On Mon, Jun 4, 2012 at 1:16 AM, nnaemekadavid wrote:

That is my editing so far an I got this image. Who can advise me on what step to carry out next.

Not sure what you're trying to do exactly. What do you mean by "saving" it? Was it originally a RAW file or a JPG from the camera? If it was a JPG, then there is no headroom, no recoverable data for the overexposed sections. They're blown, they're white, and there's nothing you can do about that except to make the white parts a different colour. All detail in those overexposed sections does not exist, and therefore cannot be recovered.

If this was a RAW file from the camera, then there may be _some_ recoverable detail stored in the file. But that picture is so blown in so many sections, I doubt any available headroom will be of much use. You'll still end up with barely any detail in those white sections. Again, the only thing you'll be able to do is make the white into a different colour.

If you're looking for artistic impression advice to learn how to make the overexposed section look more appealing, that's purely a subjective opinion. What you've done so far looks pretty good, in my opinion.

--
Frank Gore
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On 06/03/2012 10:16 PM, nnaemekadavid wrote:

Please, can anyone advise me further on what to do to this photo. the original jpg file:
www.flickr.com/photos/odimegwudavid/7315025394 the file i have edited so far in png: www.flickr.com/photos/odimegwudavid/7314917446/ I have outlined the steps I have carried out so far below while attempting to save the overexposed photo.

It looks to me like this is a scanned hardcopy. If so, you might be able to get more by rescanning.
Try scanning with several different intensities to see if there is anything latent in the image that is not available in the jpg.

1. Fixed the dynamic range. Colors> Levels. Move black point to 46 and white point to 251.
2. correct the exposure. First duplicate the image layer. Colors> Desaturate using luminosity. Change blending mode to multiply. Duplicate the multiply mode layer call it highlights. Change the blending mode of highlights layer to screen. Create “new from visible layer”. 3. correct again for shadows and highlights using the shadows and highlights filter at the gimp plugin registry with values, shadows 50, highlights 50. 4. apply color correction again using threshold and Levels tool. Using the threshold tool, pick the black, white and gray point (for the gray point, I filled a transparent layer with 128, 128, 128 and then mode difference and merged it with the layer below it). Using the black, white and gray sample points, I did Colors> Levels, and fixed these points. That is my editing so far an I got this image. Who can advise me on what step to carry out next.