There is plenty I still need to learn about Photoshop, and last month, my co-worker, Niels, hosted a quick tutorial on some post processing tips in PhotoShop Elements. And even though I've had PhotoShop Elements for years, I'd never even used Adjustment Layers, so Niels' walk-through was very helpful.
Now, I still don't think PhotoShop can turn a bad photo into a good one, but it certainly can make one marginally better--and that margin really depends on the subject and how interesting the photo is to begin with. This is by no means a great photo (it happens to be one I took for our office photo contest--theme: bridges), and here's the original, shot with my 14-54mm lens on my Olympus E-620 around 8 a.m. on my drive into work on a cloudy day (obviously).
Now, my general approach to PhotoShop is simple:
1) What do I want the focus of the photo to be? And how can I remove distractions?
2) How can I put more emphasis on what I want someone to be seeing?
Despite the 'bridge' theme of the contest, this photo has more focus on the grain silos, but they happen to be more interesting than the bridge in this shot, so I used contrast adjustment layers and a radial gradient to try and make it a little more dramatic and a little less flat. Anyway, nothing too substantial, but something I wouldn't have been able to do with Picasa (which is what I had been using the last couple of years, because it really does a pretty good job of making all the basic adjustments very simple).
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