Hi. This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV. If you have a photo that has a burnt-out sky, I'm going
to show you how to replace it with a beautiful, blue sky with white clouds.
This is an update of a tutorial I did on an earlier version of Photoshop.
Open a photo that has a sky you'd like to replace.
If you'd like to use this photo, I provided its link in the video's
description or project files. The first step is to make a selection of the sky, so we can
isolate it from the rest of the photo. There are many ways to make selections, however,
for this example, I'll go to Select and Color Range. If you're using this method as well,
choose "Sampled Colors". Make sure "Localized Color Clusters" is unchecked. The Fuzziness
is approximately 95 to 100 and "Selection" is ticked. In the thumbnail, click on the
sky and then press and hold Shift as you click on other areas of the sky until it's completely white.
Then, click OK.
Invert the selection by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + Shift + I.
Go to Select and Refine Edge.
I did an in-depth tutorial on Refine Edge, so to save time,
I won't be going over all the details here. Check Smart Radius and increase the Radius
approximately 4 to 5 pixels. Brush over the edges of your landscape to refine them.
Decontaminate the colors approximately 70% and output it as a New Layer with Layer Mask.
Then, click OK.
Click the box next to the Background to make the layer visible
and click the Layer Mask to make it active. We'll invert the layer mask by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + I.
Click the the thumbnail of the layer to make it active.
Click the foreground color to open the Color Picker.
In the hexadecimal field, type in: 88B8FF. Then, click OK or press Enter or Return.
Your foreground color is now the color we just typed in.
We're going to fill the top layer with the foreground color by pressing Alt or Option + Delete.
Make a copy of it by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + J.
In this layer we're going to make our clouds. Make your
foreground and background colors revert back to its black and white, default colors. To
do this, press "D" on your keyboard or click this icon.
Go to Filter, Render and Clouds.
Change its blend mode to Overlay.
In the next few steps, we're going make the clouds look more like clouds.
The first step is to make them look a bit less feathery by removing
the darkest tones of the cloud layer. First, click the chain-link to unlock the cloud layer
and its layer mask. Now, we can move and resize either of them independently of each other.
Double-click the cloud layer to open its Layer Style window.
In the "Blend If" section, go to the right half of this slider
and press and hold Alt or Option
to split the slider into two parts. Drag the right half of the slider approximately half way across.
Doing this removes the darkest tones, making the clouds look less feathery
Click OK to close the window.
Next, we'll stretch out the clouds and place them in perspective.
Open your Transform Tool by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + T. At the top, you'll
see the percentages for the Transform's width and height. In the Width field, type in 200%.
If the Height also changed to 200%, click on the chain-link to unlock it and type in
100% for the Height. Then, press Enter or Return. Since the clouds are stretched out
200%, they extend past our visible canvas on both sides. We'll crop them off by pressing
Ctrl or Cmd + A to select the document and go to Image and Crop.
To deselect it, press Ctrl or Cmd + D.
Open your Transform Tool again and zoom out of your document by pressing
Ctrl or Cmd plus the minus key on your keyboard a few times.
Go to Edit, Transform and Perspective.
Go to a top corner and drag it out approximately this much. Then, press Enter or Return.
Open the Transform again and go to the bottom, middle, anchor point.
When you see a vertical,double-arrow,
drag it up to where your landscape and sky meet. Press Enter or Return
and fit it back on your canvas. Next, we'll make our sky bluer at the top.
Click the New Layer icon to make a new layer.
Go to any layer mask and press and hold Alt or Option as you
drag a copy of it next to the empty layer. Make the empty layer active and change its
blend mode to Overlay.
Open your Gradient Tool and open your Gradient Picker.
Click the Black to Transparent gradient and click the Linear gradient icon.
Go to the top of your document
and press and hold Shift as you drag the gradient line approximately halfway
down your document. Then, release.
Since skies are generally less blue at its horizon, we'll lighten our sky, as well.
Make the blue layer active. Open your Dodge Tool
and invert your foreground and background colors
by pressing "x" on your keyboard.
Open your Brush Picker
and type in a relatively large size for your Dodge Tool. I'll use a size of 200 pixels.
Make the Hardness: 0%. For the Range, choose Mid-tones and the Exposure is 100%.
Brush and back and forth over the horizon to lighten the blue.
As I toggle back and forth, you can see the difference.
This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
Thanks for watching!