enhancing faint details

[bill yeates]

I shoot a lot of Indian rock art and was wondering if anyone has
experience in bringing out faint details using PS. With paintings, if
there is any contrast left, I have pretty good results with a bit of
contrast and saturation. The worst case I've had is a black painting
in a rock shelter that was subsequently heavily smoked over.
In the case of petroglyphs (carvings) the best results are with side
lighting. But in some cases, it just is not practical to use reflectors
because of being alone or there just isn't anyway to reflect any light
on the rock art. I stumbled on a technique that helps sometimes and
is illustrated in the following photos from El Morro National Monument. This is a sandstone bluff with a water hole near Zuni,
New Mexico that is covered with hundreds of Indian rock art and
historical graffiti dating from 1605.
1. This is typical of the east side of the bluff with good side lighting
and not needing any special processing.
2. This is the oldest graffiti and didn't need anything except some
added contrast.
3. On the north side of the bluff, the light is flat and some of the
carvings are really difficult to see. This pic is pretty close to what
you see by eye.
4 Using the Filter/Stylize/Find Edges makes more pop out.
5. Adding the original with the filtered with Blend/Multiply gives
this.

[mjdmike]

That's awesome Bill, big difference in details, but kept most of the color as the original. Care to offer step-by-step instructions? Looks like interesting subject matter too, thanks for sharing.

[bill yeates]

Like I said above, this one is very simple. Duplicate layer, Filter/Stylize/find Edges. Then Blend/Multiply the layers. Doesn't
work too well if the rock is rough and textured.
Bill Yeates