Nothing is a barrier...

... if you don't let it be.

[finished version on my [url=http://www.blipfoto.com/entry/1348193]Kinda Horrigans[/url] journal]

Yet another rubbish day for photography. This was taken shortly after dawn this morning on my way to work. Underexposed so needed a bit of a rescue job and then some. Today was a 'process it twice' RAW file day - first to brighten a bit by bumping up the exposure. Then, processed again to try to rescue a bit of detail from the tree line etc. Both opened in Photoshop, copied on onto a new layer in the other and used a layer mask, and the quick selection tool to select the tree line then used a black brush to paint out the rest of the selection so only the detail in the trees was coming through.

After that, converted to mono using Silver Efex Pro and bumping up the structure / brightening a tad, then warming the tones. Flattened, then a little more dodging and burning (using a 50% grey layer set to overlay mode and a white / black brush for lightening and darkening respectively - brush set to around 5 - 10% opacity otherwise the effect is too strong).

Flattened and sharpened. And done. One rescue shot!

Tip of the Day:
This little video goes through the 'double process of RAW files' thing in a much clearer way than I have, so if what I wrote didn't make sense... this will!