The Photoshop 'Secret' of Photoshop Pros!

I first saw this demonstrated at an all-day CS3 seminar -it is simple, fast, versatile.

Familiarity with the following list of Photoshop tools is necessary to understand the procedure:

Have your image open in photoshop and make your Layer Palette visible.

Create a Curves Adjustment Layer in the Layers Palette

Pull the TOP END of the Curves line from the top straight down to the bottom right.

The Curves dialog box now has a horizontal line along the bottom of the grid.

Your image has gone black. This is supposed to happen.

Click OK to accept the Curves adjustment and close the dialog box.

Back in the Layer Palette, with the Curves layer active, choose Multiply from the Blending Modes drop-down menu in the upper left corner.

Click on the mask thumbnail and Invert it, (command + I), making it a solid black mask.

Grab the paintbrush tool

Make the brush large soft & round (-50% opacity -0% Hardness -Really Big)


Click on the MASK thumbnail in the Layer Palette

Make the foreground and background colors the default Black & White

Start brushing using white to paint the shadows in, adjusting the brush size as needed.

Switch to black to reduce the effect of the shadows.

Change the opacity of the brush as needed for the desired effect.