Clouds - adding 3rd dimmension to pics

[Destiny]

Hi Everybody,

Could somebody point me into a right direction with my landscape enhancements?
Very often I see beautiful clouds on the pictures that almost feel like three-dimensional. I tied and tried but still can't get the right settings to do something like this in either PS or Lightroom.

Any help will be much appreciated.

[David Sutton]

You could try midtone contrast. There is a description from Nash Editions at http://www.outdoorphotographer.com/how-to/printing-and-output/print-like-ansel-adams.html?start=2
There is also a cloud sharpening tutorial at Tony Kuyper's site: http://www.goodlight.us/writing/cloudsharpening/cloudsharpening-1.html

[Lightbox]

Since when did clouds look sharp? All to often I see edited images featuring clouds with dark halo's and big soft puffy clouds that have had sharpening applied. Sure certain cloud formations have sharp edges and interesting patterns that benefit from sharpening, but most clouds actually look better softened or with a slightly overdone amount of noise reduction. Just pay attention to the amount of sharpening you use elsewhere in the image and use a bit of masking to keep it all in relation, using contrast and dodge & burn is a better option to give clouds more of a 3D appearance.

[Ken Bennett]

Very often I see beautiful clouds on the pictures that almost feel like three-dimensional.

Many times in classic black and white landscape photography, the skies got a lot of manual adjustment in the darkroom. That's still the case with modern digital, too.

[Destiny]

Hmm, it might help you when I put some examples here:

http://img203.imageshack.us/i/clouds1g.jpg/
or
http://img62.imageshack.us/i/clouds2m.jpg/
as well as the B&W pic from the 1st page of the 2nd link David provided
http://www.outdoorphotographer.com/images/stories/2008/aug/print-like-ansel/Badwater-Salt-10xLF-lg.jpg

[Chairman Bill]

I rarely add any extra sharpening to clouds. As well as varying the sharpening front to back through the photo (so foreground sharper than mid-ground, that sharper than far distance), I have an even lesser sharpening for clouds. What I do often do is add definition in parts of the cloudscape, & maybe some extra curves adjustments, in particular to bring out the mid tones. Works for me.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

I rarely add any extra sharpening to clouds. As well as varying the sharpening front to back through the photo (so foreground sharper than mid-ground, that sharper than far distance), I have an even lesser sharpening for clouds. What I do often do is add definition in parts of the cloudscape, & maybe some extra curves adjustments, in particular to bring out the mid tones. Works for me.

That's right, sharpening is not what needs to happen, but tonemapping is.

Cheers,
Bart

[Mark D Segal]

Hi Everybody,

Could somebody point me into a right direction with my landscape enhancements?
Very often I see beautiful clouds on the pictures that almost feel like three-dimensional. I tied and tried but still can't get the right settings to do something like this in either PS or Lightroom.

Any help will be much appreciated.

This fix has nothing to do with sharpening or local contrast enhancement, as it isn't about improving micro-contrast - rather it is about bringing out a whole lot of information which is "hidden" but may well exist in the image file. I cover this in my article on this website called "You'd Be Surprised.." http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/surprised.shtml Anyhow, to make a long story short, one very effective way of handling this is to mask the sky contained in a Curves Adjustment Layer, and change the Blend Mode to Multiply, then adjust contrast and opacity to taste. Works wonders.

[Lisa Nikodym]

OK, how to get what I think you're considering "3D" clouds, and often it takes not one but all three:

(1) Increase the sky's contrast in Photoshop or the equivalent software
(2) Use a polarizer when you shoot the image, to make the blue sky darker relative to the clouds
(3) Choose a day when the air has little haze and the clouds look right, and a time when the sun is in a position for the polarizer to do its job well - sometimes you must be very patient, and be willing to keep trying!

Lisa

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

I frequently use graduated filter in LR, reduce exposure on sky a little, reduce brightness and add saturation and perhaps clarity.

Best regards
Erik

[Brian Gilkes]

Monocular depth on land is effected by many things- occlusion, size and or tone recession , perspective , size of known surrounding objects and patterns etc. On image files some of these can be adjusted in software. Clouds are a special case . Polarizing tends to give drama and volume, rather than depth. In face the clouds seem closer, perhaps more threatening. For a simple 3D effect I would start with the low amount high radius, no threshold unsharp mask technique mentioned. The layer styles adjustment suggested by John Paul Caponigro, Mac Holbert and others may need to be modified. I would suggest adjusting the sliders while observing effect on screen at size and at 100% and comparing printed tests. There are some  complex masking techniques that work but they depend very much on the individual cloud formation and the effect desired.
Hoping this has not clouded the discussion
Cheers
Brian
www.pharoseditions.com.au