Photoshop Tutorial: How to Add and Use Contrast to Enhance Your Photos

A Quick and Easy Guide for Beginners

Most of the time when taking a photograph, film or digital, it is extremely hard to get perfect contrast. Even for professionals, it can be hard to do. If you have dull, gray, or bright photos, then this tutorial is perfect for you. In this

tutorial you will learn how to enhance the contrast of any photo in Photoshop, quick and easy. This tutorial is perfect if you're a beginner to Adobe Photoshop.

Step 1) To begin with, open up a photo on it's own canvas that you would like to enhance and add some better contrast to. It's best to choose a dull or more gray photo.

Step 2) You need to sharpen your image first. This makes it easy to determine contrast. Apply Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen to the image, if it's too strong or sharp you can easily fade it by Edit > Fade Sharpen.

Step 3) Duplicate the sharpened and background layer and then apply Filter > Blur > Gaussion Blur with a radius of 3.0 or so, depending on your photo you may need a higher or lower radius.

Step 4) Now change the layer mode to Overlay, and the opacity to 30%. This will up the contrast generously, but keep important aspects and features of the photo in sight.

Step 5) Next create a new layer and fill it with a light or softer blue, I usually used #79b8eb. Then change the layer mode to Soft Light and the layer opacity to 23%. This will add a nice tone and contrast.

Step 6) In the Layers drop-down menu, go to New Adjustment Layer > Brightness/Contrast. For brightness, select about 9+, and for Contrast, select about the same, 9+. This is the important step that will add the important contrast.

Step 7) Again in the Layers drop-down menu, make Gradient Map Adjustment Layer by going to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Gradient Map. Use a hint of grayish red. The image will now be black and white, but don't fret!

Step 8) Change the layer to soft light with an opacity of 25%. Your colored image will now be back.

And then you're done!

You can also use the auto-contrast tool. This is faster, but it doesn't always adjust contrast to fit your photo perfectly. The naked eye is what always works best.