hello! hope you're doing well :)
i was wondering if you have any tips on how to do the lighting on edits? the colorful or dark ones or maybe probably every single one you can think of because it's the part i struggle with the most so if you have the time, i would like some help in this department lol
thank you so much in advance <3
Hi! Im doing great, thank you for asking!
I guess my biggest advice is to use tons of references and gradually you'll start to understand where the light goes. Also deciding beforehand where the light is coming from will help you understand how to work around it. I'm also thinking about the vibe of the picture a lot, bc different lighting will give you different vibe.
If we talking about technicality, I use Brightness/Contrast or Solid Color Adjusment Layer with Blend Mode Color Dodge and Fill around 50%, but can change the number depending on the picture. I would also recommend to do several layers of lighting with different levels of Fill/Opacity and different Blending Modes. Use a Mask to draw the light where you wan it to be. Mostly just follow the lines on clothes and face. Play with Blending Modes and Fill/Opacity. And to create a general vibe I use Color Lookup/Color Balance or Hue/Saturation. Again depends on what I wanna do or portray. One of the things that I add as well is mist/haze. It just adds to the atmosphere in general and helps separate model from the background.
Just did a quick example. I didn't use any Blending Modes here. But I hope it will give you an idea of how it works.
You can find the Adjusment Layers here:
Oh, yeah, create a light source on the background. It helps to identify where the light is coming from not only for you but for the viewer as well.
Here's one of the method I use if you wanna add color and not just the white light. Create Solid Color Adjusment Layer. You can choose any color you want. And then click twice on the layer to open Layer Style. Here you can find Underlying Layer. And by pressing Alt drag one of the points to the middle or closer to the middle.
You shoud get something like this
Then close the Layer Style window by clicking OK if you are satisfied and click on the Mask, invert it (ctrl +i) and then using Brush, preferably soft one, draw the light. White brush color to draw and Black brush color to erase. Or you can just simply copy the mask from previous layer by holding ALT on that layer mask and drag it to this one.
And you get something like this.
Hope this helps a little. Obviously, the more you practice and experiment yourself the more you'll understand how everything works, so I hope you won't give up and continue your journey. Good luck!
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