Salvaging Prized Photos Gone Wrong

Lesson 1

Has your photographic ability ever failed you right at a crucial point? That picture of a lifetime just came back from the developer and it's less than you had hoped for. In fact, it has serious problems. Over the next few weeks I hope to show you how to salvage those photos with a series of photo manipulation, enhancements and retouches.

These lessons will be based on Paint Shop Pro 5 but will work equally as well in any graphics program that possesses the proper tools.

In the example, we will begin by selecting the freehand selection tool. In PSP, and most other programs, this will be the button that looks like a lasso. If your program has Smart Edge (or similar feature) your job will be much easier.

In PSP 5, after you select the freehand selection tool, open your Control Dialog Box. Click on the Tools Controls tab and select Smart Edge from the drop down menu. Check the anti-alias checkbox. Don't worry about the Sample Merged checkbox for now. It's purpose is to show you how all layers of your image will appear with your current selection, but since we're not working in layers for this lesson, we won't concern ourselves with it.

Using the Freehand Selection Tool, I carefully outlined the image of the girl in the tree. Since I planned to concentrate on the background first, I inverted my selection.

In PSP 5 you can invert the selection by pressing CTRL+Shift+I on your keyboard.

Next I adjusted the Highlight/Midtone/Shadow settings to

Highlight: 66
Midtone: 53
Shadow: 32

In PSP 5 Highlight/Midtone/Shadow is found on the menu bar under the Colors/Adjust option.

You will have to play with the settings to get the proper display for your own image as each image will need individual adjustments.

I inverted my selection again and applied a highlight/midtone/ shadow adjustment to the girl.

Highlight: 75
Midtone: 38
Shadow: 22

Without de-selecting, I again inverted the selection. I then chose the Clone Brush from the tool palette, using it to replace the yellowed area with different sections of the tree leaves. Care must be taken to make the tree look as natural as possible. Rather than waste time attempting to not stray into the trunk area, I decided to concentrate on the leaves and fix the trunk when I was done.

To use the clone brush in PSP, right click on the area you want to 'pick up' or transfer, then left click on the area you are transferring to.

Now it's time to finish this off. Using the Clone Brush again, I picked up an area in the center of the tree trunk. Working with small patches at a time, I transferred the trunk, filling in the areas necessary to return the tree to as natural a state as possible.