Photoshop How To

We get it. Not every photo you shoot is going to have eye-popping color or attractive dynamic range. But like a lot of things with imaging, you can fix some of your visual mistakes in Photoshop.

In the below tutorial, PSDESIRE shows you how to recover highlights and color tone using apply image in Photoshop. Begin by opening the image you want to edit in Photoshop and then duplicate the background layer with CTRL/CMD+J. Then go to the Shadows and Highlights under image adjustments. Keep all shadows and highlights sliders at zero.

"In this case, we want to recover the washed out highlights so increase amount of highlights to see the blown out sky details," PSDESIRE says regarding the demo image.

"Similarly adjust tone percentage and radius to your preference. Once you're happy click ok to apply the changes. Now add layer mask to the layer. Go to image menu - use apply image on a layer mask to make the recovered detail effect applied only to lighter parts of the photo."

Next, add solid color adjustment and select any blue color of your choice. Then change the blending mode to soft light and right click on color fill adjustment and create clipping mask.

"The Clipping Mask allows the blue color applied only to bottom recovery layer," PSDESIRE explains.

"Lower the opacity of the fill adjustment to reduce the color intensity to your liking. Similarly lets add some brown color to the shadows part of the image. add Another solid color adjustment and select any brown or orange color of your choice. change blending mode to soft light. Go to image menu - use apply image on a layer mask with invert option to make the color applied only to darker parts of the photo. Lower the opacity of the color adjustment."

The final step is to adjust the color grade to select a fall colors preset, which will give the image "a nice golden hour sunset look." After that, you're done. Watch the video below to see all the steps explained and demonstrated.