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Photography vocabulary · Editing & Retouching

Dodge and burn

Meaning in photography, with examples

phraseAdvanced term

In photography, dodge and burn means: To lighten (dodge) and darken (burn) selected areas of a photo to shape the light, add depth or guide the eye. The names come from darkroom printing.

In Turkish: soldurma ve yakma, dodge & burn, ışık-gölge rötuşu

How it is used

A key technique in high-end portrait and beauty retouching, used to even out skin while keeping its texture. Often written dodge & burn or D&B. In Photoshop it is usually done on separate layers with curves or soft brushes.

Example sentences

  1. Dodge and burn the cheekbones slightly to give the face more shape.

  2. Most of the retouching time goes into dodging and burning the skin.

Common collocations

  • dodge and burn layer
  • subtle dodge and burn
  • micro dodge and burn
  • retouchTo make detailed changes to an image after the basic edit, such as removing blemishes, stray hairs, dust or unwanted objects.
  • editTo improve photos after the shoot by adjusting things like exposure, color and cropping, and to choose which images to keep.
  • contrastThe difference between the light and dark areas of an image. High contrast has deep blacks and bright whites; low contrast looks flatter and softer.
  • black and whiteMade only of shades of gray from black to white, without any color. Also called monochrome.

More terms: Editing & Retouching

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