Highlighting the creative magic behind post-processed photos
Welcome to ABFriday! As a reminder, next week’s ABF post will reveal the photo for March’s One Photo Focus that all participants will be editing, so be sure to check back if you want to participate. For all the details on ABFriday and One Photo Focus, visit the After-Before Friday Forum page. And now, on to this week’s galleries of submissions!
My submission: Driving down the road on a dull, wet day, I spied this beautiful old T-bird in a parking lot. I just had to pull of and grab a few shots of this iconic vehicle. Despite the rain, I tried my best to compose in camera. As a result, this week’s edit is very simple. Some basic adjustments in LR and a couple of tweaks in Color Efex Pro, and a tip about when to crop in your workflow.
Submitted by Michelle Lunato — Michelle Lunato Photography
Michelle says: For this week, I decided to go with a photograph I took in 2002 when I used to live in Hawaii. I know, I know. It must have been rough, lol. I can’t lie. It was pretty dang amazing. I just wish I would have been better with my camera back then. But hey, at least I have some old photos to touch up! Not that my current photos are so perfect they don’t need editing, but at least I can sort of hide some of my ineptness back then. Now, if I could only manage to go back to take more…
Submitted by Loré Dombaj — Snow’s Fissures and Fractures
Loré says: I have this passion of taking photos of strange things, like iron gates or street lamps, always looking around for some hidden treasure other people overlook. I found this little hidden gem in a park in Salzburg. The original looks so worn out, dirty and sad, that I had to play around and make it more like I remember it.
Submitted by Benjamin Rowe — Aperture64
Ben says: To this week’s picture, I wanted to create an image specifically for Valentines Day which is on Saturday. I had tried a similar technique last week and enjoyed it so much I created a new splash picture with a bit of a twist. Visit my post to read more.
Submitted by Nic Anderson — Photography by Nic
Nic says: This week my original goal was to just crop this so that it would be more flattering to the lady in the maroon shirt and to lighten up the whole image. But the more I played around the more I wanted to do. I ended up removing the buckets from between them and then I lightened up their faces, and added some color to the scene. Overall, I think it is a much better photo.
Submitted by Mary Hone — Tales from the Backroad
Please visit Mary’s post for more information on her post-processing steps.
Submitted by Karen Chengelis — KCinAZ
Karen says: Several weeks ago when I posted the after image of the Cabo Fisherman, I wanted to send it to Visual Venturing for ABFriday since it is one of my favorite images. I missed the window of opportunity but wanted to send it for week 36 anyway. I hope that double dipping is not taboo. I did several changes to the image but the most noticeable were to straighten the skyline, some burning in Photoshop along the water line and change to a golden color tone. To see more go here.
Submitted by Lynne Ayers — Beyond the Brush Photography
Please visit Lynne’s post for her post-processing steps.
Please click on the links of those who contributed this week, to read about their post-processing steps and/or to see what other treasures they have on their blogs. They’d love to have you visit!
So what do you think of the ABFriday forum?
Feel free to leave your thoughts and suggestions in the comment section. And don’t forget to view the guidelines if you want to participate. I’d love to have you onboard!
Hi Stacy, I love the edit, your videos make learning and understanding so easy, and I love that you explain not only your process but your choice of edits. all the different photos submissions this week look great and it is going to take me a while to get through then all.
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Another gorgeous edit, the color is beautiful and the raindrops add so much. Wonderful job, Stacy.
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Thanks so much, Loré! Sometimes rain is good 😉
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Great editing Stacy, I just LOVE how the raindrops pop out of the finished image. Beautiful!
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Thanks so much, Amy! I actually am glad it was raining, as I ended up loving the added dimension the rain added to the photo 😀
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Stacy this is such an amazing image… I love the red and the rain drops. Great video, I don’t know much about editing in LR and nothing about Color Efex Pro so I really enjoy learning about those programs. You are really helping me see the value of Color Efex, I might have to purchase it.
I tend to do so much stuff manually, because I’m such a control freak, but it might be nice to have some presets in my bag of tricks from time to time.
Thanks for adding my link, sorry again about giving it to you so late. I’ve decided that I’m going to have to write the post before I submit my image to you so that I don’t become a nuisance. 😛
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Thanks, Nic! There are a whole host of programs that are part of the Nik Efex Suite, but I rely mostly on Color Efex, Silver Efex, and Dfine (noise reduction). You can try out the program’s free for thirty days, so you should give them a try and see what you think. As for the presets, I wish I was at the level where I could create my own, but until then, I start with theirs as a base and then tweak them as I need. I figure building recipes is also kind of manual 😉
No worries about the link. Glad I saw your email when I did 🙂
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Great job, Stacy. You had some wonderful entries this week. 🙂
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Thanks, Sylvia 🙂 I love opening up the emails with the before and afters – seeing what everyone has done is always such a treat! So glad you like this week’s gallery. Thanks so much for visiting it!
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Love your image, Stacy. Delicious colour and detail in the rain drops.
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Thanks, Lynne! I actually was glad for the rain – in the end, it added a wonderful dimension to the photo 🙂
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It did.
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Thank you for the continuous lesson, Stacy! I may send mine to you earlier for the next week AF, so I won’t miss it. 🙂
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You’re welcome, Amy 🙂 I’m glad you’re enjoying it. And if there’s anything in particular you’d like me to try and focus on for a particular video, I’m all ears. I feel as if I’m repeating the same things from week to week… And, yup, the weeks seem to be moving faster and faster 😉 You can send a submission anytime. I just file them in folders to keep track!
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Thank you for the offer, Stacy. I always wonder what can be done differently in editing, your Focus One give answers to that. Your editing video is very helpful. I’ll send later this afternoon, so I don’t have to remain myself later.
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I really like the metallic tone you got out of your image Stacy very nice.
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Love that Color Efex Pro, Ben 🙂 Thanks!
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Color Efex is an amazing tool.
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Everyone did a great job with their improvements. Can’t wait to join again next week. So great to get ideas and try out new techniques.
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Looking forward to seeing you back next week, Nancy! Thanks for keeping up with posts 🙂
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What a great collection of edits from everyone! Looking forward to checking out all the links. And Stacy, love your edit. It really gave the picture a “bam” effect and so much more impact. Great job!
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Amazing what some contrast and clarity will do for an image, Michelle 😉 Thanks so much!
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Love that photo. What’s not to like about an old T-bird, and you really popped out the rain.
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Thanks, Mary! Classic car clearly cherished 🙂
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