Chapter 10. Correcting Contrast, Color, and Clarity

In This Chapter

  • Correcting shadows, highlights, and contrast

  • Removing colorcasts

  • Adjusting hue and saturation

  • Removing and replacing color

  • Adjusting skin tones

  • Working with color variations

  • Removing noise and artifacts

  • Eliminating dust, scratches, and tears

  • Sharpening and blurring your image

  • Working intelligently with the Smart Brush tools

If you've tried the quick and easy automatic fixes on your images and they didn't quite do the job, you've come to the right place. The great thing about Elements is that it offers multiple ways and multiple levels of repairing and enhancing your images. If an auto fix doesn't cut it, move on to a manual fix. If you're still not happy, you can consider shooting in Camera Raw format, as long as your camera can do so. Elements has wonderful Camera Raw support, enabling you to process your images to your exact specifications. Chances are that if you can't find the tools to correct and repair your images in Elements, those images are probably beyond salvaging.

Correcting Contrast, Color, and Clarity

Note

With information in Chapter 9 and this chapter at your fingertips, try to employ some kind of logical workflow when you tackle the correction and repair of your images, such as in these steps:

  1. Crop, straighten, and resize your images, if necessary.

  2. After you have the images in their proper physical state, correct the lighting and establish good tonal range ...

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