How to fix white sky in PS? NOT my fault!

[jpeka65844]

I took a cool pic of the statue at Coors Field in Denver but unfortunately, the sky was overcast with white cloud cover. Not my fault it looks like a blown out sky!

Can anyone give me some Photoshop tips to fixing it? Can I lift blue sky from another pic?

 

[YesDear]

Depending on how detailed the edge is between the sky and any objects you can take blue sky from another image an create a layer.

You take the marquie tool and cut out the sky then create a layer an put it the ground over a blue/ or whatever sky overlay. If the sky is a single color there is a tool, I forget that will select that color and then drop out. If you have a detail around the sky and different colors it can be done but it is work!

 

[scoot241]

Depending on how detailed the edge is between the sky and any objects you can take blue sky from another image an create a layer.

You take the marquie tool and cut out the sky then create a layer an put it the ground over a blue/ or whatever sky overlay. If the sky is a single color there is a tool, I forget that will select that color and then drop out. If you have a detail around the sky and different colors it can be done but it is work!

I believe (but am not in front of PS right now) that the tool that selects everything in an area that's the same color is the Magic Wand, and the tool that works well for picking out an area is the Magnetic Lasso.

 

[VVFF]

I took a cool pic of the statue at Coors Field in Denver but unfortunately, the sky was overcast with white cloud cover. Not my fault it looks like a blown out sky!

Can anyone give me some Photoshop tips to fixing it? Can I lift blue sky from another pic?

It would be helpful to see the picture in question before recommending fixes

 

[MICKEY88]

with the right technique and some practice changing out skies can be quick and fun...

if ya run into problems and would like to share the file I'll see what I can do for you, with a real sky of course..

 

[GrillMouster]

In overcast conditions natural light is scattered and diffuse, creating soft shadows. On bright sunny days the light is directional and harsh, creating hard-edged shadows. So, if you drop the sky from a bright sunny day into an image from an overcast day, the shadows could be a dead giveaway of fakery. The color and direction of the light in both the foreground and the dropped-in sky should match. Also, be aware of reflective objects in the foreground...they could indicate a fake sky.

Before dropping in a fake sky I'd first try to salvage the sky that you have, as it should look more believable than dropping in another sky. Is the sky completely blown out, or is there at least some detail? By decreasing exposure and increasing recovery I've been able to turn bland overcast skies into dramatic skies. If you can salvage the sky, use a layer mask to blend two copies of the same image -- one copy processed for the sky and the other copy processed for the ground.

If captured the image in RAW, you might be able to recover a lot of the sky. Post the image or provide a link to a large image.

 

[saturndb]

with the right technique and some practice changing out skies can be quick and fun...

if ya run into problems and would like to share the file I'll see what I can do for you, with a real sky of course..

Nicely done! I like the Mickey one.....

Dave

 

[MICKEY88]

Nicely done! I like the Mickey one.....

Dave

thanks, I have a copy of that one hanging in my office..

these are examples of what happens when I'm up late and get bored..

 

[Quicklabs]

Waaay cool, Mickey88! Care to share how you did these?

 

[MICKEY88]

Waaay cool, Mickey88! Care to share how you did these?

I start with a picture with a decent amount of sky, then in Paint SHop Pro I use the magic want to select the sky, usually having the tolerance set from 8-10, so it doesn't pick anything but sky..once all of the sky is selected, I copy the pic I want to insert into the sky... , then switch back to the original picture,, then click edit /paste into selection

 

[wenrob]

In overcast conditions natural light is scattered and diffuse, creating soft shadows. On bright sunny days the light is directional and harsh, creating hard-edged shadows. So, if you drop the sky from a bright sunny day into an image from an overcast day, the shadows could be a dead giveaway of fakery. The color and direction of the light in both the foreground and the dropped-in sky should match. Also, be aware of reflective objects in the foreground...they could indicate a fake sky.

Before dropping in a fake sky I'd first try to salvage the sky that you have, as it should look more believable than dropping in another sky. Is the sky completely blown out, or is there at least some detail? By decreasing exposure and increasing recovery I've been able to turn bland overcast skies into dramatic skies. If you can salvage the sky, use a layer mask to blend two copies of the same image -- one copy processed for the sky and the other copy processed for the ground.

If captured the image in RAW, you might be able to recover a lot of the sky. Post the image or provide a link to a large image.

This is what I'd suggest. When I have done this type of thing I do as suggested above, put my subject layer on top of the sky layer and then "erase in" with a big soft brush. It takes more time then using a lasso or magic wand but comes out a whole lot more natural looking IMO as there are no harsh edges.
Here I wanted the skies a little less dramatic so the bottom layer I changed my blend to "soft light" and erased in. My sky looks a little blown out in the second version (I was new a little over the top I guess) but I'm posting these to show there is no real visible line along the mountains, DD's head, etc.
Before:

After:

 

[jann1033]

This is what I'd suggest. When I have done this type of thing I do as suggested above, put my subject layer on top of the sky layer and then "erase in" with a big soft brush. It takes more time then using a lasso or magic wand but comes out a whole lot more natural looking IMO as there are no harsh edges.
Here I wanted the skies a little less dramatic so the bottom layer I changed my blend to "soft light" and erased in. My sky looks a little blown out in the second version (I was new a little over the top I guess) but I'm posting these to show there is no real visible line along the mountains, DD's head, etc.
Before:

After:

this looks good, hopefully i'll remember this technique as our sky is blah gray more often than blue( even a cp doesn't help much) and i never like the results if i try to replace it.

for the op, if you have lightroom you can download some "dramatic sky" presets from matt's presets on the lightroom site( or there is a link to it don't remember now) they are better than nothing but can get fake looking pretty fast imo

 

[jpeka65844]

OP here....Here's the pic in question. You can see a peek of blue sky in the right hand corner of the building.

 

[GrillMouster]

On a day like that, the best thing to do is to minimize the amount of sky showing (which is what you did) or eliminate the sky altogether. I see the little patch of blue sky in the right corner, as you pointed out. There wasn't alot of detail to pull out in the sky area, so I dropped in a gradient to simulate a blue sky. I chose a gradient, because the reflections on the windows don't show puffy white clouds and blue sky. The highlights, especially the ones on the left, indicated that the light was coming from there, so I trailed the gradient off there. I added noise to the sky so it would look more like a natural part of the image. Overall it just took a few minutes. The most time consuming part was painting in around the signage and scaffolding on top of the buliding. Also, I did this on my office PC, which isn't calibrated and only has an old version of PS Elements. Elements doesn't have layer masks, so I did a workaround to simulate layer masks. Also, I was working on a small compressed image, which I had to recompress for posting. I didn't bother editing the rest of the image, as I was only trying to demonstrate fixing the sky. So here goes a quickie edit.