http://www.partyideasforyou.com/having-fun-with-photoshop/
How do you make photos look more vivid?
I like to do some photography for fun sometimes. I have photoshop that I edit my photos with, but when I look at professional photos or even other amateur photos, they always look so much more vivid than mine.
My pictures are always just so dull.
I try turning up the contrast, but that makes them too dark.
Don’t be tempted to alter your camera’s settings. Always shoot at the highest resolution, in RAW or tiff if you can and with no ‘enhancements’ from the camera – these always remove some image information so, by the time you get to Photoshop, you don’t have all the data.
In Photoshop, use the Levels command. It’s singularly the most powerful vividifying (?) tool in the suite.
Load up a photo, go to Image>Adjustments>Levels…
And play with the sliders. DO NOT GO SILLY with the sliders. Keep an eye on the histogram. Move the left slider until it ‘just’ touches the left side of the histogram (if it doesn’t already) and this sets the black Point. Move the right slider to set the white point. Again, be gentle. This will give you a ‘complete’ tonal range. The centre slider affects the ‘gamma’ of the picture – the overall brightness of the midtones.
Most likely, you will be suffering with low contrast lenses and the levels command fixes them better than any other.
Having Fun 3 : Photoshop Series (Tutorial Coming Soon)