HOW TO LIGHTEN AND

DARKEN WITH DODGE AND

BURN TOOLS IN
PHOTOSHOP CC
By Barbara Obermeier

Photoshop CC gives you many options for lightening and darkening.

Dodging and burning originated in the darkroom, where photographers
salvage negatives containing areas that are too dark or too light by
adding or subtracting a bit of exposure when an enlarger makes
prints.

With the Photoshop Dodge and Burn tools, you can set the size of the
tool and its softness independently by selecting a brush of the size
and the hardness or softness you require.

You can also set the Photoshop tools to operate primarily on

shadows, midtones, and highlights. You can adjust the degree of
lightening and darkening applied by specifying an exposure, too.

The Dodge (used to lighten) and Burn (used to darken) tools can be
very effective, but you can’t add detail that isn’t there. Keep the
following in mind:
  When you lighten very dark shadows that contain little detail, you
end up with grayish shadows.

 Darkening very light areas that are completely washed out

doesn’t look very good, either.

In either case, you want to use the Dodge and Burn tools in
moderation and work only with small areas. To dodge or burn a
portion of an image, just follow these steps:
1. Open an image with under- or overexposed areas and select the
Dodge or Burn tool from the Tools panel.
Press the O key to choose the active toning tool or press Shift+O to
cycle through the available toning tools until the one you want is
active.
2. In the Options bar, make these adjustments:
o *Select a brush from the Brush Preset Picker or toggle
open the larger Brush panel.
Larger, softer brushes spread the dodging and burning effect
over a larger area, making blending with the surrounding area
easier.
You can choose the same brushes available with any of the
painting tools, including preset brushes from your library.
o *Under the Range options, select Shadows, Midtones, or
Highlights.
Use Shadows to lighten or darken detail in the darker areas of
your image, Midtones to adjust the tones of average darkness,
and Highlights to make the brightest areas even lighter or (more
frequently) darker.
Note the increased detail in the eyes, teeth, and hair. A couple
swipes were added to the highlight areas with the Burn tool.
 o Select the amount of the effect to apply with each stroke by
using the Exposure slider or text box.
o Enable the Airbrush option for a softer, more gradual effect.
o *Check the Protect Tones option.
This setting provides more natural and subtle dodging and
burning results by preserving the hues and tones of the image
pixels.
o *If you are using a pressure-sensitive tablet, click the last
icon. Doing so overrides any settings you made in the Brush
Preset picker or Brush panel.
3. Paint over the areas you want to lighten or darken with the toning
brush, gradually building up the desired effect.
Using a soft-edged brush is often best when dodging and burning.
You want to create a realistic, not retouched, appearance.
The Exposure control is similar to the Opacity control offered by other
painting tools, but it’s especially important with dodging and burning.
 Using a low value is best so that you can carefully paint in the
lightening or darkening you want.
High exposure values work too quickly and produce unnatural-looking,
obviously dodged or burned areas in your images.
4. If you go too far, press Ctrl+Z (Command+Z on the Mac) to
reverse your most recent stroke.
5. When you finish, choose File→Save to store the image.