When making certain adjustments with the masking tools, I often get questions about some of the halos and fringes that can appear along edges in the photo.
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I love teaching and photography... In that order. I feel that enjoying photography, and photo editing can get WAY too complicated. So my personal mission (and favorite thing to do), is to create education that simplifies the process of taking great photos, and how to edit them to get the results you’ve always wanted.
Matt,
You mentioned that Adobe uses the blurred mask with sky replacements to help prevent the halo effect. So, two questions… 1) Does Adobe apply that technique on OUR OWN SKIES that we have saved, or only on sky replacements that are from their sky selections?
2. If you are going to do a sky replacement or (even more so) an adjustment that you suspect or expect to create a halo problem, would it help if you preemptively first create a mask subtracting a little white, highlights or overall exposure with a feathered brush and some negative clarity or negative texture, and then do the adjustment that was likely to produce the halo. I don’t know why, but to me, it seems more like the way a painter would put a base layer of color on an oil painting before trying to put in the details. (Yes, I know I could try it myself, and see if it works. But you know so many more techniques than I do, and you can tell a lot more people about it if it works.
Hi Paul.
1) Sky replacement works the same whether it’s your sky or one of the default Adobe ones.
2) I guess the idea is to avoid making changes that produce halos and my goal with the video was to make a subtle changes, but still blend that change with the foreground. Chance are if you see halos you’ve done something too harsh to a photo and/or used a sky that probably shouldn’t have been used in that photo with a sky replacement. But give what you suggested a try to see if it helps. If it looks good that’s all that matters right? Thanks!
Very useful, will definitely start incorporating this into my sky selections. I’ve found a few examples where the halos occur otherwise, and then I’ll do a sky or luminosity selection and then carefully brush through the halos with the clone stamp tool borrowing from the sky area just above. Works great but requires some patience to work through.
Hey Matt –
Thanks for the tips on the fringes!
A question! Would it be possible for you do something for the fringes and edges in PS. Ive been doing a lot of flower photos lately, and sometimes using generative fill for textures and backgrounds. A lot of times the edges and fringes are “huge.” I’ve removed them with, max, min, modify, contract and selections, feather and such. But still they are tough to remove. Just looking for a way to simplify this if possible. Thanks!
Hi Larry. Think of them as a distraction and use whatever distraction removal tools seem to work. Cloning, healing, etc… There are no quick fixes for it. Thanks
Very helpful! Thanks, Matt.
Thanks, again, Matt.
I have been using Dehaze to bring back some of the sky. What is your opinion is that to much like Clarity?
Hi Gail. Dehaze just makes things blue and usually in a gritty fake way. If it works it works. But it’s not a tool I use often for a sky and usually, I’m trying to remove it from a sky. Thanks.
Thank you, Matt. I think this will be very helpful in my work flow, at times.
Another great tutorial Matt! Thank you! You make editing so logical and easy.
I wanted to ask you about a tutorial you did years ago to make rough water smooth in Photoshop. I thought I bookmarked that video, but I can’t find it. Maybe you could show that one again sometime?
Thanks!
Definitely a corrective technique I was missing. Much appreciated.
Thank you!
Thank you
Love your “tips”
Great tip Matt…these are always helpful and easy to use…and remember…Thanks always…
Great tip Matt !!
And Love the Tee-Shirt 🙂
Thanks Matt – useful instruction. BUT, it’s aimed at the opposite of the issue I usually see masking skies in Lightroom. More often than not I find the Sky selection tool creates a mask that over-spills the sky, creating selected areas beneath the sky that should not be selected. Then I need to go in with a subtraction brush and remove the unwanted masking. This is the point at which unpleasant disconnects between the sky and the material beneath it can show unwelcome disconnects unless one is careful about the border blend between them, by not making it too sharp and abrupt.
Great suggestion … solves many issues.
TY