Model Railroading > Touching Up Photographs...

Just thought I'd share a few tips on touching up your photos. Using Corel's PhotoHouse (very easy to use editing software that comes with the software bundle when purchasing a scanner, printer or digital camera - depending on the manufacturer, of course. Mine came through purchasing my first scanner a few years ago - an Agfa 1212p) I adjusted the brightness to a figure of +25, the contrast to +10 and the intensity to -15. It's surprising how much these simple adjustments improves a photo.

First photo - before. Second photo - after.

---

After touch-up. Photographer unknown, but thanks to Telus6429 for the link to it.

---

Not so sure I'd agree with your assessment of the improved quality. By brightening the locomotive, you washed out the clouds. That's like tweaking the brightness on your TV and calling it High Definition.... Ed

Sometimes the photo adjustment software helps and sometimes it doesn't seems to be my experience. Many times I'll make corrections to photos and then compare them to the original. Often I find the original more eye appealing than the touched up photo. My camera seems to do an excellent job of faithfully capturing the scene and usually needs little if any touch up. Of course I suppose that's the whole purpose of the camera anyway...

> Not so sure I'd agree with your assessment of the
> improved quality. By brightening the locomotive,
> you washed out the clouds. That's like tweaking
> the brightness on your TV and calling it High
> Definition....

> Sometimes the photo adjustment software helps and
> sometimes it doesn't seems to be my experience.

Because of the small size of the image, and the high level of compression, getting good results from something like this is tough to do, but both observations of the touch up job are valid points.

When touching up an image, particularly a digital image where the need for proper exposure is not nearly as critical as it is with film, you need to try and recapture what the scene originally appeared as. Since the photographer is unknown, its difficult at best to know what he was seeing. The shot is clearly underexposed, but it can safely be assumed that the shot is an overcast day. The clouds are an important part of the picture, so care must be made to keep them in the image. There are many many techniques to touching up a photo, but the most important part of digital image processing is the histogram and the Levels command (May be named something different in varying photo retouching software). Balancing the histogram with the Levels command is the simplest and surest way to bring the image back to some normality. In this case, however, the underexposure is so great, that you must select various portions of the image separately to make the affect work. By selecting the locomotives and lower portions of the background, and the the mountains and the sky, separately, we are able to make the image balance better, without completely washing out the sky. The final image here tends to be a bit too punchy and a bit oversaturated with color, and I accidentally oversharpened it a bit, but the point is, with just a bit more work, the results are significantly more pleasing. Attached is a hurry-up job to make it look even better, but this still even suffers significantly from lack of real attention, (note the obvious selection error in the lower right part of the picture of what I assume is a road), however a file this small and of poor quality seldom warrants the time intensive work required.

Now that being said, before I get jumped for being insensitive, everything you do photographically is very subjective in nature, and what pleases one person won't please the next. If the reason for fixing the photograph is simply to get a better detail view of the locomotive itself, the the original touch-up is easily sufficient. However, if the overall result is for a pleasing photograph, more care must be taken.

---

Given that this discussion began with adjustments made with an older version of Corel's PhotoHouse, I would like to argue that users of any software should periodically check for improvements and upgrades in the product they are using. As improvements are made by one company, others follow suit with similar improvements.

Ricky quite correctly pointed out that the severe underexposure requires that the locomotive must be treated seperately from the sky. The latest version of Adobe photoshop incorporates a new feature called Shadow/Highlight that greatly simplifies this procedure. This new feature is quite sophisticated and the results below were obtained by making very small changes to the default settings.

I would not be at all surprised to learn that Corel has, or will soon be releasing a version of it's software with a similar feature.If you can afford the upgrade, it will simplify your retouching efforts.

Cheers,
Africansteam

---

If it's just a light/dark issue, I may decide to use Gamma Correction. But, normally, I use the Histogram Adjustment function. I use Paint Shop Pro, and it allows you to adjust the Red, Green, Blue separately, along with Luminosity (brightness, basically).

I can take a washed-out picture taken through the window of an Amtrak car (or if it's super hazy out) and correct it so it looks pretty normal....

Kennedy

Personally, I've found that bumping up the intensity and then backing down the brightness provides a little better initial results. Then I go play with the gamma to see what I can do for those mid tones.
steeplecab

Thanks for the replies. Just to note my only intent was to bring out more details of the locomotive, and to suggest how easy it can be to bring out details in a dark picture. I'm sure that further tips (in relatively plain English, please) on picture-taking would be greatly appreciated, not only by myself but others, too.

BTW, because I photograph only as a hobby (for now), I'll refrain from shelling out $999.00 CAN for Adobe's PhotoShop or CorelDraw at $399.00 US.

Paint Shop Pro is only $79US or so.

Or, you can try IRFANVIEW, which is free.

Kennedy