Luminous Landscape Forum

Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Digital Image Processing => Topic started by: luong on February 13, 2009, 05:45:16 pm

Title: Photoshop CS3 action - select channel not working
Post by: luong on February 13, 2009, 05:45:16 pm
I have used for a long time an action to blend two images with different exposures for improved dynamic range based on a technique that was described on this site at http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorial...-blending.shtml (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital-blending.shtml) (under "The Layer Mask").

That action ("dynamicblending") can be found in the action folder http://www.terragalleria.com/tmp/dynamicblend.atn (http://www.terragalleria.com/tmp/dynamicblend.atn)

To try it, you need to have two images of the same scene with different exposures.

I have found it to work very well, and I prefer it to HDR in most cases. It is hereby offered for free to anybody.

Recently, I have tried to modify that action to add an additional step so that the two images would be automatically aligned, which is useful if the camera shifted slightly between the two exposures, something that often happens with all but the sturdiest tripod and head.

Problem is that when the modified action ("dynamicblendingalign") is played, the step "select current channel" (which I recorded by option-clicking on the mask icon) does work: the mask is not selected.  

I have inserted a stop here, before the next step ("Paste"). If the mask was selected, you'd see a white image, but on my system, it is not.  As the result, the following step "paste" creates a third layer, instead of pasting into the mask.

However, when the all the action steps are executed manually (for instance while recording the action), the mask was selected. Also, after the "stop", if I option-click the mask, the mask is also selected. That's what I do now as a workaround, but I'd like to understand why it is not working in the action.

Can someone help me figure out why "select current channel" does not do the right thing in the second action ? Or is it only a problem with my system ?

Thanks
Title: Photoshop CS3 action - select channel not working
Post by: mdijb on February 13, 2009, 06:00:40 pm
The link to the action on the Terra website does not appear to be working--a bunch of gibberish appears

MDIJB
Title: Photoshop CS3 action - select channel not working
Post by: luong on February 13, 2009, 06:32:33 pm
Quote from: mdijb
The link to the action on the Terra website does not appear to be working--a bunch of gibberish appears

MDIJB

It is working, but the link points to an action file, which is a binary format (hence displayed as gibberish by a browser)

Right click on the link, and select "Save as" (or equivalent on your browser)

For saving location, use /Applications/Adobe Photoshop CS3/Presets/Actions (or equivalent on your system)

Load that action folder ("dynamicblend.atn") by clicking on the menu icon on the top right corner of the Actions palette.