Mon Dec 08, 2008 1:50 pm
Hi, Mike.
Good work, and yes, even better for having the wherewithal to ask for "C-C"...
Looking at your L'arc de triomphe" shot, I see a lot of things going on. Looks like you tweaked the levels a lot to reduce highlights and/or went heavy on the burn tool... it looks very spotty... also, I think you over-used the clone tool to fill in clouds where there aren't any ..... seems like you used magnetic marquee tool to selcet certain areas ( tell-tale edges) ... playing with feathering will make the selections blend better...
On some of your other cityscape scenes, i see spotty darkened blue skies... you're probably looking to create that 'graduated filter" effect... again, go easy on the burn midtones . Also, you could select hue/saturation and work in blue/cyan moving the slider up or down to darken a clear blue sky...
I learned traditional photography decades ago and honed my darkroom skills with some competent commercial photogs... dodging and burning techniques in the darkroom translated very well when i went digital... it takes a bit of finesse and trial and error is the only way to learn. The key points to remember when D&B'ing are to go lightly at first, thinking what zones you want to darken and lighten. Work at small % first, continue to build up or wipe out the tones you're working on, always move the tool around so your areas don't look blotchy..... I almost never preselect the areas I'm working on with a marquee tool - rather, i just change and adjust the size of the D/B tool as needed, work in different layers, and bump up or down the %-age of D/B ..
The most important thing is to WORK IN LAYERS. Create a new or duplicate layer for most every different process. That way if you over-do it, just delete that particular layer.... and, of course, you could always play with the fill/opacity layers ( same with using the clone stamp.... clone at 50% opacity or less for most fill-in jobs like clouds, foliage in the background, etc.... these things aren't sharp to begin with and the fuzzy edges from cloning won't be noticeable ..
Good luck, and..... Practice, Practice, Practice!
~M.