Tonal Contrast Example

smackitsakic · Jan 3, 2011

As mentioned on other posts, a friend of mine is an amazing photographer and one that I hired during a previous employment of mine. His photos are what I consider profound.

Here is a link to a photo that he obviously manipulated in photoshop during post processing:

Celebrate! photo - Steve Hiscock photos at pbase.com

He says he played around with the tonal contrast of the image. My question to you - how did he achieve this feel? While i'm not trying to duplicate a photographers style, I would like to have this in my post-processing arsenal in the future.

Namely, I love the 'cartoon' feel that is in this image. The colours are vibrant, specifically in the players hockey pants (sitting), and the sharpness on the players face/visor is precise.

I also like the play on the arena ceiling, giving it a cooler feel than the rest of the image.

How do you do this in Photoshop? Specifically, Photoshop CS5?

marmots · Jan 3, 2011

Getting That Cool Gritty Look Right in Camera Raw and Photoshop or Lightroom Scott Kelby's Photoshop Insider Blog » Photoshop & Digital Photography Techniques, Tutorials, Books, Reviews & More

ann · Jan 3, 2011

check out Lucis Art software and Dave Hill,

smackitsakic · Jan 3, 2011

Thanks Marmots.

I used your link and created this. The photo isn't as compelling as others, but it was the best RAW photo I could find with fairly strong contrast.

Thoughts on the results for a first try? Not really look for preference on which photo is 'better', just wanting C and C on the effect itself?

BEFORE:

AFTER:

marmots · Jan 3, 2011

try darkening it a bit, that often helps

the softening helps a lot too, in lightroom just a heavy noise removal makes a perfect layer mask

here's one that i edited i did not take this picture, i only edited it