step by step Night on the town

Learn how to drop in a new sky, remove passersby and tone your photos for a late-night look

01 Mask the sky

Open day_night_before. Grab the Quick Selection tool. Paint the sky (hold Alt and paint to subtract if it goes wrong). Click ‘Select and Mask’ button. Set Radius 4 and paint edges with the Refine Edge brush. Click ‘Invert’, set Output: Layer Mask and hit OK.

02 remove the People

Click the New Layer icon (Layers Panel ) then grab the Spot Healing Brush tool. Check ‘Sample All Layers’ (Tool Options). Paint over people to remove them. If necessary, switch to the Clone tool (again set to Sample All Layers) and tidy any rough patches.

03 Drop in the stars

Open day_night_stars. Use the Move tool to drag the image up to the tab of the main image, then down and in to copy the image over. Go to the Layers Panel and drag the layer to the bottom of the stack and then position it over the sky.

04 adjust the tones

Highlight the top layer. Click the Create Adjustment Layer icon. Choose Color Balance. Push sliders towards cyan and blue (experiment with Highlight and Shadow). Hold Alt and drag the Layer Mask thumbnail to the newly created Adjustment Layer to copy it over.

05 Glowing windows

Grab Polygonal Lasso tool and select the windows. Add a ‘Solid Color’ Adjustment Layer and choose a bright yellow. Double-click Adjustment Layer to access Layer Styles. Click ‘Outer Glow’, choose an orange tone, set Mode: Linear Light (sliders as shown).

06 Final adjustments

Press Cmd/ctrl+shift+alt+e to merge a layer at the top of the stack then go to Filter>camera Raw Filter for final tonal adjustments. Reduce Temperature and Saturation as shown and experiment with Exposure until it looks right. When you’re happy, hit OK to apply.