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Lesson 2 - Objectives 9-12 (Wednesday)

Time yourself! Spend 45 minutes in this section, and learn as much as you can!​

As was mentioned earlier, Camera Raw features an intuitive and easy workflow. Start your adjustments with the Basics panel. Next, finesse the adjustments with the Tone Curve panel. Then, move to the next panel, the Detail Panel, where you can reduce noise and sharpen the image. Then on to the next panel - the HSL/Greyscale panel where you can adjust hue, saturation, and luminance for each color range. Watch the video, Camera Raw workflow, to see an example of this.


Assignment: Download B02-09_Exercise and try it for yourself! This is a RAW image file in .DNG format (Digital Negative).

Video: Camera Raw workflow. (4:42) Image by Rachael Smith ©2015

Assignment: Download this image, B02-10-12.jpg, and try reducing color and luminance noise, while sharpening the details, and getting rid of color fringing.

Camera Raw excels at removing noise from your digital images. There are two kinds of noise that camera sensors introduce into digital images: Color and luminance noise. Although Photoshop has noise removal filters, I have found that Camera Raw does an even better job at noise removal. Watch the video "Photoshop: Noise Reduction in Adobe Camera Raw" to see how this is done.


HINTS:  You'll want to zoom in at 100% to work with reducing noise in an image.  The quickest way to zoom to 100% is by double-clicking the zoom tool (magnifying glass at the top).  Try also holding down the OPTION key as you adjust the sliders in the DETAIL panel (ALT key on PC).  This will help you visualize what each slider does.

B02-10-12.jpg before camera raw processing.

Video: Photoshop: Noise Reduction in Adobe Camera Raw (3:52)

Camera Raw has an excellent panel - the Detail panel - that allows you to sharpen an image or remove noise from an image (or both!)
It doesn't really bring an image into better focus, but it tricks the eye into thinking an image is in crisp focus by highlighting one side of every edge with light, and the other side with dark. Watch the video "Photoshop: Sharpen an image in Adobe Camera Raw" to learn how this is done.


HINT:  You'll want to zoom in at 100% to work with sharpening in an image. The quickest way to zoom to 100% is by double-clicking the zoom tool (magnifying glass at the top). Try also holding down the OPTION key as you adjust the sliders in the DETAIL panel (ALT key on PC). This will help you visualize what each slider does.

Video: Photoshop: Sharpen an image in Adobe Camera Raw" (3:33)

Color fringing is a lens aberration that adds green or purple edges to objects in an image. This video, Camera Raw - How to Remove Color Fringing, will demonstrate how to remove those in Camera Raw.  Watch how it's done! Then practice on either of the two images below.

Video: Camera Raw - How to Remove Color Fringing. (2:42)

You'll notice we haven't yet talked about the tools at the top of the Camera Raw interface. These will be learned in the Advanced Photoshop and Graphic Design course offered Spring semester. If you're interested, there are resources and videos there to help you learn them. For this lesson, I'll introduce you to what they are...
​
The Tools (Shortcut Keys)
A:  The Zoom Tool (Z). Lets you zoom in or out of your image.
B: The Hand Tool (H). Lets you scroll the image when you're zoomed in close.
C: The White Balance Tool. (i). Lets you pick a point in the image that would be neutral gray, and sets that as the white point.
D: The Color Sampler Tool (S). Lets sample colors in the image for precise RGB values.
E: The Targeted Adjustment Tool (T). Allows you to choose the type of correction you want to make: Hue, Saturation, Luminance, or Grayscale Mix. Then, drag in the image. Dragging up or right increases values; dragging down or left decreases values.
F: The Crop Tool (C). Let's you non-destructively crop your image.
G: The Straighten Tool (A). Allows you to straighten a crooked horizon (or make it worse if that's what you want!)
H: The Transform Tool (Shift-T). Allows you to transform (warp) images.
I: The Spot Removal Tool (B). Allows you to use a brush to remove blemishes.
J: The Red Eye Removal Tool (E). Get rid of those glowing red eyes caused by camera flash.
K: The Adjustment Brush (K). Let's you use a brush and masks to adjust areas you decide needs adjusting.
L: The Graduated Filter (G). Applies a linear setting from 100% strength to begin, and gradually reduces the setting to 0% at the end.
M: The Radial Filter (J). Same as above, but works radially.
N: Open the Camera Raw Preferences Dialog (Command-K)
O: Rotate Image 90 Degrees Counterclockwise (L)
P: Rotate Image 90 Degrees Clockwise (R)

There is a great set of YouTube videos about Camera Raw here (see image below)...