This is a quick way to add a vignette effect. It is sometimes purposely introduced for creative effect, such as to draw attention to the center of the frame.

Open an image you like to try this vignette effect on.

Now go to: Filter > Disort > Lens correction

In here the only option you have to adjust is the vignette

In my example I changed the vignette amount to -90 and set the midpoint to +70, then click ok.

That’s all there is to it ! Of course it depends on the image and your own preference in how much you like to use the vignette effect.

Check out the Result: First the Image I started with, then the one with vignette effect.

There are a large range of effects and post-processing techniques you can apply to your 3D visualisation images and as always, there many ways to achieve a certain effect.

What I like to recommend to all post-production effects is, duplicate your image before you do anything to it ! Photoshop  “eats up” undo steps like no other application. This means you usually run out of undo steps before reaching back to the original image.

Let’s start with an 3D Visualisation image:

To create an illusion of HDR to your 3D image just follow these simple steps. First make a duplicate of the original image and name it ‘Black & White’

Now make this layer greyscale by pressing Ctrl – Shift- U.

We have to inverted this by pressing Ctrl – I

and set the blending technique to Overlay

Your image should look something like this. Obviously every image will have a slightly different result, so don’t worrie if yours looks not similar to mine for know.

Next step is to go to Filter – Blur – Gaussian Blur.

Increase the amount until you are happy with a slight glow at the edges of the image. ( the larger the resolution of your image the larger the radius amount will be, mine here on the blog is only 600 x 338 pixels, so my radius amount is fairly small )

You can see now the slight glow at the edges. ( especially around the sofa )

Now go back to your original image layer and duplicate it again. This time name it Linear Light.

drag it to the top of the stack and change the blending mode to Linear Light.

which makes it look something like this.

Now all you have to do is play with the opacity which should be anything between 10% and 30%

The end result is this.

For any created 3D image the outcome is always going to be different. Each image has a different reason for being produced,it could for commercial, for marketing, for printing, for media adverts or just for yourself. So this HDR effect won’t be ever ones “cup of tea “

Many times we get a photo from a client or one we have taken ourselves, which is not quite up to scratch.I like to show you how to improve a photo. In this particular case I will mainly concentrate on the sky and the trees at the back. The sky and trees at the back are washed out, this is a common case in a lot of photos. We use Photoshop for this, as I use in all my post production.

Lets start with the main photo, taken on a good day ( In Switzerland ) . Even so the sun is coming from the back left, there is still a haze at the back which makes the trees and sky look washed out.

First before I do anything to a photo I double click on the Background layer and give it a name:

After this a duplicate the background photo original layer – hide the original and work with the copy. This way we can always access the original if needed

Next I open the levels under: Image – Adjustments – Levels.. or hit Ctrl+L . As with all photos over or under exposed you usually always can adjust the levels to make the image look better, without doing much else. This is a good example, you can see the black arrow on the left at O and the white arrow on the right at 255, both having some flat levels to adjust inwards.

So let’s move the arrows along the flat levels until the levels start to show some “movement”

Notice the black arrow on the left now at 15 and the white level now at 237

You can see now all ready a good improvement. The lower half of the photo looks much crisper and the contrast is great, even the upper half has improved but there is more work to be done.

Next I choose the Burn Tool with  the following settings:

Make sure the brush is large enough to cover most of the trees at the back, so this obviously depends on the resolution you have. In my case I went from left to right with the burn tool and back to left again. Make sure you use a smooth motion. Depending on the image you have to trial an error yourself a bit. Don’t be shy to undo a couple of steps and try a couple of times until you get it right and you are happy with it. Some of the tools in Photoshop need a bit of experience and a bit of an artistic stroke, which will come automatically over time.

You see an improvement, the trees don’t look as washed out anymore.

The next step is to delete the sky and replace it with a nicer more contrasty sky. There are several ways to delete the sky. I used the Polygonal Lasso Tool. It’s important to zoom in to get it right. After I fine tuned the tree horizon edge with the Eraser Tool ( zoom in again ). I also left a tiny bit of sky leftover at the tree edge as this will help smoothing the connection to the new sky.

Now we create a new layer and name it sky, which we place at the bottom of the stack.

Let’s create two different sky’s, one with the Gradient Tool and the other one with a new cloudy sky taken from another photo.

First we select the Gradient Tool and choose there the option: Linear Gradient, which is usually the default setting. For the foreground color we choose a nice blue and for the background color we use the Eyedropper Tool. With the Eyedropper Tool we zoom in somewhere near the tree edge. As I mentioned I left a bit of the old sky in there, this is where we pick our background color from. So it should look like this:  

Now we use the Gradient Tool and draw from the top left hand side, vertical down a bit to the right ( because the sun is coming from the left ) past the tree line a bit.This is what we have now.

If you prefer a cloudy sky the just search on google images for cloudy sky. Make sure you look for the right resolution in regard to your photo and of course it should be without copyright. I found a sky I am happy with and inserted it above the Gradient Sky Layer. The reason is so you can erase a bit of the cloudy sky just above the tree line which helps smoothing the transition by showing a bit of the Gradient Sky behind. Here we go:

Here the photo we started with:

As always there are many ways with Photoshop to get to the end result, this is one way.

Hope you enjoyed my first tutorial and if you have any question, please feel free to drop me a line.

This category will focus on post production in 3D Visualisations. Furthermore you will get some tips, how to create great textures. As example: seamless textures, larger texture to fit certain sections of your model and create easy bump maps.

Photoshop all ready has an immense amount of tutorials and tips online but 80% of them are for Graphic designers, Digital Artist etc. My tips and tutorials will all relate to Architecture.