Pushing to the Extreme

Sometimes an image just needs some more punch. A little something extra. A little more extreme. The image above is an extreme version of the one just below.

 Quite a difference.  A rather mundane photo of some rooftops goes on steroids. How did the transformation take place? A few extreme adjustments in Photoshop Lightroom helped me to make the jump to the slightly out of this world look. 

I accomplished the effect in the Develop module of Lightroom. Push the following sliders to the extreme right: Recovery, Fill Light, Contrast, Clarity, and Vibrance. The image will likely look awful. Adjustments to Exposure and Blacks will be the next. make sure to have enough darkness in the shadows and ample brightness in the highlights. 

Thee Brightness slide may also help in getting the tone to a point that appeals to you. An adjustment to the Saturation slider will almost always be required to reduce the saturation to an appropriate level. Before the reduction of saturation, the colors will be over the top in intensity.

Normally, I'll tweak the Tone Curve to achieve a level of contrast in line with my vision. The final step will be to add a strong vignette. In a colorful image, I usually chose the Color Priority in the Post Crop Vignette tool. All other adjustment are open to your interpretation; White Balance to Camera Calibration adjustments may add to the desired effect. If you have Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, give it a try.