Still Journal :: #14. Soft Focus for Holiday Shots

Still Journal is a weekly digest of accumulated links, tutorials, news, tricks, ideas and creativity on the culture and art of modern photography.

Still Journal is currently on hiatus - hope to resume updates soon.

Saturday, September 29, 2007

Which Came First, the Chicken or the Egg? | Errol Morris, at his usual best, does some intriguing investigative work on two Crimean War photographs by Roger Fenton.
morris.blogs.nytimes.com

Spoonfed Photoshop Tutorials | Enjoying the fresh looking psdtuts.com - some great looking original Photoshop tutorials for your consumption.
psdtuts.com

Realistic Film Grain For Digital Photography | A Photoshop Tutorial of a nice film grain technique reminiscent of Tri-X 400. Well executed and great example.
The Net is Dead

Saturday, September 29, 2007

#14. Soft Focus for Holiday Shots

The technique of applying Soft Focus to a photo is not just for portraits - give a dreamy look to your holiday photos.

Soft focus is frequently used to take away some of the harshness in portrait work but it is a technique that is certainly not limited to this subject matter.

In this photo I have used the Chuisoft action, it's been around a while now, you can download it free from Action Central.

As creator Daniel Chui comments: "This action attempts to take a properly exposed (or overexposed) image and turn it into a “soft but reasonably sharp” version of itself."

Conclusion
I like the way it takes a little of the gritty reality out of this shot and adds a slightly dreamy glow - just how I remember it.

About The Photo
Taken at the stunningly beautiful seaside resort of Buzios in Brazil.

Soft Focus Effects (oaktree-imaging.com)
Really nice illustrated tutorial from Oaktree Imaging on creating a soft focus effect - including a number of variations.

Soft Focus (photoshopbox.com)
A quick and easy way to manually apply soft focus, also using Photoshop.

Chuisoft Action Discussion (dpreview.com)
A brief discussion about the Chuisoft filter including sample shots.

Posted on Friday, September 28, 2007

#16. Paranormal Blurry TV Effect
An effect frequently used and abused by horror/thriller films these days - now you can give your still images a spooky look.
View Technique

#15. That Cross-Processed look
Take a few years of a photograph and give it that nostalgic colour shift.
View Technique

#13. Black & White Colour Overlay
A distinctive method of bringing out detail and depth in a photo.
View Technique

#12. Simulating Light Leaks
Another bygone characteristic of the film age that you can resurrect with a simple layer trick in Photoshop.
View Technique

#11. Creating dramatic skies.
Give your skies more punch with a simple Photoshop layer effect.
View Technique

#10. Vintage Film Effect
A quick and easy way to transform an image back in time with a vintage film effect.
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#9. Morning Light
Give a dazzling morning glow effect to a photograph.
View Technique

#8. Grunge Effect
Give an aged and grungy look to a photo.
View Technique

#7. Half Sepia Toning
Give a warm, yet grungy look to a photo by applying a half sepia effect.
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#6. Extreme Contrast (Faux Bleach Bypass)
Punch out the contrast and hold back the saturation of an image in this Faux Bleach Bypass technique.
View Technique

#5. Velvia Effect
Add subtle saturation and depth to bring out the best in a colour photograph.
View Technique

#4. Digital Infrared Effect
Creating a dramatic infrared effect in Photoshop.
View Technique

#3. Lens Blur (Selective Focus)
Give your action shots a visual boost with this selective-focus/lens-blur effect.
View Technique

#2. Ray of Light
Adding shafts of light to photos with a single light source.
View Technique

#1. Faux Lomo Effect
A modern digital approach to creating a traditional alternative process.
View Technique