Using Luminosity Masks In Photoshop

Click image to enlarge. 

Well, played hookie from working again yesterday.  I was "supposed to be" cleaning out the spare bedroom.  Getting rid of (or at east organizing) buckets of photographic bits and pieces.  Instead, a friend suggested anyone interested should get together and go down to the New York Botanical Gardens.  Sometimes you just can't say no to that kind of temptation.  It didn't take a whole lot of persuading to get Doris' buy in on the caper.  Flowers have been sort of her thing lately, taking equally good shots with both her Nikon and her Samsung cell phone.  She has a very good eye, but I swear I'm going to "accidently" smash that phone because of the quality of the images she gets with it.  Oh well, sometimes the gods are with you and sunlight finds it way to exactly the right spot.  To find out how a couple of Luminosity Masks rounded out todays image, hit the "Read More".

Today's image is probably a lot easier to create than you might think.  There were several spots in the Gardens where light was falling where you'd typically aim a strobe.  Sort like nature's spotlight.  The flowers were in full cloudy bright light and, with the right shooting position, the background went fully dark. 

Once back in the darkroom (okay, it was actually Adobe Photoshop Lightroom [LR]) it only took bringing the Shadows down and the Highlights up to get 90% of the way there.  A quick trip over to Adobe Photoshop (PS) and the use of Jimmy McIntrye's Easy Panel gave me the Luminosity Masks (LM) needed to drop the background out entirely without damaging the flowers. 

Jimmy's Easy Panel is a free extension panel you can add to PS.  There's probably a dozen or so choices you can make from the panel.  I've only tried the LMs and the sub-choices produced by them cut work time down considerably.  If you have a basic understanding of LMs you'll find Jimmy's panel very useful.

That was it.  A couple sliders in LR and the use of LMs in PS.  Quick and easy.