L603+Fiesta+2--Griessman--Photo+Editing


 * Digital Photo Editing**

For this portion of the assignment, Jasc Paintshop Pro, a program that I typically only use to crop photos and to resize them. In this instance, I explored the color correction portion of the program.


 * Jasc Paintshop Pro**

In the first portion of this assignment, I took pictures of flowers outside and had some issues with lighting, in that some pictures were too dark. I wanted to see if I could use Jasc in order to lighten and brighten one of these photos.


 * The original flower photo looked like this:**



As stated earlier, I really wanted more contrast here, especially in the center of the flowers so as to give the phto some depth. I particularly wanted to bring out the red color on the tips of the coneflower center spines.

Opening the file in Jasc, I chose "Adjust-->Color Balance-->Automatic Color Balance." Using this portion of the program, I was given the option to make the image cooler in color, tending toward shades of blue, or warmer in color, tending toward orange. I ended up setting this somewhere near the mid-way point. Here, I could change the color of the flower spines to more reflect their actual color. However, the colors of the flowers were changed slightly. I do like the somewhat antiqued feeling I get though, from this photo. It looks aged, somehow.


 * Here is my result using the color auto adjust feature:**




 * Other Options**

Jasc allows for a number of ways of correcting color. The manual color correction allows you to basically filter the image through a filter of your choice. The red/green/blue option allows you to adjust these three colors individually by changing their values. Other color correction options include a color balance and channel mixer.

Also Jasc allows you to adjust hue and saturation in a variety of ways. In the hue and saturation menu, there is an automatic saturation adjustment as well as a hue/saturation/lighteness tool.

Going back to the original photo, I tried lightening and brightening the image using the "Adjust-->Color Balance-->Red/Green/Blue" option. I played with the levels of all three colors, and found I was happiest with the red set at 30%, green at 19%, and blue at 22%. I found it interesting that I couldn't just increase the red value to obtain the red color in the spines, as this made the flowers too red. Still, the flower petals, especially the ones in the center of the picture, are a bit too light in places, given the image an "over-exposed" quality.


 * Here is the result using the red/green/blue color correct option:**

You'll note that the flowers are not exactly the same color as in the original, but I thought this was pretty close.

Next, I tried using the hue and saturation adjustment option. I tried using the "Adjust-->Hue and Saturation-->Automatic Saturation Enhancement." This, actually, gave nice results. This adjustment enhanced the colors just enough to give me the depth I wanted without changing the colors of the flowers overly much. And it was automatic, so I didn't have to fuss with settings. Of all the images I corrected, this looked most natural, and was closest to the result I was looking for from the camera itself.


 * Here is the result obtained from the automatic saturation enhancement tool:**



Now, let's learn something with our pictures! On to Digital Learning!