touching up screen shots

[hyster]

i have PS cs5 and i messed about with a couple Of SS earlier.
the top pic is the original and the bottom 1 i worked on a little. all i did was auto tone, colour and contrast and ran noise ninja.
now bare in mind I'm a complete noob with PS and never really used it bar the most simple stuff.

my question is: how can i change it to look better? more artistic sort of thing.

thanks for any help.

[AKP]

The best advice I can give, is just to play with the different settings and filters.  I took your original image, and made a few adjustments.  First, I adjusted the contrast.  Then, I added a slight blur to the background, as in real life, the eyes (and cameras) only focus on one thing.  So the plane in the foreground is clear, but as you move father away, the background goes out of focus.  I also added lens flares to the canopy glass, to simulate a reflection from the sun. 



Then... I desaturated the image, and adjusted the contrast again.  Added a very slight film grain to it, and used custom brushes to put stains on the picture to make it look old.



Finally, I used the variations adjustment to add just the colors I wanted back in, and got the old fashioned "sepia" tone.



I also make full use of layering in PS.  Sometimes you can apply a filter or adjustment to an image and it is just too much.  Before you make an adjustment, duplicate the layer and then do it.  Then, adjust the opacity of the filtered layer to get the effect you want.  I also did something like this with the blur...  I duplicated the layer, added a gaussian blur, then erased the parts that I didnt want as much of the blur. 

Again... just play around with it.  I started playing with photoshop about 11 years ago... and I still learn something new all the time.

<S> 

[BulletVI]

I also took your original Photo aswell but as i dont have the like's of photo shop i only have a basic photo editing software. But for basic photo Editing it is great.

When i edit my photo's i always have a before and after view you can get this in your view tab but photoshop may be different location. Then i use toll pallet now this relates to your

RGB      Red    Green    Blue

Also your brightness and contrast along with tou Hue and Saturation.

First i injcrease brightness and contrast to suite each other ( depending on orignal pic's brightness will depend on whether or not your contrast is more than your brightness. )

Second i adjust Hue And Saturation to give a more colour feel.

Third i adjust the RGB now the RGB is your Red.Green.Blue setting this will adjust it all at once.

Fourth i adjust my Red. Green. Blue separably Now again if you adjust your RGB up Then Independently adjusting you Red. Gren. Blue should adjust down.

Now it took me a while of getting it right so i sujest plenty of practise on this front but it shall be worth it in the End.


To show you i took your original SS and adjusted it in the way i described.



In Photoshop i believe this can be done if you select  
                                                                         Enhance   then adjust colour   then colour variations ( RGB ) or adjust colour curve's
Like i said it is all practice practice practice practice. And you will get there