Ryan Ackerman: Final Photostory

HOW IT HAPPENED:

Edits (high level overview)

1. Masked image to Polaroid frame, added text, brought in a background, drop shadow on Polaroid, color balance on green channel, and burn on the trail sign
2. Black and white layer adjustment to the entire image, painted out the walking stick in the mask so it wasn't black and white, copied and pasted the red from the backpack on top of the B&W layer, corrected spots with the brush in the layer mask
3. I got a Duluth Trading Company feel from this image. I used a filter, copied the layer, and pasted the original in between the two. After that, I set the middle (original) layer to soft light, the top to multiply. I added a brightness/contrast adjustment to the entire image and painted out some parts in the mask. I can't remember exactly what filter it was, but I know it was in the "Artistic" section.
4. This is one of the subtle ones. I used a sharpness filter, dodged out the green plants in the foreground, and burned some of the ground very close to the camera. This is actually the only photo with a person in it, I copied the person out of this and added it to other images to convey more of a message of hiking.
5. I used a color balance filter, mostly on the greens and neutrals. I added a "Lens Flare" filter where it looked like it made sense. This one actually took a while to get right
6. This was color balance, a lighting effects filter with custom settings, and a copy and paste of the person (along with blurring the edges to make it look like it fit). I had to add a brightness/contrast on the hiker to make it blend well.
7. Channel mixer/color balance to boost the greens on the leaf
8. I cropped this image down to make the path run up the right third. I dodged some of the path and added the person again. The person is subtle, but that's what I was going for. Again, brightness/contrast on the hiker to make it fit and blurring the edges.
9. The first step of this was HDR toning, the second was adding a color balance mask and playing around with the layer mode until I was happy with how it looked.
10. This was a photo filter set to "warm" I believe. I burned some of the rocks in the foreground and repeated the process of adding the hiker.
11. The bottom layer is the original image. On top of that is a watercolor filter set to overlay. On top of that is the original image again set to multiply. If you look closely you can see the strokes. The final step was adding a color balance and masking out parts I didn't want to affect (the river mostly). I also burned some of the large rocks.
12. Color balance to boost greens and yellows and burning out the background to make it look like it's on black.
13. The bottom image was HDR toning, on top of that was the layer duplicated with a warm photo filter applied and set to overlay. I think I adjusted the opacity of the top layer until I was happy with what it looked like. I clone stamped a rogue tree branch in the foreground as well.
14. This may be one of my favorites. I did a color balance and a black and white adjustment layer. Then I used a radial gradient to unmask the middle of the image where you see the color. The rest is black and white.
15. I needed at least one that looked SUPER instagrammy! This was a combination of hue/saturation, levels, color balance, and brightness/contrast. I'll admit this was slightly overdone but I wanted to get that big "oomph"
16. This took quite a bit of work. I used color balance masked to the blue sky and did the same for the mountains to boost the blues and the greens in each. I burned some of the ground in the front and cleaned up small parts with the clone stamp and patch tools. 
17. I took my final image, adjusted it as I wanted (color balance again with masking) and added a white stroke (30px I believe) on the INSIDE of the image. That gave me the white photo frame. I transformed it, copied a few times, added drop shadows, and adjusted the layers behind to give the appearance of a stack of photos. I brought in a background and then strategically erased pieces of a paperclip to make it look like it was holding the stack of images in my photostory together. I added text on top of an altered rectangular marquee tool selection filled with white, and voila!

Week 11: Portraits

When I saw the assignment I thought, "portraits, that can't be too difficult." Turns out, I was wrong. This was one of the tougher assignments for me. I ran into multiple obstacles with this week's project - the biggest was not being able to find a subject to shoot. I almost resorted to asking random people at the Farmer's Market as outlined in one of the links.

I attended a dog sport exposition this weekend so I tried to capture some shots there of trainers in context with their dogs, but out of the fifty images none of them really worked.

I tried to illustrate how the framing of the image makes a difference in the overall shot. I found a spot with beautiful natural light for these shots. I really liked how the light worked in these.

EDIT:

I think Jason brought up a good point about enhancing the photos by exploring and altering them further. This is a result of the first photo being manipulated. It is still mostly washed out, but I feel like it looks more like it's supposed to be. This was done with B&W layer filters and a color balance masked to the eyes.

Week 10: Photostory

Sorry to cut the deadline so close, I just got off the mountain. 

My theme is, "A Walk in the Woods" and I wanted to capture what it felt like to go on a hike. This was a hike at White Rocks national forest area in Vermont I did this afternoon. I wanted to give viewers the sense that they were walking with me through the trails - they'd be looking at the trail and then shift attention to something else. Not everyone in the class is from Vermont, so this may be new to some people. I hope I can give people some insight into Vermont life! 

The hardest part was picking these twenty. When I got home I realized I shot more than 130 photos for this project. These were the ones I felt worked best to tell a story.

Side note: check out the rock towers I came across near the top of the mountain. There were dozens of these things in this serene rock garden - at 3000' above sea level. 

Week 10: Clone & Text

Clone stamp is by far one of my favorite things in Photoshop. The patch tool and content-aware move tool are also great for manipulating images. I use the clone stamp a lot when I shoot pictures of food to remove imperfections on the plate. I also use it for crazy things like making people look like they have no eyes - I digress.

PART I: CLONE STAMP & BRUSH
I looked at this image and I didn't think the kayakers interfered too much. I thought removing the kayakers was a cool thing to do to completely isolate the natural feel of the photo. You may have to enlarge these too see the difference, but I removed both kayakers as well as the right kayaker's water trail. I used the clone stamp as well as the brush in conjunction with the eye dropper to blend the colors together more smoothly.

Original

Altered

The difference?

PART II: TEXT TOOL
I use this more than any other tool in Photoshop, besides maybe the move tool. Putting text on your image can enhance your photo and send a message when done right. Advertisers are really good at this. I decided to make my images look like simple advertisements.

Week 9: Dodge and Burn

PART I: DODGE AND BURN

I don't really use dodge and burn in these circumstances. The most I use them is for minor adjustments so I tried to jump feet first in and completely change the complete lighting scheme. The final product isn't the most realistic looking, but I shifted the lighting as I wanted. When you take into account the different opacities, different brushes, and the shadow/midtone/highlight you have tons of flexibility in terms of what you want to do . 

PART II: FILTERS

Filters are a really cool part of Photoshop. I use them with virtually everything I create. You basically have infinite possibilities of combinations because you can stack the filters on top of each other. Couple the stacking with the ability to change layer modes and you have more possibilities than I can even imagine.

I don't get to play with the artistic filters much so I used these for the assignment to change up what I'm used to.

Image I
I decided to stack several layers with different filters for this photo. I was going for some kind of mix between cartoony and simple. There are 5 layers in this image

Layer 5: Cutout - color
Layer 4: Median filter @ 12px - soft light mode
Layer 3: Dry Brush - Screen mode
Layer 2: Cutout filter - Luminosity layer mode
Layer 1: Original image

IMAGE II

This one was completed with similar techniques, but I wanted to show how color affects the entire composition. There are three active layers in this 

Layer 3: Red selected from original and pasted on top of all other layers

Layer 2: Stamp filter - very simple settings

Layer 1: Original with 1px gaussian blur

Week 8: Photomosaic

One of my clients is publishing a book and I was hired to design the jacket. He's a journalist and the book is about the stories of people he has encountered over the last 25 years. I tried doing this with about 25 images but it wasn't nearly enough. Luckily he provided me with a folder of 150 head shots and I used those to create the photomosaic. 

Week 8: Color Adjustments

I chose to use images from the past for this assignment. I used a variety of tools to achieve these effects. I think it is also important to note that you should start with a goal when altering colors to give yourself some direction. I find that saying, "I want this to feel brighter and I want the colors to be warmer," is more helpful than saying, "I want to make this picture look better." Having a goal in mind helps me stay on track when manipulating images. It's helpful to start with a mini creative brief for yourself.

IMAGE 1
Goal: Make the sky pop and appear more blue and lighten up some of the greens
Tools: Levels, color balance, curves (masked to the blue channel), masked brightness/contrast

IMAGE 2

Goal: Make the image feel warmer and get the foreground to pop

Tools: Color balance (masked to the green channel), brightness/contrast, channel mixer, hue/saturation on shadows

Week 7: Selection & Manipulation

Here are the shots I altered for this week's assignment. Below are the originals.

ORIGINALS

Week 6: Landscapes

One of my main takeaways from the landscape reading was trying to capture how the landscape feels. She went into detail about looking for patterns, seeing how people play a role in the environment and trying to capture that relationship. 

Having a 60 mile commute to work everyday in the green mountains of Vermont, I wanted to take a different approach. I wanted to try to capture "Vermontness" in my pictures. I also tried to take photos of the same thing on different days with different elements coming into play. The first two images illustrate how a foggy morning completely changes the picture versus a clear morning. 

"Getting the perfect photo" is subject to your own goals. I'll use the first two photos as an example. If I wanted a mysterious photo of a farmer's field, the first image would be the perfect photo. If I wanted the same exact subject, but on a clear day, the second would have been perfect. It all depends on what you're going for as a photographer and what you're trying to capture.