Getting Started in the Layers Module – ON1 Photo RAW

hey everyone Dan here let me give you an introduction to the layers module I'm gonna start off here in browse and select a photo that I want to work on let's use this wedding photo when you find the photo or photos you want to work on simply click on layers the layers module is designed to let you combine multiple photos together so you can take the best parts of different photos this is great for doing head swaps or sky replacements or if you need to combine multiple folders to create a composite of some sort it does a lot of a layer based heavy lifting that applications like Adobe Photoshop do let me give you a quick tour and then I'll show you how to use it over here on the left hand side is the tool well it has the biggest tool will of all the modules at the top is the move tool we'll talk about that in just a moment then there's the crop and trim tool then there's a section of the masking tools a section for refining the mask the retouching tools you're familiar with and then the view adjustment tools on the right hand side you'll see the layers palette each layer that you create either by merging photos together are cut making multiple copies of the same photo will appear as a layer similar to the way it layers work inside of effects with a layer you can change its order its position size of rotation you can also change its blending mode and its opacity and then each layer can also be masked as well so you can combine layers together when you save the file in layers it's saved as a PSD or a Photoshop format with all of the layers and masks in place that way it's cross-platform and compatible with Photoshop in this example I want to replace this boring white sky with a more exciting sky we're actually gonna build a sky from scratch but before we get into that there's kind of an ugly chain-link fence and an electrical pole over here I want to get rid of so I'm gonna use some of the retouching tools let's use the perfect eraser now you see me use the perfect eraser in the develop module it works the same way here in layers simply paint across what you want to get rid of and it will automatically fill it in with proper image detail next we need to find the beginning of our sky now you can go back to browse and select another photo and use the sky from it or you could use some of the built-in skies that come with layers I'm gonna open up the little file browser over here on the left and I'll go to the extras tab inside of the extras tab there's tons of included elements that you can use to work on your photos I'm gonna go to the skies category and you can see how there's a ton of different skies that we include which makes doing sky replacement easy I want to build up a warm late afternoon sky so I'm actually gonna start with this one and we're gonna use it a couple of times when you find one you want simply drag it on top of your photo you can open it as a new photo or you can add it as a layer I'm gonna use the add as a layer option you can see in my layers palette there's a new layer for the new file that I've added in let's close that browser so we have a little more room to work the first thing I need to do is to size and position this new layer to transform layers you use the move tool when the move tool is selected you can click on a photo to drag it and reposition it you can make it bigger or smaller using the corner handles you can even rotate it by moving the cursor just outside of a corner and rotate it there's also some tools in the top to make this easier there's tools to rotate it and flip it or to have it filled the canvas size I mean to use the fill canvas option this will make it automatically fit my size of the photo now right now it's on top of my photo I actually want it to be below so simply select the layer in the layers stack and drag it in the position you want I want to below my photo there we go now it's hidden the next thing I need to do is to use the masking tools to paint away the boring white sky to reveal my new more interesting colorful sky so select the layer you want to mask the upper layer and we're going to use the masking tools I'm gonna start with the masking brush and use the perfect brush option the perfect brush will sample the color under the center of the brush we'll paint away the white but we'll stop when it gets to the green of the trees so I can simply paint through here and it'll start to paint away that boring white sky you could always hit the O key on your keyboard or press the mask preview button in the bottom to see the mask if you're unfamiliar with masks anything that's white on the mask will reveal the layer anything that's black on the layer will conceal it anything it's a shade of gray you'll get partial transmission now that's a good start but it's not quite perfect yet to refine that edge and make it softer we'll use the refine brush the refine mask brush will work along the edge and automatically detects the color differences and will soften and create a more natural-looking transition for us there now if you look in the mask you'll see how it creates a softer more natural transition around those subtle how to focus leaves I'm just gonna repeat that around the rest of the branches there that's looking better now let's make our sky a little bit stronger I can simply select my sky layer and duplicate it by pressing the duplicate button then by using the power of the blending modes I can combine those two duplicates together to make them stronger or darker I'll just change the blending mode to multiply and then by using the layer opacity control I can control how strongly I want the two combined together so I can really dial in just how intense I want that sky to be now I like that but I'd like to have a little bit of clouds in there too so let's go add another layer of a sky that has some clouds I'm just gonna open up my browser and look for another photo that has some subtle clouds that would mash maybe this one there we go we'll drag it in and add it as a layer as well let's close the browser again so we have space to work and now we'll use the Move tool to size and position that photo you notice how it placed it automatically on top of the layer that I had selected let's just move that and I'm gonna use the sizing handles to make it much larger because I really only want just the top portion of the photo there we go that adds some nice fluffy clouds next to make let's blend in and look a little more realistic I'll just use the opacity slider and pull it down and adjust it until I have just the edge of those clouds appearing in my beautiful late afternoon sky if I need to fine-tune my mask a little bit more I can go up to the upper layer and use more of the mask refinement tools so far we use the automatic refinement tool but I'd also like to use the blur tool a little just to soften that edge of the mask a little bit more so this will gently blur the edge of the mask and we'll make those out-of-focus areas blend in in a more natural way this doesn't actually blur the pixels in the photo it's effectively just softening the mask there we go we use the power of layers to combine multiple photos together I was able to replace a sky by building a new sky using multiple photos to create the late-afternoon look that I wanted now that's just the tip of the iceberg of what you can do with the layers module we'll cover some of the more advanced features in the advanced video thanks for watching

Channel: ON1

Views: 16,524

Keywords: on1, onone software, effects, photo editing, image editing, Adobe photoshop, Adobe Lightroom, Lightroom, Photoshop, Apple Aperture, photo effects, photo filters, photography filters, lightroom presets, masking, inspiration, photo raw, raw processor, raw, image, photography, photography training, landscape photography, portrait photography, travel photography, iPhone, professional photography, professional photographer, Apple, Windows

Id: RcWDkSlZ7_c

Length: 7min 35sec (455 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 09 2018