Just a Little Flowing Water

This is not a traditional image for me – I usually do not shoot flowing water, especially in close-ups, but with a little Photoshop help, I got a really nice look. The rock was in a stream at Iao Valley in Maui, Hawaii. Very little was done to this image – just basic changes in Lightroom which included using an Adjustment Brush set to 100 Clarity to smooth out the water areas. The thing that really made this image pop was opening up the Topaz (see sidebar for website link) ReStyle and selecting the Blue Dreams preset. The color combinations really changed a boring image into a beautiful image. I am amazed by what this plug-in can do! The Structure and Detail were increased on just the rocks and flowers using a Mask for this section inside the plug-in. I wanted the water to still look soft. Back in Photoshop a Levels Adjustment Layer was added where the Midtones tab was set to 0.82 and the Output Levels were set to 7/255. The last step was adding a Layer Style by double clicking a composite layer (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+E) that I created on top. A Pattern Overlay was added using Photoshop’s pattern called Dark Coarse Weave set to Overlay blend mode, 65% opacity and a Scale of 128%. These settings can change depending upon the size and resolution of your image. Anyway, pretty easy to do and I love the result!…..Digital Lady Syd