Photoshop CS3 Photo Effects Cookbook

Recipe 6.4. Infrared photography effect

Traditionally, black-and-white infrared photography involves the use of special filters and film stock that is only sensitive to light which emanates from the far end of the visible spectrum of light. Many digital cameras are capable of "seeing" this essentially invisible light, but infrared photography is not just the preserve of those who posses the correct filters and techniques; it's something that can be replicated from full color digital images in Photoshop. Essentially, an infrared photograph gains its mysterious and otherworldly qualities from the infrared light being reflected back into the camera at different strengths, depending on the local color of elements within the subject. Some local colors reflect a lot of infrared light, so trees and foliage take on an ethereal white glow, skin tones adopt a rather waxy, ghost-like quality, and blue summer skies are rendered almost black. To add to the mix, the whole image adopts a soft, glowing quality for truly unique, monochrome images.

1 Images that contain lots of green foliage are ideally suited to this technique. Open your start image and increase the saturation a little using Image > Adjustments > Hue and Saturation. Drag the Saturation slider to the right until the foliage is ...