Days Fork Powder Run

[zerodog]

Went for a quick tour this weekend. We had some stellar light right in this very spot when we were on the way up. On the way down, we were too late and missed the light. At least it was clear and not snowing hard. Tried a different tracking setting. I set it to "Normal" instead of off. Worked very well. In dense trees I think I will set it to "long" to try that. That is the setting I use for fights. The tracking doesn't get faked out by the cage or a ref running in front of the real action.

Anyone have any ideas for bringing out some more snow detail in these snow shots? For this one I made a few layers in PS to make some tweaks to specific zones. I think it was a moderate improvement over the original/ LR tweeked shot.

[Danbaileyphoto]

With shots like this, I usually use Photoshop's Shadow/Highlight tool to bring back some definition in the snow.

[xxxoverridexxx]

dan..how long have you been in Alaska for?

[SmartWombat]

Snow detail?
I'd ask P-J about the Photoshop action he uses to get the detail in his shots.

[Photo-John]

Snow detail?
I'd ask P-J about the Photoshop action he uses to get the detail in his shots.

I actually have a huge bag of tricks. But Uwe Steinmueller's Highlight Resolver Photoshop script is really good. Actually, lately I haven't been using it because I got a new computer and have been too lazy to install it on the new machine. Another trick is very careful curve adjustment in the highlights. And of course, masked adjustment layers, which allow very controlled and non-destructive selective adjustments.

I really recommend Uwe's script, though. If you're serious about the snow photos, it's totally worth the $25 he sells it for. Combine that with the Photoshop curves tool and as long as you haven't actually blown out the highlights, you can squeeze a lot of detail of snow - no matter what the conditions.

DOP Highlight Resolver Filter >>

Maybe this winter I'll get around to actually making a video of my whole snow photo editing process. Is that something anyone would actually want to watch?

[zerodog]

I would be all ears to learn some of your techniques PJ. On these I did use a few layers to make adjustments. I just wish LR did layers. It would be really fast and easy to do it.

The thing I don't like is when you bring out more details in the snow a lot of time it seems like you loose so much white. I like the bright white. I just suck at pulling the small shadow details out of the features in the snow without loosing too much whiteness.

[Photo-John]

I use Lightroom and Photoshop for pretty much every image. I've found LR is great for RAW conversions and global corrections. But when it comes down to really fine-tuning and getting my images perfect, I can't live without Photoshop and masked adjustment layers. I usually use a curves adjustment layer to bring down the highlights and then I'll use a levels adjustment layer to pump up the contrast on the snow and make it pop better. That's how you keep the snow bright and get bring the details in. It can be a tricky dance, though. Sometimes the color gets wacked in the process, too. When that happens I switch the layer mode to Luminosity because that takes the color out of the equation.

I've never made a screen video before. Maybe it's about time I learn