My Thoughts and How and Why I Did It

In a previous blog, I shared How I Did It.  Because of some of the replies that I received, I am going to continue with more of my thought processes and how I did it, utilizing Lightroom, Photoshop, and plug-ins.

In my last blog, I had the picture of the mute Swan with its wings spread and the other Swan with its head out of the water.  I had a different picture of the mute Swan with its wings spread, but the other Swan had its head under the water.  My thought was that I would like to post process this picture and only keep the Swan with its wings spread in it.








Here is the original picture, I first try to remove the second Swan using the spot removal tool in Lightroom, but it would not work.  So I did my initial processing of the picture in Lightroom.













Exporting the picture, utilizing control-E, into Photoshop, I added a new layer, utilizing the layer button at the bottom of the layers panel.  I then utilize the clone stamp, taking pieces from different parts of the picture and then help blend it utilizing the lasso tool and contents aware.

Once I had it to my liking, I did my first crop.












 I have been utilizing Topaz clarity plug-in for many of my pictures.  I like it because it doesn't give halos and that the presets are easily customized utilizing the sliders and/or the mask.  I duplicated the layer and then opened Topaz clarity.  In Clarity: 1 - Picked the Collection to use; 2 - Picked the Pre-set to use;  3 - Adjusted the preset to my taste.

After I was finished, I flatten the picture in Photoshop and then exported the picture as a PSD back into Lightroom, where I've made a few more adjustments and fixed the crop.

Final Result

I hope this has been useful and if you have any questions please email me.