How to 'fake' a sunset?

[WillyNelson]

I'd like to give this picture

a golden sunset glow as in this image

but I haven't got the first clue how to do it. I tried adding a gradient with the desired colour but that just made it look all washed out.

Any advice would be very welcome.

Thanks

 

[foodpoison]

Ideally, you'd want to make the colour temperature warmer by using the photoshop's in-built raw converter. if you haven't shot in raw, there is no easy way to change colour temperature.

Here is my attempt:

What I did:
Step 1. Image>Adjustments>Colour Balance
Made the whole image a lot more yellow and then half as much magenta as yellow
Step 2. Repeated step one
Step 3. Used the selection tool with a 15 pixels feather to highlight the sky
Step 4. Repeated step 1 on the sky to required effect
Step 5. Changed the brightness on the selected sky a bit higher, and added about 10% more contrast

Its not great, but it took about 3 minutes, and its a start. Good luck

 

[mattyh]

Nice work FP... nice pic willy

Horizons not straight though

 

[WillyNelson]

Ideally, you'd want to make the colour temperature warmer by using the photoshop's in-built raw converter. if you haven't shot in raw, there is no easy way to change colour temperature.

Sadly not raw

Here is my attempt:


What I did:
Step 1. Image>Adjustments>Colour Balance
Made the whole image a lot more yellow and then half as much magenta as yellow
Step 2. Repeated step one
Step 3. Used the selection tool with a 15 pixels feather to highlight the sky
Step 4. Repeated step 1 on the sky to required effect
Step 5. Changed the brightness on the selected sky a bit higher, and added about 10% more contrast

Its not great, but it took about 3 minutes, and its a start. Good luck :thumbs:[/QUOTE]

That's great, exactly what I was looking for. I'm having trouble replicating the effect though. Don't suppose you can recall how much you increased the yellow by each time can you? And I'm not really sure what you mean by "Used the selection tool with a 15 pixels feather to highlight the sky"
:thinking:

 

[foodpoison]

you have photoshop i assume?
On the selection tool, in the top menu, there is a feather option, just type 15 in there.

And I don't know, about 3/4 of the bar?
and the magenta, about 1/3 of the bar.

 

[Techno-Geek]

foodpoison - You de man @ Photoshop

That looks awesome

Tony

 

[foodpoison]

Here it is again, just a little less orange (can see the colour in the pebbles is retained) and straightened horizon (used the ruler tool and then rotate canvas>arbitrary).

To get it less orange, I just did a single colour change to the whole image, then selected various areas and added more orange. Sky had the most orange treatment.

 

[CT]

Good edit by fp there.

There's loads of ways to do this. Try using a lighting effect.

Set the light as a uniform flood fill and vary the colour of the light for different effects. You can even set the amount of darkness you want and the intensity of the light.

 

[Alfred D.]

Or, in the menubar, you can goto image –> Adjustments –> Photo filter... –> Warm filter (LBA) at 75%.
However, imo the secret of the 'golden glow' in that original sunset picture is in the highlighted edges of the clouds. And I don't know how to wrangle those into the edit.
Ideas anybody?

 

[Garry79]

There's also a handy tool in Photoshop called 'Match Colour' for situations like this, where you have two images with different colour casts and you want to match one to the other. It usually works well and ensures that both images have a similar feel to them.