Okay, so I messed around with Topaz Photo AI today, specifically trying to get that “page green” look. Let me tell you, it wasn’t as straightforward as I thought it’d be, but hey, that’s part of the fun, right?
First, I opened up Topaz Photo AI. Pretty standard stuff. I grabbed a photo I took a while back – a picture of some trees, figured it’d be a good test subject.
Initial Fumbling
I started by just playing with the basic adjustments. You know, the usual suspects: brightness, contrast, that sort of thing. I wanted to get a feel for the software before diving into anything too specific.
- Bumped up the contrast a bit.
- Lowered the brightness slightly.
- Played with the saturation… a lot.
Honestly, I was just kind of winging it at this point. I didn’t have a super clear plan, just a general idea of what I wanted the “page green” to feel like.
Getting Closer (Maybe?)
Then I started messing with the color grading tools. This is where things got a little more interesting. I focused on the greens, obviously, trying to find that perfect shade. I shifted the hues, played with the luminance, and tweaked the saturation of just the green channels.
It was a lot of back and forth. I’d make a change, step back, squint at the screen, and then undo it all and start again. I probably spent a good hour just tweaking sliders and seeing what happened.
The “Aha!” Moment (Sort Of)
Eventually, I stumbled upon a combination of settings that started to look pretty good. I can’t remember the exact numbers, and honestly, it’ll probably be different for every photo anyway. But the key was finding the right balance between the green hue, saturation, and luminance. I also used some masking to make sure the effect was only applied to the areas I wanted (mostly the leaves and foliage).
It wasn’t perfect, but it was definitely closer to that “page green” I was aiming for. I still think I need to refine it a bit more, maybe experiment with some different photos, but I felt like I was on the right track.
Final Steps and Thoughts
Finally, I added a bit of sharpening and noise reduction, just to clean things up a bit. Topaz Photo AI has some pretty good tools for that, so it was a quick and easy process.
Overall, it was a fun little experiment. I learned a lot about Topaz Photo AI’s color grading tools, and I got a decent starting point for achieving that “page green” look. It’s definitely something I’ll continue to play around with. My main takeaway? Don’t be afraid to just mess around and see what happens. Sometimes the best results come from happy accidents!