How do I fix this photo?

Question

I'm fairly new to photoshop but know the basics. I often get photos like this. I've searched for tutorials but can't find any good ones. Anyone have a link to a tutorial or could point me in the right direction. I've tryed brightness/contrast, shadows/highlights and had a go at levels.
Lightening the image or doing a shadow/highlight works for some of the image but the man at the back is still in the dark.

Answer 1

Hello,
Is this something like what you want?  If so I’ll try and explain how to do this.  I pre-apologize for having lost the bookmark to the video that fully explains this process.
Once in photoshop, go to levels and move the right and left sliders to the edges of your histogram, create a new layer (layer 1), change the color to gray, set the mode to overlay, reduce the opacity to 50% click ok.  Select your paint brush, set opacity to 20%, leave the flow at 100%.  Set your default foreground and background colors to black & white – now paint over the image, white removes color, black will add color.  Changes will be minor, you may have to paint over the subject several times – do not use a hard brush.  Once you have the photo adjusted to your satisfaction, click “Ctrl, Alt,, Shift and the letter E” all at the same time, this will create a new layer (layer 2) above the previous.  You should now have three layers, with the most recent at the top, with that layer active go to “Filter”, select “Other” from the dropdown menu, select “High Pass” adjust the radius to around 0.5 or 0.6, click ok.  With that layer still active right mouse click on layer 2, select blending options, change the blending mode to “Overlay” leave everything else at 100%  This will sharpen the image slightly.  If you have changed the radius to much delete layer 2 and repeat “Ctrl, Alt, Shift & E” and decrease the radius.  This may sound convoluted, in actuality it is very simple once having gone through the process.
Good Luck!!!