How to Do Everything With Your Scanner- P41 docx

FIGURE 10-27 The same photo after the sharpening tool is used Improving Photos with Soften and Blur Effects There are times when you might actually want to blur a photo to achieve a cert

FIGURE 10-27 The same photo after the sharpening tool is used

Improving Photos with Soften and Blur Effects

There are times when you might actually want to blur a photo to achieve a certain

effect Most image-editing programs come with softening and blurring tools that are useful for the following purposes:

Creating the effect of motion Slightly blurring a portion of a photo can create the impression of motion I’ve used this technique on the batter’s feet in the photo

in Figure 10-28 to create the illusion that she’s about to run to first base

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FIGURE 10-28 Blurring the area around the batter’s feet creates an illusion of motion

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Obscuring background and emphasizing your subject In Figures 10-29 and 10-30, I’ve used this technique to make the subject stand out against the relatively uninteresting backdrop of the computer lab

FIGURE 10-29 An attractive subject against a busy, uninteresting background

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FIGURE 10-30 Blurring the background enhances the subject of the photo

Making photo retouching less apparent It’s generally impossible to get a perfect match when using the clone tool described previously in this chapter to retouch a photo Using the softening tool to blend the retouched area can make it nearly indiscernible See Figures 10-21 and 10-22 earlier in this chapter

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Correcting Under- and Overexposed Photos

Do you have photos of meaningful memories—but the memory is obscured or ruined because the photos came out too light or too dark? Scanning and editing can salvage your precious memories It’s simply a matter of correcting the effects of the initial under- or overexposure

How Exposure to Light Affects Photo Quality

Regardless of what type of camera you use to take a photo, the brightness and darkness

of your shot are controlled by a measurement called exposure Exposure refers to how

much light reached the film inside the camera at the time you took the photo

Two factors determine the level of exposure:

Camera shutter speed Your camera has a component, called a shutter, that

covers the lens The shutter allows light to travel through the lens to the film when the shutter is opened Shutters are set at different opening and closing speeds The faster the shutter speed, the more quickly the shutter opens and closes and the less light is allowed to enter

Film sensitivity If you look at any box of film, the packaging displays a rating, for example, 100, 200, or 400 This rating tells you how sensitive the film is to light The higher the rating, the more sensitive the film is to light

The more exposure the film has and the higher the sensitivity of the film, the lighter and brighter the final picture Too much light, and the image appears washed out, or

overexposed Too little light, and the image appears dark, or underexposed.

When you’re taking a picture and not sure of the shutter setting to use, it’s generally better to err on the side of overexposing rather than underexposing Overexposed photos have more stored image data, and can be corrected more effectively using your scanner and image-editing software than underexposed photos.

Enhancing an Entire Photo

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