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hellboy801
Participating Frequently
July 19, 2012
Question

How to show overexposed areas in Photoshop?

  • July 19, 2012
  • 5 replies
  • 44945 views

This funcion is in Lightroom, but not in Photoshop. Is there a way how to see overexposed areas in Photoshop?

    5 replies

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    dogmatheque
    Participant
    July 6, 2017

    Hello,

    There's a simple and effective way to see clipping for any kind of image in photoshop.

    You can achieve this by using 2 Gradient maps:

    - One for the highlights.

    - One for the shadows.

    For highlights:

    - Create new adjustment layers using gradient maps.

    - Create 3 a colors gradient : Black at 0% / Black at 99% (set the gradient location as close as possible from the black)/ Red at 100%.

    Set the layer transparency to multiply.

    Thus everything that will be between 99% and 100% of brightness will appear red on the image.

    (you can change it if you move the color cursor).

    For Shadows:

    Create a gradient map adjustment layer.

    3 colors gradient : Blue at 0% / Black at 1% / Black at 100%

    Set the layer transparency to Screen. Only the dark area will appear blue.

    So far it works pretty well.

    Depending on your needs, you can, of course, change the desired colors and adjust the gradient sliders to change the sensitivity threshold.

      Stephen Marsh
      Community Expert
      Stephen MarshCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      July 8, 2017

      Thanks for sharing dogmatheque – I'll give it another go as I must have messed up my first attempt at following our instructions!

      I personally care more about not blowing out levels in key areas of detail, it is all about horse-trading and there are only so many available levels/tones that the key is to allocate them to the areas that really need it the most. Blown highlights or plugged shadows can be distracting and ugly, so I may make two adjustments and blend them (one for the key areas and another for the less critical areas).

      JJMack
      Community Expert
      JJMackCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      July 19, 2012

      I don't know if this will be of intrest to you you can set to preview ourput device colors  the best it can do on your display and when preview these colors you can have Photoshop overlay the image with a out of gammut warning map to show you problem areas. I beleive that will show blowout areas as well as other problem areas.

      You can also use Ctrl+L level command and the ALT key modifyer and slide the black and white sliders to see where thing blow out and burn out. With theAlt key held down Photoshop changes the image view to map blow out area and burn out areas when you touch the black and white sliders..

      JJMack
      conroy
      conroy
      Participating Frequently
      July 19, 2012

      Maybe this will help... add a Levels Adjustment Layer, and without actually adjusting anything, click the white point sampler button then with the dropper over the image, pres Alt/Opt key for a display of pixels with clipped channel(s).

        H
        hellboy801Author
        Participating Frequently
        July 19, 2012

        Nice tip. Thanks.

        Anyway, I just tried the Calvin Hollywood method and it works great:
        http://www.calvinhollywood-blog.com/2011/08/06/photoshop-tutorialstory -the-police-the-thief-and-the-details/

        Noel Carboni
        Noel Carboni
        Legend
        July 19, 2012

        That Calvin Hollywood tutorial is a cool technique.  But I'm worried that it can give a false sense of security...  It will NOT show you when individual channels have reached max or min values, just when the overall luminance of pixels are below or above the thresholds set in the Blend If settings.

        -Noel

        janelle_f
        Adobe Employee
        janelle_f
        Adobe Employee
        July 19, 2012

        There are a few tutorials in how to "fix" overexposed photos:

        http://www.photoshopsupport.com/tutorials/jennifer/fix-underexposed.html

        have you tried to open the image in Camera raw and view the overexposed areas that way?

        -janelle

        H
        hellboy801Author
        Participating Frequently
        July 19, 2012

        Yes, I can do that, but sometimes I do a lot of postproduction in Photoshop and I would like to see how far I can push contrast, exposure, saturation etc. I want to see where are the limits (like in Camera Raw). I dont want my images to be unprintable.

        Noel Carboni
        Noel Carboni
        Legend
        July 19, 2012

        Yes, assuming you're talking about Camera Raw...  Click on the little triangles in the upper-right and left of the histogram display for highlight and shadow warnings.  They're normally shown in bright red.

        -Noel

        H
        hellboy801Author
        Participating Frequently
        July 19, 2012

        No, I mean inside of Photoshop, not in Camera Raw.

        Noel Carboni
        Noel Carboni
        Legend
        July 19, 2012

        There's really no way in a digital image in general to know whether a color channel *just* reaches the maximum value or is overexposed.  Thus the concept does not apply inside Photoshop, which is why there's no special "maxed out" indication.

        That said, I can see the utility in knowing what pixels are the very brightest in an image, and I can make a suggestion for a workaround:  Add a Curves Adjustment layer and pull the black point way over to the right.   Make that layer visible when you want a solid indication of what pixels are at or very near their brightest.

        -Noel

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