Bleach Bypass Effect in Photoshop

Thank you to PhotoshopGirl for providing the steps for this tutorial.  Her tutorial allows you to click and follow along in the corresponding buttons in Photoshop, which is a great way to learn!

If you're a Photoshop beginner, probably best to view her tutorial first (at the link above) so you can see each step visually in detail.

Before

After

1. Duplicate the Background layer
2. Change the blending mode of the new background layer copy to Multiply.
3. Create a new Hue/Saturation adjustment layer and change the Saturation slider to about -45.
4. Create a new Levels adjustment layer, move the white slider left to about 200.
5. Create a new Curves adjustment layer and drag the middle of the line diagonally left to create an arc shape.

To see the effect that each layer creates, you can hide it by click on the Eye symbol next to each layer.  If you need to adjust some changes, simply click on the half darkened circle symbol in each layer to make adjustments. 

The final stylized image is high contrast, lower saturation, and has a more striking look in the highlights. Similar Photoshop effects are used in fashion ads, movie posters, and many more.  In the movies Minority Report and Three Kings, they achieved a similar, highly stylized effect by using a process called Bleach Bypass, where the color movie film is not bleached to remove the excess silver.  This creates a look that is much higher contrast and brighter in the highlights.

Read more about Bleach Bypass used in Hollywood:

American Cinematographer: Munich

American Cinematographer: 21 Grams 

American Cinematographer: Alexander