Thanks for trying and the tip.