Sunset photos can vary a lot depending on the time it was taken. Take the photo too early and it’ll look dull. If you have a sunset photo that was taken too early, follow this Photoshop tutorial to learn how to enhance that photo of a sunset to make it look stronger and more vibrant.

Photoshop Tutorial Preview

Step 1

Begin by opening a photo into Photoshop. You need to find a photo that was taken too early in the sunset.

Step 2

First, we’ll create a group. This tutorial will use several layers to enhance the photo, so it is important to keep the layers organized by using a layer group. To create a layer group, click on the “Create new layer group” button in the Layers Pallet or go to Layer> New> Group. You should now have a little folder with a triangle beside it. Double click on the text of this group and you should be able to edit it. Change the name of this group to something relevant such as “Enhance Sunset”.

Step 3

Duplicate the background layer and put it into the group. To do this, select the Background layer, press Ctrl+J or go to Layer> Duplicate Layer, and click and drag the new layer into the folder. The new layer should now appear inside the group.

Step 4

Change the blending mode to Overlay.

Step 5

Make sure you have the layer inside the group selected. Now go to Image> Adjustments> Threshold. In the Threshold settings, move the slider until everything is overexposed but keep the silhouette visible. What this layer will do is brighten the background but keep the silhouette dark.

Step 6

Now we need to add a Levels adjustment layer to adjust the levels of the image. Go to Layer> New Adjustment Layer> Levels. Now the layer should appear above the Background copy layer if you had the Background copy layer selected early. We need to move this layer below the Background copy layer. So click OK to exit out of the Levels and drag the Levels layer below the Background copy layer.

Step 7

You should end up with a layer setup like this.

Step 8

Now double-click the thumbnail in the Levels adjustment layer. This should bring back up the Levels tool. In here, you need to adjsut the settings to get a strong sunset with a strong orange glow. There’s no one single setting that works for every image, but we’ll show you where to start with this. First, move the black slider towards tie right to darken the image. Now move the middle gray slider towards the left or right to adjust the contrast. On the bottom where it says Output Levels, move the white slider to restore some cloud details if it is being blown out and same goes for the black slider to recover some shadow.

Step 9

This step is optional, but if you want to make the orange more vibrant and vivid, use a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer. Go to Layer> New Adjustment Layer> Hue/Saturation. Increase the saturation to one that you like. Note that this layer should appear below the Background copy layer. It can be below the Levels adjustment layer too; they’ll both give the same results.

Final Results

Here’s the image before.

Here’s the final result from this Photoshop tutorial.