Uneven Lighting

[okyou]

Hello,
Is there any way using tools in paint shop pro to correct uneven lighting in a photo. I shot a photo but it came out with uneven lighting as below

Appreciate if anyone can share any information on how to correct the lighting issue and make the lighting level uniform across the photo ?
Thanks

[hartpaul]

1 Duplicate the image
2.Hide the top image
3. Apply a levels to the bottom image so that the darker parts are to your liking
4. Make the top image visible again.
5. Choose the Eraser brush and with a low opacity and large brush and Hardness about 10 (makes it a soft edged brush slowly erase the darker parts of teh image to show the lightened parts below. If you go to far then right click and drag unerases that section.
You couod also use masks but that would involve an ectra layer and explaining about masks and using black and white fotr your paint brush.

[bruce1951]

Many approaches.

I would use the selection tool. Select the darker area making sure your selection tool is set with a soft edges. Then have a play with the curves tool.

or, or,

As I said many approaches.

bruce

[okyou]

1 Duplicate the image
2.Hide the top image
3. Apply a levels to the bottom image so that the darker parts are to your liking
4. Make the top image visible again.
5. Choose the Eraser brush and with a low opacity and large brush and Hardness about 10 (makes it a soft edged brush slowly erase the darker parts of teh image to show the lightened parts below. If you go to far then right click and drag unerases that section.
You couod also use masks but that would involve an ectra layer and explaining about masks and using black and white fotr your paint brush.

Thanks for your tips, it work out well.

Also thanks for bruce's comment. But can you explain where is a selection tool with soft edge and the curve tool ?

[Joelle]

How odd, I replied yesterday, but don't see it..

I use Fill Light/Clarify for this, repeat it a few times if necessary :

Joëlle

[bruce1951]

Find the Selection tool on the left hand side. Choose the Freehand option. In the tool options change the Feather to a suitable number. (Higher the wider the 'blur'). You can also play with Smoothing. Draw around your darker area and try adjusting with Curves or Levels.

bruce

[okyou]

How odd, I replied yesterday, but don't see it..

I use Fill Light/Clarify for this, repeat it a few times if necessary :

Fill Light-Clarity.jpg

Joëlle

Hello Joelle,

Thanks for your suggestion. I played with The Fill Light/Clarity a few times but it affect the whole photo area.

[okyou]

Find the Selection tool on the left hand side. Choose the Freehand option. In the tool options change the Feather to a suitable number. (Higher the wider the 'blur'). You can also play with Smoothing. Draw around your darker area and try adjusting with Curves or Levels.

bruce

Thanks for the alternative options.

[Joelle]

A Fill Light makes dark areas lighter, of course the settings needs experimenting with

Joëlle

[ehume]

1. Somewhere I remember an app (could be PSP?) where you could set lighting from different directions.

2. Something to do with a gradient fill, with the gradient running from transparent to dark. You select the whole image; apply the gradient fill, the darker end on the lighter part of the image. Then the image will have a uniform darkness. You can then increase the EV of the whole image.

[hartpaul]

Fill light lightens all areas, but has a bigger effect in darker areas.
The image looks like it was taken with soft light from about 45 degrees right, and as such the darker areas are to the left with the darkest on the lower left.

I tried Adjust > Brightness and Contrast > Highlights Midtones and Shadows with settings Shadows +61 and Highlights -36. This lightened the darker side and brought back the lighter side but flattened the image a bit.
So then used Adjust Brightness and Contrast > Brightness/Contrast with Brightness -6 and Contrast 9.

This was the result

Note that the colors have now been changed a bit so some color corrections may need to be done as well.

[okyou]

Thanks for your parameters. Well done.

[JoeB]

Back in the days of PSPX1, a member named Peter Anderson (aka Rusty) created a script called Rusty's New Dynamic Range script, the stated purpose of which is to increase the dynamic range of an image. The practical purpose is to even out the dynamic range of an image where, like the image originally posted in this thread, the lighting is uneven in a gradual way, although of course it does affect the dynamic range overall. The major perceptual effect is to make the darker areas lighter and the lighter areas darker, and it affects the entire image.

I applied the script to this image. But because it made the sky much more dramatic (like applying an HDR filter) I first I isolated the sky area by selecting it, promoting it to a layer, then going back to the previous layer and running the script. Also, the adjustment layer it creates defaults to an opacity of 50%, and I hiked it right up to about 93% until I felt the lighting was fairly even.

The first image is the result of just using the script.

The second image - personal preference - is the result of taking the image created with the script then Clarity at 53 and then Brightness at 11 and Contrast at 6. In other words, if the script does most of what you want to achieve, then other tweaking - brightness, contrast, colors, sharpening, etc. - can obviously be used to suit personal preference. Of course you have to merge the adjustment layer created by the script before you can do further tweaking.

I have used the script many times over the years on images with this type of lighting problem. If anyone thinks it would be useful just let me know and I'll post it in the Scripting sub-group.

[Joelle]

Small correction:
Rusty is not Peter Anderson
Peter Anderson is Ken Russell's son. Ken is also known as Rusty.
He is one of the very few who still partakes in the Photo group on the dogagent server.
news.dogagent.com
Photography.
As Corel saw fit to plug on the newsgroups, the loyalty to PSP is not 100% and this group allows any editor.
Rusty now uses Serif Affinity Photo.

Joëlle

[JoeB]

Small correction:
Rusty is not Peter Anderson
Peter Anderson is Ken Russell's son. Ken is also known as Rusty.
Joëlle

Thanks for the correction. The reason I thought they were the same person was because the name of the script it Rusty's, and the author shown in the script header is Peter Anderson. Wondering why Peter's name would appear in the Author field of the script and yet the script be named Rusty's