This is because some of the image enhancement tools can make noise more pronounced. However, because increasing structure can result in increased noise, and because the sky in this image was already noisy, I felt this was a good time to apply a dose of noise reduction.Ī lot of people make applying noise reduction their first step in the image enhancement process, however others (myself included) prefer to apply noise reduction closer to the end of post processing.

My next step was to use Viveza to bring out some depth to the sky by adding some structure to the clouds. My goal for this image was to emphasize this contrast between the light and dark areas, and to revive the mood of the scene by presenting a sense of “storminess.” The original image The original unprocessed imageĪfter converting the image into a Smart Object in Photoshop, and adjusting the contrast of the image using Color Efex Pro’s “Tonal Contrast” filter, I warmed up the image and adjusted the saturation using the “Brilliance/Warmth” tool ( not really necessary because the image will eventually be converted to Black and White). Where I stood, there was a lone tree stump glistening in the sunlight, and the stark contrast between the stump and the dark looming clouds in the background caught my eye.

In the image below, I recall that there was an intense storm moving in, and dark clouds were quickly encroaching. Ask yourself “What features were present in this scene that made me want to capture this image…what was the attraction?” Whatever the inspiration was, this is one of the things that you should focus on when enhancing your image-try to emphasize it and share it with the viewer. When enhancing images, it’s good to think back and remember what aspects of the scene caught your eye. I’ll also be using some other tools from the Nik Software collection such as Color Efex Pro 3.0, Viveza 2, and Dfine 2.0. In this tutorial I’ll demonstrate the use of this wonderful tool on a noisy, relatively low quality image that I captured back in 2002 using a Nikon 995 digital camera. The tool offers loads of flexibility and and high quality results with minimal loss of image information (just like all of the Nik Software tools). Nik Software’s Silver Efex Pro 2 plug-in is “King of the Hill” when it comes to processing black and white images.

Nik silver efex pro