Creating Cinematic Colour

1. The original image was shot with a digital camera outdoors in the late afternoon, using the sun as a backlight and the main lighting source with a reflector. This image is well shot with adequate exposure, but it seems necessary to remove the roof in the far background, which does not sit well with the overall picture. It would also be nice to reduce the strong contrast a bit by brightening a little bit of the shady area just to the right of the head.

2. Select the area of the branches as shown on the picture with the Feather value of about 50. Perform Layer via Copy (Ctrl+J) on the selected area.

3. Move the copied branch area to the roof area you intend to remove, and create a layer mask to remove the roof using the brush.

4. Copy a layer after merging all the layers and perform Image > Adjustments > Desaturate to make a black-and-white image.

5. Open the Layer Style windows by double-clicking the layer that has been converted to a black-and-white image.

6. In the two gradation bars under Blend If on the Layer Style windows, click and hold the black triangle to the left in the upper gradation bar and move it to the right while holding down the Alt key. As the half of the triangle moves to the right, the black-and-white image will gradually sink into the coloured image.

7. Once the half of the black triangle has been moved far enough, merge the layers and select the highlighted area by pressing Ctrl+Alt+~. Inverse (Shift+I) the selected highlighted area and create a layer for the shady area using the Layer via Copy command.

8. Select the layer of the shady area and select Curves to adjust the tone. At this point, choose Red and move the curve downward to give more cyan. Then select the Blue channel and add yellow to add a warmer feel to the image.

9. Merge the layers again and create a layer for the highlighted area. (Ctrl+Alt+~ > Ctrl+J)

10. Open the Red channel in Curves and add a red colour by adjusting the curve to make the image warmer.

11. Merge the layers and adjust the overall tone using Curves.

12. To brighten the shady area, select Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlight, adjust the values as shown on the picture and press OK. Unlike other tools, the Shadow/Highlight command allows you to adjust the highlighting using values, and you can therefore use the command more effectively than Curves or Level.

13. To darken the surrounding area, copy one layer and select Filter > Render > Lighting Effect. Set Lighting Type to Omni, adjust Intensity and press OK.

14. To bring out the background and the darkened area, change the blend mode to Overlay.

15. Create a layer mask for the darkened layer and apply the brush on the central area to darken the surrounding area only.

16. Merge the layers to finish the job.