Lumenzia – New Training

Posted on June 3, 2018 by Andrew Astbury

Lumenzia – New Training Course Available

Regular subscribers to my blog and YouTube channel should know by know that I highly recommend Greg Benz’s Lumenzia plugin for Photoshop.

I know many readers of my blog have downloaded the Lumenzia plugin from my links dotted around the site, and previous posts such as HERE and HERE

Lumenzia is just about the best tool you can buy to help you master exposure blending using luminosity masks, but its uses do not stop there – I use it on quite a lot of my images for making ‘controlled tweaks’ in Photoshop.

But it is most readily associated with landscape photography exposure blending.

An awful lot of people have asked me if I’d do a set of comprehensive training videos on how to use Lumenzia, but that would be a little difficult to do without on-going additions as the plugin is frequently updated with new facilities.

But I’m pleased to say the Greg Benz (the plugin author) has just launched a comprehensive training course for Lumenzia, and I have bought the course myself!

Yes, that’s right – I’ve bought someone else’s training!

Lumenzia

After watching the videos that Greg has put together I can honestly say that the course is excellent – as you would expect.

The course is hosted on Teachable – so you don’t have to download any huge chunky videos either.

For those of you who already have the Lumenzia Photoshop plugin you can get the full course by clicking on the following link:

Exposure Blending Master Course

And for those of you you have NOT already got the plugin itself, you can buy it bundled with the training course on the link below:

Lumenzia + Exposure Blending Master Course

If you only want the plugin, you can still get that on its own by clicking below:

Lumenzia Plugin on its own click here.

Greg covers everything you need to know in order to leverage the power of Lumenzia. And anything that gets people to use Photoshop gets an extra ‘thumbs up’ from me!

Greg is the one trainer I know of who does what I do with my training videos – supply RAW files to support each of the lessons.

You will get raw files from various cameras including some D850 files, so you will have the added bonus of seeing how these cameras perform in the hands of an expert photographer.

So, I strongly urge you to use the links above and purchase this great training course from Greg Benz, and get to grips with Lumenzia.

You might be wondering why the heck I’m promoting training from someone else.

Well, the reasons are two-fold; I’ve already said that logistically it would be a nightmare because of the fundamental updates.

But more importantly, I’d never be able to teach you how Lumenzia works any better than Greg himself – he IS the plugin author, so it stands to reason!

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Patrons gain access to a variety of FREE rewards, discounts and bonuses.

Lumenzia – Enhanced Twilight Colours

Posted on November 14, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

Lumenzia – Enhanced Twilight Sunset Sky and Lighting

Sunset lighting and sky as captured by the camera – image is in need of some enhancement.

Now THAT’S more like it!
Simple enhancement in Photoshop using Lumenzia.

I’m sure you’ll agree that the image looks fantastic after the processing, but if you watch the video below you’ll see that it’s such an easy, quick and simple procedure.

If you are reading this post via email then click HERE to see the video:

Get the LUMENZIA plug-in for Photoshop HERE

The first key to this simple adjustment is the mask from behind which the colour enhancement is made:

The L2 Lumenzia mask, modified slightly with a white brush in the Overlay blend mode.

There are a number of ways that this mask can be created, but all of them are more time-consuming to create then by using the simple Lumenzia interface.

The second key move is to switch the blend mode of the colour overlay layer (then one this mask applies to) to the Hard Light blending mode within the layers panel.

The overall adjustment process is, other than the minimal amount of manual brush ‘tweaking’ of the mask, simply a matter of a few clicks here and there – it couldn’t be simpler really now could it.

If you have not bought the Lumenzia plug-in for Photoshop then get it here

UPDATE: Greg Benz (the plugin author) has launched a comprehensive Lumenzia training course – see my post here for more information.

Become a patron from as little as $1 per month, and help me produce more free content.

Patrons gain access to a variety of FREE rewards, discounts and bonuses.

Photoshop Colour Range Selection Tool

Posted on November 12, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

Photoshop Basics: Colour Range Tool

The Photoshop Colour Range Selection Tool used to isolate part of an image based on colour.

I’ve just uploaded a new video to my YouTube channel:

Click this link if you are viewing this post in your email

OK, so I’ve made a tentative start on my new Photoshop video tutorials and I thought I’d upload this Colour Range Selection Tool Basics one to my Tube of Me channel – just so that everyone can see what the Fuzziness, Localised Colour Clusters and Range “do-hickies” actually do for your workflow process!

The colour range selection tool can be used for many different purposes within Photoshop where you want to make a selection based on Colour/Hue as opposed to a selection based on luminosity.

In this video I use it to effect a colour change to a specific object within an image; but in the previous video post I used it to ‘remove’ a black background.

But both cases amount to the same thing if you think about it logically – it’s just a way of ISOLATING pixels in an image based on their colour range.

Overall, this is a bit of a “quick ‘n dirty” way of doing the job, and I could do a little extra brush work inside the mask to tidy things up that little bit more!

But now you know how the tool itself works.

A purer way of changing localised colour involves a very different method – see these other videos on my channel:

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Simple Masking in Photoshop

Posted on November 10, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

Simple Masking in Photoshop – The Liquid Chocolate Shots

Masking in Photoshop is what the software was built for, and yet so many Photoshop users are unfamiliar or just downright confused by the concept that they never use the technique.

Mask mastery will transform the way you work with Photoshop!

Take these shots for instance:

Milk and Liquid Chocolate Splash

Liquid Milk and White Chocolate splash together in an abstract isolated on white background

Wanting a shot to look like liquid chocolate and cream on a black or white background is all well and good, but producing it can be either as simple or hard as you care to make it.

Trying to get a pure white background ‘in camera’ is problematic to say the least, and chucking hot melted chocolate around if fraught with its own set of problems!

Shooting on a dark or black background is easier because it demands LESS lighting.

Masking in Photoshop will allow us to isolate the subject and switch out the background.

Now for the ‘chocolate bit’ – we could substitute it with brown emulsion paint – but have you seen the bloody price of it?!

Cheap trade white emulsion comes by the gallon at less than the price of a litre of the right coloured paint; and masking in Photoshop + a flat colour layer with a clipping mask put in the right blend mode will turn white paint into liquid chocolate every time!

A tweak with the Greg Benz Lumenzia plugin will finish the shot in Photoshop:

SSChoc A final tweak in Lightroom and the whole process takes from the RAW shot on the left to the finished image on the right.

The key to a good mask in Photoshop is ALWAYS good, accurate pixel selection, and you’d be surprised just how simple it is.

Watch the video on my YouTube channel; I use the Colour Range tool to make a simple selection of the background, and a quick adjustment of the mask edge Smart Radius and Edge Contrast in order to obtain the perfect Photoshop mask for the job:

Like everything else in digital photography, when you know what you can do in post processing, it changes the way you shoot – hence I know I can make the shot with white paint on a black background!

Useful Links:

Greg B’s Lumenzia Plugin for Photoshop – get it HERE – you can’t afford NOT to have it in your arsenal of Photoshop tools.

UPDATE June 2018: Greg Benz (the plugin author) has launched a comprehensive Lumenzia training course – see my post here for more information.

Masking in Photoshop – you mustn’t let the concept frighten or intimidate you! It’s critical that you understand it if you want to get the very best from your images; and it’s a vast subject simply because there are many types of mask, and even more ways by which to go about producing them.

It’s a topic that no one ever stops learning about – nope, not even yours truly! But in order to explore it to the full you need to understand all the basic concepts AND how to cut through all the bullshit that pervades the internet about it – stick with me on this folks and hang on for the ride!

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Lumenzia for Wildlife

Posted on March 14, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

The Lumenzia Photoshop extension

Yet more on the usefulness of the Lumenzia Photoshop extension, the short cut to great looking images of all types and styles.

I had an email from client and blog follower David Sparks after my last post about this useful mighty Photoshop tool.

He sent these before and after rail shots:

Before adding Lumenzia. Click for larger view.

After adding Lumenzia. Click for larger view.

Comparison overlay – see how the left side of the image has that extra presence – and that’s just with the click of a couple of buttons in the Lumenzia GUI. Click to view larger.

Here is what David had to say in his email:

Andy, here is a before and after. Processing was much, much faster than usual, using Lumenzia.

Thanks for bringing it to my attention….I’m working my way through your Image Processing in LR4 & Photoshop + LR5 bundle and enjoying it very much.

And as my friend and blog follower Frank Etchells put it:

Excellent recommendation this Andy. Bought it first time from your previous posting… at just over £27 it’s marvellous

What gets me puzzled is the fact that these Lumenzia posts have had over 500 separate page views in the last few days but less then 3% of you have bought it – WTF are you guys waiting for…

Get it BOUGHT – NOW – HERE

UPDATE: Greg Benz (the plugin author) has launched a comprehensive Lumenzia training course – see my post here for more information.

Become a patron from as little as $1 per month, and help me produce more free content.

Patrons gain access to a variety of FREE rewards, discounts and bonuses.

Colour Editing in Photoshop

Posted on March 13, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

Colour Editing in Photoshop using the Channel Mixer

I’ve just uploaded 3 video lessons on THE BEST way to do selective colour changes in Photoshop using the Channel Mixer.

This is a far better and more accurate way to change the colour of something whilst maintaining all its original tonality, and it is vastly better than the commonly touted Hue saturation method.

HueSat doesn’t do the job with 100% fidelity, and you are very limited in the colour choice.

Using the Channel Mixer method you can effectively make every single colour in the Pantone colour spectrum simply by using Pantone/RGB conversion figures.

If you watch the videos on YouTube it may take a minute for the HD play option to activate.

Part 1 is here:

Part 2 here:

Part 3 here:

The demo file can be downloaded on the link below:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/87066369/Caterham.psd.zip

There are many instances where you might want or need to change the colour of an object in your image, and this is exactly what the Channel Mixer exists for; not for creating crappy black and white conversions as some crackpots think.

Give it a try for yourself by downloading the file and following along with the videos – the file has the path built into it, put these paths are simple to make with then pen tool.

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Lumenzia – Not Just for Landscapes

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Andrew Astbury

Luminosity Masking is NOT just for landscape photographs – far from it.

But most folk miss the point of luminosity masking because they think it’s difficult and tedious.

The point, as I always see it, is that luminosity masking allows you to make dramatic but subtle changes and enhancements to your image with what are actually VERY fast and crude “adjustments”.

This in reality means that luminosity masking is FAST – and way faster than trying to do “localised” adjustments. But the creation of the masks and choosing which one to use is what crippled the “ease factor” for most.

But with this new Lumenzia extension is so snappy and quick at showing you the different masks that, if you know what area of the image you want to adjust, the whole process takes SECONDS.

Let’s look at a White-tailed Eagle taken just 15 days ago:

Straight off the 1Dx it looks like this:

RAW unprocessed .CR2 file (CLICK to view in new window)

Inside the Develop Module of Lightroom 5 it looks like:

RAW unprocessed – (CLICK to view in new window)

A few tweaks later and it looks like:

Tweaks are what you can see in the Basics Panel + CamCal set to Neutral, and Chroma Noise removal in the Lens Corrections Panel is turned ON – (CLICK to view in new window)

Sending THIS adjusted image to Photoshop:

(CLICK to view in new window)

All I want to do is give a “lift” to the darker tones in the bird; under the wings, and around the side of head, legs and tail.

Using a BRUSH to do the job is all fine ‘n dandy BUT, you would be creating a localised adjustment that’s all-encompassing from a tonal perspective; all tones that fell under the brush get adjusted by the same amount.

A luminosity mask, or indeed ANY pixel-based mask is exactly what it says it is – a mask full of pixels. And those pixels are DERIVED from the real pixels in your image. But the real beauty is that those pixels will be anywhere from 1% to 100% selected, or not selected at all.

Where they are 100% selected they are BLACK, and any adjustment you make BEHIND that mask will NOT be visible.

Pixels that are NOT selected will be WHITE, and your adjustment will show fully.

But where the pixels are between 1% and 99% selected they will appear as 1% GREY to 99% grey and so will show or hide variation of said adjustment by the same amounts…got it?

The Lumenzia D4 mask looks like it’ll do the job I want:

Lumenzia D4 mask (CLICK to view in new window)

Click the image to view larger – look at the subtle selections under those wings – try making that selection any other way in under 2 seconds – you’ve got no chance!

The “lift” I want to make in those WHITER areas of the mask is best done with a Curves Adjustment layer:

Select “Curve” in the Lumenzia GUI – (CLICK to view in new window)

So hit the Curve button and voilà:

The Lumenzia D4 mask is now applied to Curves Adjustment Layer – (CLICK to view in new window)

You can see in the image above that I’ve made a very rough upwards deflection of the curve to obtain an effective but subtle improvement to those under-wing areas etc. that I was looking to adjust.

The total time frame from opening the image in Photoshop to now is about 20 seconds! Less time than the Lightroom 5 adjustments took…

And to illustrate the power of that Lumenzia D4 Luminosity mask, and the crudity of the adjustment I made, here’s the image WITHOUT THE MASK:

The effect of the luminosity mask is best illustrated by “hiding” it – bloody hell, turn it back on ! – (CLICK to view in new window).

And at full resolution you can see the subtleties of the adjustment on the side of the head:

With Lumenzia (left) and just the Lightroom 5 processing (right) – (CLICK to view in new window).

If you want to get the best from your images AND you don’t want to spend hours trying to do so, then Lumenzia will seriously help you.

Clicking this link HERE to buy Lumenzia doesn’t mean it costs you any more than if you buy it direct from the developer. But it does mean that I get a small remuneration from the developer as a commission which in turn supports my blog. Buying Lumenzia is a total no-brainer so please help support this blog by buying it via these links – many thanks folks.

UPDATE June 2018: Greg Benz (the plugin author) has launched a comprehensive Lumenzia training course – see my post here for more information.

Become a patron from as little as $1 per month, and help me produce more free content.

Patrons gain access to a variety of FREE rewards, discounts and bonuses.