golden retriever in a golden field

[jess128]

Hello everyone.
I took this photo about 2 years ago on a Nikon Coolpix P100. I have now upgraded and have more knowlege on lighting and such, but didn't when this photo was taken. I love the colour of the field and the way my dog looks in it, but the overexposed sky bothers me. I want to get this photo framed but I'd like to edit the sky somehow. Does anyone know how I can do this or what can be done? I brightened it up when it was first taken just using iPhoto's editing tools, because the shadow being cast was quite dark and this made that area much better, but overexposed the sky.

[karen_s]

What a perfect setting for a golden. He reminds me of my last boy Jordie, grey and handsome.

Anyway, to your issue ...

I think your shot somewhat salvageable. What software do you have to work with? I'm guessing iPhoto but wondering if you have anything else as there are at least a few ways to fix this and I'm not sure iPhoto has what you need. (You might be able to find a plug-in though.)

Here are a few tools that will help you get there so look to see if your software has any of them ...

1. A dodge and burn tool or light tool. Basically, you want to burn the sky and dodge the dog and foreground to balance out the exposure.
2. A gradation tool that allows adjustment of large areas of light. This has less control than the dodge and burn tool but will achieve the same thing and works pretty well for landscapes.
3. A recovery tool or slider. As you lighten the overall exposure, you can bring back a bit of the sky with a recovery tool.
5. Layers. A bit more advanced (and I don't think iPhoto has layers) but you can take two images and put them together in Photoshop or Gimp using layers. (Gimp is open source software and I believe it's a free download.) You need one image properly exposed for the sky and one for the dog and you merge them together using layers.
6. Crop. If you don't have any of the above tools to work with, you could try a crop. It doesn't bring back the sky but rather gets rid of most of it. The blown out area becomes much less of the image and lessens it's ability to overpower your subject.

Hope that's enough to get you started.

[jess128]

thank you, Karen! My brother has photoshop and I've been meaning to download his copy, so I will have a more substantial program to work with and I'll go through the techniques you suggested. Much appreciated