The Photoshop® Elements 10 Book for Digital Photographers

The Orton Effect

Another new built-in special effect in Elements 10 is called the Orton Effect. The technique comes from traditional photography, where a photo was created by “sandwiching” two photos, one in focus and one out of focus, together. It adds a semi-soft focus, an almost dreamy style, to your photo, while still looking like the photo is sharp.

Step One:

Open a photo in the Editor to apply the effect to. You can use it on just about any photo, but I find photos that have a softer look to them work best. Portraits tend to get too blurry, but hey, you can always give it a try. In this photo, the late-afternoon feeling of the sun and trees works really well. Click on Guided at the top of the Edit tab, scroll down to Photography Effects, ...