Rob Trek Forum

This is before and after of photo Rob critiqued on one of his streams. Since I did not use it, I never applied this things he mentioned in his critique. This photo was just used as a test. Monday Adobe updated PS and when they do, they mark which beta things are new. I try them all and send them many PSDs of other things I am doing when requested. One of the things I some use is depth maps with focus blur. It is a long process as I need to mask things at their proper depth on the blur line. Tuesday my mind was occupied so I just did a photo with my wife with a dozen or so textures and 8 blend modes. I had taken photos with a friend using a Canon 50/1.8 and I used a loaned EM1 II or II, I forget and a 25/18 to test the Depth Blur. I was asked not to post them because she did not like the way her Canon photos used. So today I in tried with a photo that had some dof already. This was taken with a 45-150 on an EM1. Although my 100-300 is much sharper and better this lens is small light I can put in places and shoot at arms length because of the lighter size and weight. The setting info is 40-150/4-5.6R @ 78mm, 1/180 sec, f/5.6 ISO 200. This is overdone and what I used was a little more light handed to smooth the bokeh. I usually over do things when testing to push them more and show the effect. This was a quick edit and all I used was the Depth Blur Neural Filter. It should give an idea of what 1 filter can quickly do. The neural filters (as does most AI processing software - all I have tried) is GPU intensive. With a 4 Gig Radeon card I had to wait a few seconds on each slider adjustment. Noticeable, but mainly time to have a swallow of coffee and set the cup back down. I do not think it is too bad for a beta and separates depth better than the previous version that needed simpler scenes with more clearly defined depths. It is coming along nicely in my opinion. Not ready for prime time and I send them this photo with my comments about its limitation (Adobe does not like work failures ). You may notice I chose a focus point with the filter that also gave blur to things in front of it. The layer it generates is a depth mapped partial image. Normally with depth maps, I add noise to look more natural. Which is so easy to do as this layer only has the parts that need noise on them. I did not do that here as I am just showing the filter.

One problem with the Blur Effect that is not refinement is that it should match the original grain (noise) of the photo. I went ahead and did in manually to give it the look and also did a Selective Color adjustment to adjust the white per Rob's removing some green.

It's a very subtle difference and I do like a little less green. I think green is my least favorite color.

I would I had some more green - the folding kind. The finishing touches are always subtle. I added a little blue to keep them from getting too warm as well as removed the green and removed some cyan also. I really like the Selective Color in PS. Since my B&Ws are always 16 bit color, I use it to adjust my whites, greys, and blacks. Adobe should have said they had a white grey and black adjustment instead of hiding it under something called Selective Color (which it is not anyway). I tune my whites in about every photo once I found it. Before it was highlights which affected other colors. Someday I will learn PS. Still things to click on and see what they do. BTW, the updated the beta I used Wednesday and it did this photo better - especially when I picked a focus point further back.