The Best way to Dodge and Burn in Photoshop

[@steveclarkemedia]

Very good. I am trying to improve my Photoshop technique and this is the most helpful guide on dodging and burning I have seen to date. Importantly ALL your steps are clear. So often important details like - how do you make a group - are glossed over by the demonstrator because they think it's trivial. But it's not if you don't know the program well. Thank you for your clarity. I subscribed today!

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you. That's what I try to do. I may go through some information quickly but I do try to explain.

[@barbara.mouraf]

Very well explained and straight to the point. Thank you so much!

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you. I'm pleased that you enjoyed it.

[@TamerZourob]

Awesome, very well explained, Thanks for sharing.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you.

[@bbrussard]

Thank you again for sharing your techniques Robin. Always appreciated!

[@RobinWhalley]

You're very welcome.

[@laurenebonsor4575]

Excellent thankyou. Exactly what I needed:)) Cheers from Pukehina Beach New Zealand

[@RobinWhalley]

Brilliant, thank you. I stopped for a couple of hours in 2018 after a few days in Coromandel. It's a small world.

[@berbarmoumen1847]

Merci beaucoup, très utile en Fine Art......!

[@RobinWhalley]

Merci beaucoup. Je suis content que ça aide.

[@veselinvasilev9362]

Thank you!

[@gerarddonovan8678]

Very well explained Robin

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you

[@cliveingram9840]

Robin really helpful video but when you have your completed your dodging and burning, do you then merge (flatten) the layers?

[@RobinWhalley]

No, don’t flatten the layers. It’s better to save them in the file. If you need to work on another pixel layer, create a new consolidated layer.

[@cliveingram9840]

@@RobinWhalley thanks Robin but where I’m trying to get to is when I have a completed dodge layer and a completed burn layer - how do I combine them into the final photo? Sorry I’m a bit of a newbie in PS

[@andychattaway1361]

Great tips and techniques as usual.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks Andy.

[@arcp_]

Great video!

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks

[@kevingreiner5772]

When you use a mouse, do you have to keep clicking and moving or just click once and move the mouse over the desired area?

[@RobinWhalley]

That depends on the Flow setting for the brush. When it's set to 100%, the first click will apply the maximum strength. When you use a lower flow, each click on the same location builds up the strength of the adjustment. With a lower flow, you can also build up the strength of the effect by moving the mouse over the same area.

[@kevingreiner5772]

@@RobinWhalley Thanks! I was always confused by this. I thought you had to keep clicking with every brush stroke.

[@ushren]

Looks great. How do you know where to dodge and burn to improve the image? That is what I'm grappling with. Thanks

[@RobinWhalley]

As a general tip, try outlining objects you want to emphasise. Aim to increase the contrast around areas you want to make stand out. If you have a boulder against the sky, make the outline of the boulder dark, the sky around the boulder light and possibly the centre of the boulder lighter.

[@ushren]

@@RobinWhalley Thank you. Are there any books that describe this in detail? Thanks again!

[@RobinWhalley]

Not that I’m aware of. It’s something that’s more of an art than a science which means you need to practice. A few pointers that help are the idea of outlining objects or areas that you want emphasise. Areas that are lighter tend to attract the viewers attention more than dark areas. Areas with contrast will attract attention more than areas with poor contrast. Creating separation of an object from it’s background is important. All of these concepts are at work in this video. Another example might be a street scene at night. Your eye is drawn to any areas where there is light and you ignore the dark areas. If a person was illuminated by one of the lights your attention would automatically be drawn to their shape. It wouldn’t matter if you couldn’t see their detail, their outline would be sufficient.

[@ushren]

@@RobinWhalley Thanks. Appreciate the pointers!

[@lycosa10]

Great video :)

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you

[@DCW96161]

Great tutorial as always Robin. Thank you. But here's an unrelated question: How do you get your cursor to provide that magnifying loupe?

[@RobinWhalley]

Lots of people ask this. The magnifier is actually a feature of the video recording software I use. If you like it though, try doing a google search for "Accessibility Magnifier" and your operating system. Both Windows and Mac have a similar feature but how you turn this on depends on your OS.

[@satart6080]

Thank you very much!

[@betohs]

There's to many videos on this topic...too much bla bla bla....thank you. You make it easy and simple...new sub

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you.

[@777-Phil]

Thumbs down: Consider artists who must discriminate 'on-the-fly': Much better for me to hit 'Ctrl+J' (non-destructive copy) and just apply a shortcut key-board letter to the Dodge-Tool and Burn-Tool ... with Shift+# for exposure. Worse here, iirc, you are not able to discriminate the shadows-vs-mids-vs-highlights using this basic method I do appreciate your excellent thoughts. Many appreciate your method. Utmost blessings!

[@RobinWhalley]

If the old Dodge and Burn tools work for you then don't change. Whilst I didn't cover it in the video because I wanted to keep it short and simple, I only demonstrated part of my method. I use this method in combination with Zone Masks so I can target whatever tones I want. But I'm really not sure what you mean by the comment "Consider artists who must discriminate on the fly".

[@joseph-the-seventh]

Interesting technique. Any advantage here over using curves adjustment layers with masks? Seems like curves would give you more control but I could be mistaken.