#softdreams

Yo! Here’s the second edit: the indoor pic. Sorry it has taken me so much time to get these two edit “tuts” done, nonny. Life’s just too busy (⇀‸↼‶)

Right click the image and open it in an another tab to see the enlarged version for details. Open them in tumblr mode, or else they’ll show up tiny.

1. So, this is the ‘before the edits’ pic which was taken with Whiisker SoftDreamsreshade preset! This time I think the “ambient light” setting was on.

2. In Photoshop I fix few things that bother me too much such as clipping and odd shading caused by reshade etc. I use smudge tool, clone tool, liquify tool, and my paint brush for fixing. The GIF  below shows the ‘before fixes and after fixes’. Yes, the quality of the gif is bad but that’s not the point d(-_^)

2.5. I also added smart sharpen and used a mask to erase the sharpening from the blurred area. I reduced the noise with Topaz noise (I use default settings but pulled the strength slider to 0.05) Oh and I used the blur tool to blur the chair a bit.

3. After those steps I placed rain images over the windows to make it a bit more obvious that it is raining outside. Window 1 and window 3 have a black-and-white rain image over them, which layer mode is set to ‘screen’. 

Window 2 has a rain splash drawn with a brush and faded out with the the layer fill option to 22%

I also grouped the window rain layers and set the group mode to Pass Through.

p.s you can get all kind of free rain brushes and images by simply searching them via google

3.5. Every rain layer has a layer mask, which ensures that only the window areas are visible while rest gets hidden! (the red x I have on the example images is just there because I turned the mask off to show what the layers look like without the masks)

4. Finally I add image adjustments. 

One: Curves adjustment from cowplant-pizza Yogi bear action. 

Second: I brush a spot of warm yellow color on top of the fireplace area and set the layer to overlay mode and lower the opacity to 37%

Third: I place a light-dust (black-and-white) image and set it on screen mode and use mask to erase any parts I don’t need. I set the layer also to 27% opacity because I didn’t want the light-dust to be too strong.

Okay, nonny, here’s the outdoor pic edit of mine. (I’ll do the indoor one later)

1. This is the before the edits pic which was taken with Whiisker SoftDreams reshade preset. I think I had the “ambient light” setting off, or what ever causes the pretty pinkish tone in this preset.

2. I duplicated the layer and added a field blur. Then I painted a mask to define what areas I needed blurred exactly. I did this to get a better control for the depth of field since the reshade didn’t do it exactly the way I wanted. 

3. Then I used Bohemian Sundance action. I don’t usually use this action for sim pics, but I randomly tried it and it gave this image much more interesting feel so I kept it.

4. I added a couple of adjustment layers to fix the tones because the action made it too purple. Color balance + Selective color to lessen the magenta. (You can right click the image and open it as a new tab to see the settings closely) Lastly I added a color-fill adjustment layer with a ‘Lighten’ mode.

5. Next I added more rain with free rain and splash brushes because there wasn’t enough rain in that pic. I adjusted opacity of the rain layers and masked away anything I didn’t want!

Sounds Better With Reverb  is one of my favorite media sites

Here’s the lyrics to “All The Outs Are Free”

waiting so long

to only appear 

real in a dream 

don’t drift away

stay if you can

come as you are

I’ll let you in 

find somewhere inside

closer to my heart

outside of these walls