Aéropostale

The sun is directly behind the model in this shot. Onboard flash was used to add some light to her front. The RAW (attached) turned out predictably dark. I was surprised at what I was able to recover by hacking away with lightroom and photoshop.

Model is a separate layer in photoshop, brightened and dodge/burned a bit. Colour adjustments made in lightroom. I'm pretty happy with it. Suggestions? Comments?

Also working on an unintrusive but legible copyright tag. I don't like them but I guess in this day they're needed.

I was able to save a very dark picture from the recycle bin. Original

picture attached in the comments section.

A definite save Michael. I was just wondering whether the on board flash ( you mean pop up flash) was too weak to make a balanced fill...or some other setting. Meaning, how could you have gotten a better balance in a strongly backlit photo without the post processing wizardry.---which I hasten to say I do not knock.... I ask in humble inexperience so far with the kind of layer adjustment you skillfully navigate.

Otherwise, okeedokee.

Now, the sunlight was pretty low, and I guess it didn't reach the model's hair although it does spiffy well to accent hips. Low angle, wonder if that was what you sought.

. I know you posted this mainly for instruction to the post processor novices like me...and I salute you for that. More power to us all who go out in the mosquitoey countryside. I wish you well , gerry

Thanks for taking the time to comment, Gerry. I am also a pp novice, and was very surprised that anything could be saved from the darkness of the original.

I am sure that this could have been accomplished without the PP had I a brighter flash, or a big reflector, for the fill. And now that you mention it, I notice I had my camera's flash set to -3, the weakest setting possible! A left over setting from a previous photo. I wonder what difference it would have made had i noticed at the time and turned up the flash.

Ah, well, you live you learn. It's the learning that's the fun part =)

cheers!

I think by making the model brighter, it blew out the colors, contrast and detail behind her. Did you try to extract only the model into another layer adjust her brightness? Leaving the background untouched. Very good try in terms of saving this picture.

Hmm, yes I brightened up the model by using a separate layer, then masking out the background. And changes made to the background were made in lightroom, throughout the whole picture. I'm not seeing the blow out areas, at least not much different than the original. I calibrated my monitor in the hours before working on this picture - I am not sure what you are seeing. I agree that there are differences between the colour and contrast in the background PP. Perhaps I should recalibrate and take a second look...

And next time I will pay attention to my camera settings and perhaps avoid this whole mess.