Hello, and welcome to another edition of our Tutorial Tuesday series here on The Digital Press blog! Today, I am here to share information about how to use your Dodge and Burn Tools to make your layouts pop a bit more! I normally like to use it on flowers and leaves (in my photos and in the elements on my layout), but you can really use them on anything.
Your Burn Tool will make things darker and your Dodge Tool will make things lighter. You can find each of these tools in the following places…
When using either of these tools, you will want to adjust your settings (see next screenshot). Personally, I like to work with an ‘Exposure’ of 50%… Range: Midtone… and honestly any soft brush, with a size that works for the particular element or item I’m editing. It’s possible to change the exposure to make the dodging/burning less noticeable or more noticeable.
To show you the effect you can get with each of these tools… I’ve placed two flowers side by side (see next image), and I’ve burned the shadows more (making them deeper/darker), and dodged the highlights (i.e. accentuated the brighter areas) to pop the texture of this flower and to make the leaves feel fuller. I also wanted the flower to look as if it was sitting higher on the leaves, so I burned close to the edge of the flower (but on the leaves) to add extra shading, conveying more depth.
Take a look…
See the differences?
The left flower has my regular shadowing… and the right flower has been tweaked using the Dodge and Burn Tools.
I realize the changes are subtle, but they definitely add some realism… and on a full layout, they look AMAZING if you take the time to add this pop to a few elements. You can do as little or as much as you’d like to add depth… and as I said earlier, you can even do the same thing to your photos.
I’m now addicted to these two little tools… and I hope today’s tutorial will inspire you to give them a try!
About the Author Anita is a creative team member at The Digital Press.