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Speed Up Your Editing Workflow With This Helpful Web App

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It doesn’t matter how often you use Photoshop or Lightroom, it’s almost impossible to remember every keyboard shortcut. Keyboard shortcuts are pretty useful when it comes to speeding up your workflow; In Photoshop or Lightroom you can use shortcuts to access tools or perform actions much quicker than you could with your mouse or graphics tablet. It works with Mac OSX, Windows and Linux.

[REWIND: THE 7 COMPONENTS OF LIGHTROOM AND THEIR SHORTCUTS]

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Waldo Bronchart has created a web app called “Application Shortcut Mapper”, designed to visualize keyboard shortcuts for Photoshop, Lightroom and Blender. Previous to this helpful web app you had to buy stickers and physically apply them to your keyboard, a method that works, but it has one huge disadvantage: other than the web app, your stickers aren’t interactive.

The Application Shortcut Mapper web app has one huge advantage over the more “traditional” method: If you press any key on your keyboard, the highlighted shortcuts on the website change and show you various possible combinations with the pressed key.

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web app with cmd pressed

The neat little web-based application works with Photoshop, Lightroom and Blender in different categories. In Lightroom, for example, you can access shortcuts specific to certain modules like “Library” or “Develop.”

In Photoshop, you have even more options. There is a shortcut category for almost every single tool/filter.

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I can see this app helping me speed up my workflow. You can check out the website here and see for yourself.

What do you think about this web app? Do you think this could help speeding up your editing workflow? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

[Via Waldo Bronchart, images via screen capture]

 

 


Sharpening | So Many Get It Wrong & This Will Help You Get It Right

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It’s really quite astounding the degree to which sharpening can affect the outcome of a photograph. It can render a photo useless as quickly as it can improve it. Used selectively, it can lead attention to the points of chosen focus in an image, save portions, enhance others, and if it’s wielded in a cavalier manner, can amplify a mistake and attract the wrong sort of attention. Along with saturation, it is the most commonly overkilled post process I come across. There’s this idea among many, especially beginners, that a sharp picture is a good picture, but truly the definition of both of those terms, ‘sharp’ and ‘good,’ are sort of nebulous.

Far too many photographers use sharpening as a corrective tool to correct that which sharpening wasn’t really meant to fix. And while I’m all for having clear photos, and respect artistic license, I think there should be greater restraint when it’s being applied. I wish I could get it through the heads of the accused that some phenomenal photos aren’t necessarily sharp. Studying photographic history, even a minuscule amount, and learning how to critique photos is a good way to get a grasp of this, and leads to better application. It’s something I’ll be addressing soon.

[REWIND:'Breaking Pixels’ | High Bit Files & Why They Matter]

Anyway, now that I’ve rambled and set a precedent of restraint, I’ll discuss a few different types of sharpening methods; what the differences are, and how to use them. To many of you advanced and or discerning photogs, this will not be groundbreaking, but perhaps you’ll find some value in it nonetheless.

What IS Sharpening & Why Do it?

At a very distilled level, sharpening is adding contrast between pixels, and edges in general. Essentially, one side will be made darker and the other lighterhence, contrast. This added contrast can give an image more definition, and the appearance of refinement. It is for those reasons and those similar that you would want to add sharpening to an image. You can make a feature seem more defined, create a sense of separation from surroundings, and in some cases it can be effective to remove a haze.

If you’re shooting in RAW especially, you’ll understand that the lack of compression and ‘edits’ that are provided in other file types, can give your photos a slightly softer look. Photos with phone cameras or point and shoots often have automatic edits done as a photo is taken, and sharpening is one of them.

Here are a few examples of sharpening – from neutral to ok, to bad. You can see from the last one what too much sharpening does.
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You can see the almost crystalline effect on the fibres of the ball.
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Sharpening in Photoshop & Lightroom

In Lightroom you can create brushes of your own or apply the general sliders. I don’t find I have as much control, but if you have good brushes and know the balance of how the different sliders adjust contrast and sharpness, Lightroom’s sharpening is very good, and our Lightroom Preset System with its custom brushes is good for this

I like the control Photoshop affords me in general, and in sharpening especially. I work a lot with layers to be very precise, and I find that and masking variables highly valuable. The primary methods to sharpen in PS tend to be using the Unsharp Mask, just the regular old Sharpen filter, and High-Pass filter. If you are in any drop down menu in Photoshop and you see the three little dots (ellipsis) after the words of a selection, that means you will have some degree of control over the action (a further menu will appear), so when it comes to sharpening, I ignore anything that doesn’t have that. You’ll notice in the Photoshop Filter menu that Smart Sharpen, Unsharp Mask, and High Pass all have them; the latter two being the most common.

Unsharp mask allows you to see real-time adjustments as you move the sliders and you can control the parameters of each for more specificity.

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High Pass does a decent overall job though you only really control the radius, as seen here: (good way to explore the effect of radius on halo effect though0. Switch blending mode to overlay after (or before) to have a normal look.
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I won’t get into detail here on how to use each one, for the reasons that there are many sources for that, and that there are many variations on how people implement each. Some like to just add the filters to a duplicate layer, while others like to change blend modes and all sorts first. I find I have less control with the High-Pass filter even when fiddling with blend modes and opacity, and I find it doesn’t handle the empty areas as well as Unsharp-Mask. Here are basic explanations of the sliders:

Amount: refers to amount/strength of sharpening to the entire image
Radius: refers to how many pixels on either side of the edge will be ‘sharpened’. As this number grows, so will the likelihood that you’ll start to see weird halo effects around edges. This is a sign that you’ve gone too far. Resolution should also be taken into account when using this slider. Higher pixel counts allow, or possibly require high radius numbers.
Threshold: This is the ‘money’ slider for me. This dampens the sharpening in areas where there aren’t edges or a lot of contrast. This is useful for skin tones or bland open spaces like skies or walls.

Thoughts & How I Sharpen

When I’m not sharpening in Camera Raw, I do a sort of strange work around/bastardization of Unsharp Mask for my sharpening work since I like to be very specific. It’s essentially using Unsharp Mask, but I select a specific image mode. Here is the basic breakdown that you can save as an action which is what I do. Once you ‘play’ it on an image, just select the brush tool and paint over the parts you want sharpened. You can fiddle with opacity to get it just right.

  1. Image>Mode>Lab Color
  2. Duplicate your layer
  3. Go into your ‘Channels’ panel and select ‘Lightness’
  4. Apply Unsharp Mask
  5. Return to RGB mode and ‘Don’t Flatten,’ and return to ‘Layers’ panel
  6. Hold Option/Alt and Add Layer Mask
  7. Take a brushpaint the areas you want sharpened

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It may be less obvious given the size here, even though I oversharpened from what I would normally do for the sake of demonstration, but if you look at the lips, eyes, hair, between the petals, you’ll notice the difference.  Of course, you can do with it what you wish.

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Here’s a closer look to get a clearer idea. This is an even more oversharpened example for demonstration but you get the idea. Notice the lips, nostrils, brow hair, petals, eyelashes..

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In closing, I’d just like to mention again that really, it’s up to you to decide what looks good or appropriate for what you’re aiming for. As always, and some of you give me a hard time for my subtlety, I would err on the side of restraint. Also keep in mind that the type/amount of sharpening you do should be adjusted for the display medium the image will be used for; if online solely, what size, and of course when printing take into consideration the paper being used as papers with more or rougher tooth tend to create softer images anyway, and may require more sharpening.

Women in Classic Paintings Get Photoshopped to Fit Today’s Standards

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Photo editor Lauren Wade has seen and preformed many a Photoshop retouch having worked in the industry for 5 years. A little nip there, a little tuck here, it is the standard of beauty these days to see gaunt models airbrushed to perfection. No thigh gaps, double chins or a blemish to be found…perfection. Just like a mannequin.

Yet, this was not always the case. Throughout history, and even in recent history, a size zero woman was not upheld as the norm. Going back throughout art history, famous painters from Degas, to Raphael to Botticelli depicted curvy women, with bellies and “imperfections” that the modern magazines would “fix” with some quick clicks in Photoshop.

[REWIND: THE CAMGIRL PROJECT: HOW THE FEMALE NUDE WENT FROM BEAUTY IDEAL TO TABOO {NSFW}]

To show the contemporary skewed standard in today’s beauty industry, Lauren has wielded her liquify tool to some classic works of art for a feature in TakePart Magazine. The pieces of art do show nudes so I suppose the following images may be considered NSFW(ish)…

 

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Titian, Danaë With Eros, 1544

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Sandro Botticelli, Birth of Venus, 1486

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Edgar Degas, La Toilette, 1884–86

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Raphael, Three Graces, 1504–1505

To see more works of art being modified to perfection, check out Lauren’s article over at TakePart.

[PRODUCT HIGHLIGHT: PHOTOSHOP 101 AND PHOTOSHOP 201 BY PHLEARN]

[Via Sploid]

Quick Masking & Sharpening With Camera Raw & The Camera Raw Filter

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A few days ago we wrote, at some length, about sharpening your images; how to think about it, pitfalls to watch out for, and ways to actually do it. I happened to mention near the end that I do some sharpening in Camera Raw which does a great job masking, and have been asked to explain how to do this.

[REWIND: Sharpening | So Many Get It Wrong & This Will Help You Get It Right]

Firstly, you can do the following actions either directly in Camera Raw, or using the Camera Raw Filter in Photoshop. This method can work well with most anything, but I find it effective in architectural imagery, and portraits. The reason being is the masking feature allows for a very quick, yet accurate mask of edges which leaves open, empty spaces, free from the sharpening applied after. I still go in and use the method mentioned in the last article afterwards because I’m picky, but often this is a fine enough job.

How To:

Open an image in Camera Raw or from Photoshop go to Filters>Camera Raw Filter, and the same box will appear.

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Click on the Details button (see below) and you’ll be presented with a menu of 8 sliders. For the most part, we’re concerning ourselves with the top 4.

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Holding down the Alt/Option button, use your mouse pointer to select and hold the Masking slider. As you move it from side to side you’ll see on one end (left) your image box appears entirely white, and as you move to the right your image are will begin to refine as white gives way to black. As this happens, the white will stay on the edges, essentially where you want to sharpen, and anything that is black will not be sharpened.

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Once you’re content with the selection your masking slider has made, you can adjust the other adjustment sliders to your will. That’s really all there is to it. Click on the images to follow for a larger view.

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I’ve included a close up example here where I used this method, but overdid it to highlight how it masks.

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You can see around the edges of the glasses, lips, nostrils, etc. that there is grainy noise, but in the more open areas of the skin, it’s been left entirely alone.

 

Phlearn’s Photoshop 201 Review, No Longer A Photoshop Virgin

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I must be a lucky man. When I reviewed the Photoshop 101 tutorial by Phlearn, I was hoping I would have an opportunity to review the Photoshop 201 tutorial as well. Photoshop 101 is a great introduction for a Photoshop virgin like myself, but now that I had picked up the basics, I wanted to learn more…

[REWIND: PHLEARN’S PHOTOSHOP 101, FROM THE EYES OF A PHOTOSHOP VIRGIN]

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Overview

The Phlearn Photoshop 201 tutorial is on Adobe Photoshop CC and is an extension of Phlearn‘s Photoshop 101. There are 185 minutes showing how to use features in Photoshop to edit an image. The tutorial is broken up in to six videos:
1. Intro
2. Retouching
3. Cutting Subject out
4. Creating a Background
5. Coloring
6. Finishing Touches

As a bonus, there is a 7th video that goes over the lighting diagram for the images that are used in the tutorial. This is a brief, yet fantastic video!

Intro

The majority of the preferences and settings were covered in Photoshop 101. This tutorial revisits preferences and covers things that were not covered in 101. Photoshop 201 talks about why specific settings were chosen. In this intro, the images are loaded and grouped together. The most important piece of information for me that was shared was not to select ‘delete cropped pixels.’ If you select ‘delete cropped pixels’ when cropping, you lose all information outside the cropped area and can’t get it back. It was a great tease and lead in to the tutorial.

Things I liked:
1. Choosing Color Pallet: ProPhoto RGB
2. Loading files into stack
3. Layers panel
4. Cropping: Do not select “Delete Cropped Pixels”

Retouching

I love what I would call special features. The liquify and puppet warp tools are selling features for me. You can do so much to clean up an image and make it look professional. You can play with an image to create something fun or edgy. I could watch this video many times and not get tired of it. Because of my lack of experience, I would have been satisfied if it had stopped here. It was that good for me.

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Things I liked:
1. Liquify Tool
2. Puppet Warp
3. Clone stamp Tool
4. Healing brush tool

[RELATED: Check out Photography 101 and Photography 201 by Phlearn]

 Cutting Subject Out

There is more than one way to cut a subject out. The tutorial covers the options and shows how to do it. It gives options on which way works best for the image that is edited.

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Creating a Background

You want to choose a background that creates a nice composition. I am happy with the techniques that were shown to figure out what type of background would work best with the image being edited. It was interesting to watch Aaron play and to hear his thought process. It was fun to see two separate images put together to create a background. You can take a landscape or structure you like and blend that with a sky you like to create something that works for your image.

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Things I liked:
1. Finding right composition
2. Blending layers
3. Using clipping masks
4. Curves adjustment layers

Coloring

Color, or lack of color, impacts an image tremendously. I am drawn to a good black and white photo, and I have fun playing with color. There are several tools in Photoshop that allow me to be as creative as I want to be with color. You can change color in a specific area of your image or you can change the coloring of the whole image at once.

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Things I liked:
1. Hue saturation adjustment layers
2. Levels adjustment layers
3. Gradient tool
4. Apply image tool

Finishing Touches

This was a really fun video. The image was turned into an ad. A border, words, and color blur were added. White highlights were added to the skin and there was talk about how to create a porcelain look. It was a good way to end the tutorial.

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Conclusion

This was a great tutorial and well worth the money. I don’t feel like I am going out on a limb by saying that this was worth much more than the cost. If I can improve my skills and the product I put out exponentially for a reasonable price, I’m going to jump at it. You get both the 101 and 201 tutorials, 408 minutes of instruction, for $35! That is well worth all the content you get in this series.

If you’re interested in purchasing, check it out Photoshop 101 and Photoshop 201 by Phlearn in our store.

Learn To ‘Fake Using A Very Expensive Lens’ With Serge Ramelli & Photoshop

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Is your blog or Instagram looking a bit tired? A bit boring? A bitlocal? Need something a bit new, that looks like you’re somewhere a bit unusual like atop the Empire State Building or Eiffel Tower even though you’re reading this from Wisconsin? No worries. Have Photoshop – will travel.

Sort of.

Making it seem as though your photo was taken somewhere it wasn’t is only part of what you’re about to see here. The other part is making your images seem as if they weren’t just taken somewhere atypical, but also with a beautiful-bokeh inducing lens, which you may not have, or may not have on you.

[REWIND: Sharpening | So Many Get It Wrong & This Will Help You Get It Right]

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At its core, this video tutorial is really a fine example of how specialty filters in Photoshop can make a mountain out of a molehill. Serge Ramelli is a French photographer with some serious Photoshop aptitude, and in this video he will teach you how to ‘Fake using a very expensive lens’ using only Photoshop. Really, it’s a highlight of how simple and practical Photoshop’s Field Blur, and bokeh effects are. In the example he composites, rather quickly, a photo of his nephew and a background photo of an aerial city shot, which has the effect applied.

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Thoughts

While I find his title a little misleading, I see his point, and where this can be useful. I’m rather adept at Photoshop myself, and had known of this filter option since it became an offering, yet I dismissed it because in my experience, these things just always look artificial. Bokeh production from different lenses to me is something that is so rarely done well in post, if ever. Having now tried it myself, I’m somewhat eating my own words because the bokeh effects sliders give a user much more control that I would’ve expected.

As Serge mentions in the video, it works best with smaller lights, and having tried lights of all sizes, I’ve come to the same conclusion. Interestingly, if your photo already has some round-light bokeh of the larger variety, the ‘Light Range’ slider has the strange ability to render their edges as having many small lights. It’s weird, but I’m sure someone can find use for it.

Where as Ramelli creates a composite of two different images, I can see this could also be used for layering in a single photo. If you have a photo with a subject in the foreground and you’d like the have a nice blur with bokeh balls in the background, a very similar technique will apply. Check it out.

Ramelli has a good sense of humor and the good sense to explain his actions well. As such there’s lots more to be learned from Serge at his YouTube channel, which you’d do well to visit.

Source: Serge Ramelli YouTube

Get Great Skin With This Highly Unknown Photoshop Tool

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Aging, I would venture to say, is good. Your gray matter, while maybe not as pliable, is probably more purposefully used; you have probably surrounded yourself with a group of people you care about after picking off the stragglers as the years move; you have money to spend on whatever you like whether it be bottles of brandy with just enough bon bois, to fishing trips; and you’re able to do things you can’t when you’re young, such as rent a car, and drink (not at the same time), and have sex (incorporating all three is your prerogative).

[REWIND: Quick Masking & Sharpening With Camera Raw & The Camera Raw Filter]

But there is a ‘yang’ to that ‘yin’. Mail has replaced the birthday cards and packages with bills and bigger bills; you realize your dream of being a fighter pilot is probably over; and your body begins to bloat and fall apart quicker than anyone ever told you. That last one is insidious and shows up first on the part of us everyone seesour face; bags, dark circles, lines, moles, rough texture, and blemishes. Time can be a cruel bastard. But there’s an app for that. Surprise surprise, it’s Photoshop. Here in this video tutorial Phlearn wizard Aaron Nace draws upon his well of Photoshop knowledge to show us a surprisingly fine way to turn back the clock on many of these pesky ailments.

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Thoughts

Specifically the focus is demonstrated primarily on removing bags under eyes, which can be done in a myriad of ways, but he touts a tool which not many actually know about. If you’re one of the ones who does, well you can chime in if you like, but the fact is, it’s not very well known. Which is sad, because it’s tremendously useful. It’s worth a watch, and will help you perfect some post processing portraits in probably record time.

If you like this, and would like to become quickly adept at Photoshop, I might suggest having a look around our site as we generally post tutorials like this often. And to have a look at the Phlearn Photoshop 101 & 201 as they are comprehensive and will have you doing things with Photoshop you may have otherwise thought too complex, or didn’t even know you could do

The Best Way to Cut Out Hair in Photoshop: Phlearn Pro Tutorial Review

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Phlearn-PRO-The-Best-Way-to-Cut-Out-HairEven though I’ve been using Photoshop for 20 years (Holy Cow! Am I that old????) I always learn something new when I watch a Phlearn Pro Tutorial. I’m amazed by the wealth of Photoshop knowledge presented in these affordable videos.

During my Graphic Design career, I’ve created my share of clipping masks and composited images in Photoshop. Cutting out hair is always a struggle and it’s also something I see being done very badly in general. Look at the myriads of local dentist and realtor newspaper or banner advertisements and billboards in your area and you’ll see what I mean!

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In this Phlearn Pro Tutorial, The Best Way to Cut Out Hair, Aaron teaches how to create a custom brush to replicate the texture of hair in your specific image. Then he uses the custom brush to layer-mask hair (or in this case, fur on a coat) in the image without leaving any fringing or soft edges. Brilliant!

This method seems like it might be time consuming or difficult, but compared to trying to cut out individual hairs with the pen tool, or using channels when your background color is similar to your subject, this is quick and easy. I can’t wait to try this out on my next composite image.

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This video really should be called, The Best Ways to Cut Out Hair, because more than one technique is explained. Other options presented for cutting out hair include how and when to use the pen tool (which has been my go-to method for cutting out hair in the past), how to make a selection and mask using the color range tool, how to use the Step and Repeat tool (one of my faves in Adobe Illustrator, but I had never used it in Photoshop!) and why it’s important to use a pressure sensitive pen and tablet (like the Wacom Intuos Pro Professional tablet, which is what I use).

[REWIND: WACOM INTUOS PEN & TOUCH TABLET | REVIEW & THOUGHTS]

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Aaron is really good at explaining why he’s using a specific method (since there are several ways to do anything in Photoshop, after all). He goes into detail about how to use each tool required and always mentions key commands, which are crucial for learning to use your editing software in the most efficient way possible.

After reviewing several Phlearn tutorials, I highly recommend them, including The Best Way to Cut Out Hair. It’s $24.99 and available at the Phlearn store here.

Click here to read our other Phlearn Pro Tutorial reviews. And if you’re a Photoshop beginner, check out his Photoshop 101 and 201 series, now available in our store.


A Sneak Peak Of A New Photoshop CC Feature, “Focus Mask”& It Looks Impressive

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It’s been a hell of a year for Adobe with their new formula for snagging (and keeping) users based on their subscription model, and in doing so they have the ability to continuously update the software, and deliver the latest and greatest directly to end users while they work. This is something they actually do, as anyone with Creative Cloud knows.

June 18th  is a date Adobe promised to uncloak “the next evolution of Creative Cloud,” and while we have yet to arrive at that calendar box, Adobe has begun to share some of what we can expect. One of the features to be added I’m quite excited about, and I’m sure is one other photographers and graphic designers alike, will welcome with all the fervor of a lab whose owners have just come home. It’s called “Focus Mask,” and it looks brilliant.

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It seems a natural progression for masking, and intuitive. Essentially, according to Senior Photoshop Product Manager, Zorana Gee, who narrates the demonstration, this will allow a user to,

make an automatic selection based off of pixels that are in focus versus out of focus.

This makes perfect sense as an approach seeing as we tend to often isolate our subject matter via defocus control, naturally then lending to treating the areas in and out of focus differently in post. If you’ve ever tried to mask something in Photoshop, especially something with many fine edges, you know it can be a time swallowing endeavor to get right, and even with a pen tablet. From Gee’s demonstration is seems to be highly effective, and rather simple to use.

[REWIND: Wacom Intuos Pen & Touch Tablet | Review & Thoughts]

Some of the brushes in the new selection settings allow for adding to the mask, as well as removing it, making it very versatile, accurate, and likely better for working in steps. She mentions it works very well on hard edges and then shows just how efficient it is at refining the soft edges.

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Thoughts

The applications for this are far as they are wide. Designers will surely rejoice, and photographer also. It will more easily allow for anything from dropping in a different background, like a sky, to simply changing the tones and brightness of each part without affecting the other.

I’m hoping this isn’t Photoshop‘sbait trailer,’ where they give away the best of the show in the trailer, because if this is not that, then I suspect the 18th will be quite revelatory. I wait now in keen anticipation.

Source: Adobe Photoshop YouTube Channel

The First Photoshopped Photo | Topless & Tanned In Bora Bora, ‘Jennifer In Paradise’

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It’s that name. How many incarnations of it, how many times, and for how many years have we been greeted with that screen? That blue screen that seemed to take the same approach for design evolution as Porsche – slow. For those of a retouching persuasion, that screen is was like the inside one’s eyelids; seen so often it was all at once familiar, and yet details are hard to recall. But over time there was usually a part that was recognizable, and it was a name: Thomas Knoll (really small and difficult to see here but it’s the first name).

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Thomas was Photoshop’s original developer, hence his name’s prominent placement on the greeting/loading screen. Another Knoll’s name however, is not seen: his brother John, whose contribution to the editing software was not only as developer, but provided what was, essentially, the first Photoshopped image.

‘Jennifer In Paradise,’ it was called. Jennifer was his then girlfriend, and later that day, his fiancee. The paradise? Bora Bora. So they didn’t really go out on a limb in naming the photo, not at all like the limb they went on with Photoshop. Still, that photograph became a sort of historical stamp when Photoshop was developed into something deemed sellable, and there needed to be a demonstration piece.

[REWIND: A Sneak Peak Of A New Photoshop CC Feature]

Jennifer in Paradise.tif ñ the first photoshopped pictureBrothers Knoll sent over their original Je

Keep in mind it was the late 80’s, when digital images weren’t exactly commonplace, so while visiting friends at Apple’s Advanced Technology Group lab, John took advantage of a flatbed scanner they had, uncommon then, and scanned the only photo he had on him – Jennifer, tanned and topless, on a beach in Bora Bora, staring out at a background as beautiful as what sat affront it.

The image’s symbolism, though not intended, isn’t lost on many; that here is a woman staring at an endless horizon just as the dawn of ‘lying’ photographs was emerging. A Dutch artist, Constant Dullaart, even uses the image as a muse for his own art installation at a London show, though John, according to the Guardian, doesn’t seem particularly pleased.

There’s an early Photoshop demonstration that’s on YouTube, where you can see John manipulate the ‘Jennifer In Paradise’ image. It’s history. It really is.

Source: The Guardian

Learn How To Remove Anything From A Photo Using Photoshop

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How many times have you taken a photo and not noticed something unwanted in the frame? Maybe a tree branch that appears as if it’s coming from someone’s head, or someone stepped into the frame who wasn’t meant to be there, or perhaps a set piece out of place, we’ve been there. Sometimes it’s due to negligence, sometimes you have no control over the matter, and other times everything else in the shot couldn’t be more right and you just have to get rid of that item. Well, Phlearn and Aaron Nace have put together a tutorial which illustrates methods anyone with Photoshop can employ to remove any unwanted thing from a picture.

[REWIND: A Sneak Peak Of A New Photoshop CC Feature]

In this particular instance, the objects in question are a rather obvious garbage can sitting too close to the model, and a light post. However, as those are the primary subjects, removing them effectively means removing any remnants of their existence, often in the form of cast shadows, or reflections. Aaron goes through the steps and tools required to do this, admitting the limitations, but explaining ways to get around them, or at least make the best of them.

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Thoughts

One of the best things about Aaron is the manner in which he brings across the material; unassuming, and not in the least bit patronizing. This episode is no different. Nace explains in his way, the tools to use, why, and possible substitutions.

I think most notably in this video, for me, is the acknowledgement of the artistic and creative resources Photoshop often requires from the user in order to render a quality edit. Using the example at hand, in removing the garbage can, there was left a sizable void behind it. Given the surroundings, it wasn’t possible to do direct cloning to reconstruct the area. Aaron, sensing the concerns, addresses how to think about and execute creating a fill for the void, complete with adding texture. The process requires technical skill, but also a keen artistic eye to finish it well. Anyway, it’s well done, and this is definitely a skill all photographers and editors should equip themselves with.

If you like this, and would like to become quickly adept at Photoshop, I might suggest having a look around our site as we generally post tutorials like this often. And to have a look at the Phlearn Photoshop 101 & 102 as they are comprehensive and will have you doing things with Photoshop you may have otherwise thought too complex, or didn’t even know you could do.

A Look at the Most Important Features of the Photoshop CC 2014 Release

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It was a big day yesterday for Adobe as they announced a whole set of new features to their Creative Cloud applications as well as the permanent $9.99 per month price tag on their CC subscription for photographers.

In the following CreativeLive video, Ben Willmore shows us the most important features of the new Photoshop CC . He’ll show you how to set up the new version, use the new color panel, the select focus area and the new changes in the smart guides.

To learn how to use the Adobe Creative Cloud applications - Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Premiere, Dreamweaver, and After Effects – check out the 6 day FREE CreativeLive course Adobe Creative Apps Starter Kit and also a code to get 20% off of the SLR Lounge Lightroom Presets in the Swag Bag going on NOW.

How To Add A Realistic Tattoo To a Person With Photoshop

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I think the concept of using skin as a canvas is curious. I don’t have any tattoos, and in a day where it seems everyone and their mother has one, or four, I’m the odd man out, and I like that. Tattoos were somewhat of a rebellious experiment that stuck, and is, as such, culturally ingrained. The Tā moko of the Māori is cultural, and like beanies, sort of represent a bit of bohemian flare, with a dash of rebellious cool. Clearly, I’ve considered getting one, though I think now to be different, you don’t.

[REWIND: Learn How To Remove Anything From A Photo Using Photoshop]

But I think most people in the west have pondered what it would be like to get one. Some may have considered to the point of actively searching for just the right one; something meaningful perhaps? Or maybe just something interesting or beautiful. Either way, you never quite know what you’re going to end up with until it’s done. I suspect, that’s half the joy. Now, however, using Photoshop, you can get a pretty damn good idea, and Phlearn’s Aaron Nace offers his hand, and a chair, and talks you through it. Pain free.

Thoughts

The process is deceptive in that it can get quite intricate, but the fundamentals are actually easy to repeat. Aaron’s method is choice for a few reasons; it takes texture and light into proper consideration, and explains just how simple it is to take any image or design from a photo, and digitally stain your skin. The use of blending mode sliders to meticulously refine the image is an eye opener for many, and the touch of coloration also has huge impact, and they both help make the tattoo melt seamlessly into flesh.
 Here’s a quick example:

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The difficulty for me came in when deciding to wrap tattoos around or set it to the curves of a body, but with some warping and vectoring, you really can achieve something surprising. It’s absolutely perfect for freaking out the family, and I guess you could use it as a preview to see if you like the design of one you’re considering for real. Get tatted up!

For more Photoshop tutorials by Phlearn, check out PHOTOSHOP 101 AND PHOTOSHOP 201 BY PHLEARN in the SLR Lounge store!

Source: Phlearn

My 2 Current Favorite & Fast Photoshop Tools

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Long ago, I would be one of the first to dismiss the use of Photoshop, not because of some Philistine mentality that a photo should be unaltered, but rather I didn’t understand it, how to use it, and to some extent, it just didn’t seem as useful as it is now. Nevermind that I was shooting in film till not too long ago. When it came to anything other than point and shoots in terms of digital, I wasn’t an early adopter. I was still dodging and burning the old school way, with a cotton swab and any manner of other things inside a dark room.

Photoshop has come a long way, and the current evolution has a host of features I truly adore. I get asked frequently about how to do this and that, and make a certain photo look a certain way. I think it’s best to tell you what features I really like, then one can learn how to use them. In the process of learning, and the application of the feature, it becomes apparent how else and where else the methodology can be applied.

[REWIND: How To Add A Realistic Tattoo To a Person With Photoshop]

Currently, in the latest version of Photoshop CC, there are a number of features I’m loving. Some of them are available on previous versions and some, sadly, not. Here are my first two which should be available to most:

Selective Blurring Via Field Blur

As I’ve mentioned on more that one occasion on here, I generally dislike the use of faux defocused areas and faux bokeh. It’s just not a look I tend to like, and I’m not all about shallow depth of field. However, I’m sure we all can recognize the artistic component and license in photography and these features can be used to good effect. The Field Blur option in Photoshop is actually quite impressive. It lets you choose points, as many as you like, to defocus. It also lets you choose to what degree those areas are defocused.

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It’s rather simple to use, and if you have an technical understanding of defocused areas and bokeh, you can render realistic results. In order to do this you will be playing around with the level of each point, and understand that when the first point is plotted, the entire image will be defocused. You have to then drop points where you want to lessen or remove that defocus, and then you adjust accordingly.

In the example below, I took a shot outside of a usual haunt of mine and felt it was a good candidate for an example. The photo itself was shot on an Fuji X-E2 at over 2000 ISO and at 1.4, but I think a little more defocus in the far background would be a nice touch to tone down the bokeh lights also. Here’s an example of the effect. Warning, it IS subtle, as that’s how I operate. If you want more of an effect, it is simple to do.

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Camera Raw Filter

I’ve done a whole segment on this before, however it remains possibly my favorite Photoshop filter tool. We know it’s essentially the same engine that powers Lightroom’s adjustments, but having them in Photoshop where it can be applied at will, over and over again, is lovely.

In this example, we take a crop of a shot I took this weekend and all I want to do is bring out the highlights from the shadows a bit, and I can think of no better tool to use that that of Camera Raw. It is what I tend to go back to for most of my primary edits.

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You can see the result here after I upped the shadows, and then added a layer mask so I could target to only show the new highlights in the hair, hip, and slight side of the leg, to give more depth. It took all of about one minute.

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If you like this, and would like to become quickly adept at Photoshop, I might suggest having a look around our site as we generally post tutorials like this often. And to have a look at the Phlearn Photoshop 101 & 102 as they are comprehensive and will have you doing things with Photoshop you may have otherwise thought too complex, or didn’t even know you could do.

Friday Funny: Find Your Donut Twin {Bonus: 3D Parallax Effect Tutorial}

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They say that everyone has a doppelgänger in the world, that walking around in the streets of New York right now, could be a woman that is my long lost twin. Now, apparently, everyone has a donut twin as well.

Brandon Voges, photographer with the company, Bruton Strobe,  paired up with ad agency, The Marlin Network and Strange Donuts to find the lookalike donut for each person. As part of the a teaser for the National Restaurant Association’s annual food show breakfast, six people were paired up to their Donut Double. 

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As a bonus, the group put together a teaser invite video of the images using the 3D Parallax Effect made with Cinema 4D and Photoshop. They also created a great tutorial on how to use the technique.

[REWIND: STUNNING EXAMPLE OF USING STILL IMAGES TO MAKE A PARALLAX MOVIE – WWF PARALLAX SEQUENCE]

Donut Double Teaser Video

3D Parallax Camera Mapping Tutorial

So, that leaves the question, what kind of donut are you? I’m an Eternal Spring donut which frankly sounds quite delicious. You can take the donut quiz here to find your donut double.

To see more of Brandon Voges’ work, check out his Behance page.

CREDITS: Photographs by Brandon Voges/Bruton Strobe Studios are copyrighted and have been used with permission for SLR Lounge. Do not copy, modify or re-post this article or images without express permission from SLR Lounge and the artist.

[Via Feature Shoot]

 


How To Masterfully Fix Skin & Hair Issues With Photoshop

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Have you ever come across an image, specifically a portrait, that you felt you could re-create, then tried and had the result just not compare? Or perhaps it was close, and you did everything you could to make it look just so. You could’ve even had all the right lighting elements in check, camera execution with the same settings, there was the perfect planetary alignment, and still, something was amiss. These days, if you’re not adept at Photoshop and Lightroom, the likelihood is that would be your answer.

Now, any photographer worth his salt is going to not only understand, but promote for themselves and others, to always do everything feasible to get the shot right, IN-camera. There is no substitution for this, and those who don’t adhere to this are kidding themselves that their work can compete with those that do. They’ll never understand gargantuan value of subtlety, and will always be a step, or 12, behind. It’s like getting a 4.0, once you drop below, you’ll never get it back. That being said, there are things you’re going to want to be able to do with your images; ways of manipulating them to make use of artistic license, and that’s entirely fine. What I suggest is that you learn how to do this well.

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Human brains are engineered it seems, to recognize faces. It’s possibly the visual we know best. It’s so good at it we see them everywhere, and even when a face comes within a breath of ours, and our eyes are taking in a warped image, our brains shift it around so we don’t really see the true distortion. As this is the case, if you’re going to Photoshop someone, make it good. Make it really, bloody good. Michael Woloszynowicz of Vibrant Shot, puts out some of the absolute best Photoshop retouching material I’ve seen, and much of it free. In this tutorial, he gives an in depth look at how to fix hair and skin issues with texture grafting.

[REWIND: My 2 Current Favorite & Fast Photoshop Tools]

Managing texture is extremely important in order to render a realistic, yet improved image. It’s also not one of the simplest things to do, though Michael certainly breaks it all down so well it appears so. Even the most difficult problems seem easy once solved.

Branching out of frequency separation, the steps can be used with ease, and either with a mouse/trackpad, or pen tablet.

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Further Thoughts

I have been using a slightly varied version of this method for some time and I actually like this one better, and have adopted it into my routine. Some of the results that can be achieved are quite astonishing, and you would hardly know that the photos were edited to begin with. I would be remiss not to mention that Michael’s images tend to be very high fashion, or high quality studio portraits, so he takes his editing further than I take most of mine. The methodology in practice can be easily adapted for all sorts of shoots, for lifestyle etc. The method also can be helpful in sorting out issues in texture with other items, such as clothes, or even in landscapes.

Some Key Notes:

1. Shortcuts – they will make your life so much easier. Remember the ones mentioned by Michael or make your own.

2. Work in layers. Work. In. Layers. When it comes to portraits, you’re often working in sections and it can be just one of the most frustrating, patience-testing events to make a mistake and lose your past edits, or to accidentally save in a way where you can’t go back and modify each adjustment. This can make your file sizes grow tremendously, so if your computer is more akin to a bi-plane, versus an F-15, then you may want to have other programs closed.

3. You’ll notice that the model in the tutorial doesn’t have very distinguishing moles or freckles, and if you’re retouching someone who does, understand that even when working on the ‘skin texture’ layer, you’re somewhat going to be changing these skin characteristics.

I like to keep the photo, most times, from looking too much like the model has on a blanket of make-up and like to keep certain distinguishing skin features apparent, if not toned down, so the model still retains some more of his/her unique marks. So just keep that in mind when adjusting ‘texture.’ Here’s an example of an outdoor portrait photo I retouched lightly using my slightly varied version of this method, where my friend/model has some unique freckles and moles, and I didn’t want to change them.

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There are a lot more tutorials from Michael to be seen on YouTube which are certainly worth checking out. Vibrant Shot also offers one-on-one coaching, and that’s pretty special. You can also follow along on Vibrant Shot’s Twitter

Source: YouTube

The Best Way To Watermark Your Images With Photoshop

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When I first heard of watermarks, it wasn’t in relation to photos, but instead on company letterhead. You’d see it on the legal documents from my parents’ companies, and on my school report card, much to my scheming chagrin. It may have something to do with why I generally associate watermarks with something dated. Perhaps. The reasoning behind using a watermark is in photography is a relatively apparent one; as protecting, intellectual property (imagery) is a greater and greater concern for people who produce in a time where technology is both friend and foe, and watermarking is a line of defense against those dark arts.

[REWIND: Make Your Own Sign Or Signature Into a Watermark in 10 Min (No Scanner Needed)]

As I’ve written about before, the chair of opinion on the matter, rocks back and forth on both the effectiveness of a watermark, and its practicality. Some see them as solely serving to distract and detract from the image, while others feel it’s great for name association. Some feel it’s entirely useless, and others just don’t seem to care.

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Yet regardless of what side of the line in the sand you choose to be behind, there’s probably some validity to it, and I think most photographers have considered using watermarks at some time. If you’re going to use them, it’ll pay to know how to do it well, and Phlearn’s Aaron Nace, in rather typical friendly and informative fashion, demonstrates how to make a custom brush and use Photoshop to do just that.

Thoughts

Even if you’re not going to use the brush and watermark, as always, Aaron’s method of teaching guides you through steps and in the process shows you aspects of the program which you may want to use some other time. The approach also depicts ways you can manipulate the watermark since it is a brush, that you may not have thought of, such as changing its blending mode & opacity, or its color by sampling in the image.

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Also don’t be put off by the seemingly daunting idea of ‘creating a brush.’ It’s far simpler than you may think. In fact, you may have to rewind that portion of the video to see it again because it happens to quickly.

If you like this, and would like to become quickly adept at Photoshop, I might suggest having a look around our site as we generally post tutorials like this often. And to have a look at the Phlearn Photoshop 101 & 201 as they are comprehensive and will have you doing things with Photoshop you may have otherwise thought too complex, or didn’t even know you could do.

Source: Phlearn YouTube

Photoshop’s New ‘Focus Area’ Tool Makes For Easy Masking & Great Portraits

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It would seem Photoshop CC, and all that Adobe cloud mentality is here to stay. Now, if that’s not your particular brand of scotch, well you may have chase it with something. I like it for a few reasons, most of which I won’t get into here, but one of which has to be the ease at which updates can be delivered to the entire user base, which one would hope, would prompt the company to do it more frequently. So far, this has been a bit of a blessing and a curse. There are constant updates and most of which aren’t noteworthy to most of the user experience. Some, however, are brilliant.

[REWIND: My 2 Current Favorite & Fast Photoshop Tools]

One of the newer updates can really help to speed up the process of masking, and in turn, can really help your images turn into something better, and do so quicker. Portraits do especially well from the update. It’s a new option called ‘Focus Area,’ and what it allows you to do is isolate the focused area of a photo, or the inverse. Since we often tend to guide a viewer’s eye by selective defocus, naturally that portion of the image is treated differently from the rest, and this tool allows for all sorts of adjustments to be made to either area.

The tool also has a good amount of customizability, so you can tailor the mask with ease. For example, you can use brushes to select areas you want to add or remove the mask from, you do have the ability to soften and refine edges, and you can choose different overlay options to aid you in making said selections. So, without further ado

How To

Last weekend I was with a friend in Wynwood, Miami’s design district, and took this casual photo of her in this rather decrepit little corner full of graffiti as she took refuge from the sun. I’m quite sure I was shooting close to racked out at around 180mm at 2.8 which gave a slight amount of background separation given how confined everything was. The photo had some interest, I liked the designs, but she sort of blended in a bit too much for my liking, and I wanted to tone down the colors and brightness of the noisy background. Perfect, in other words, for this:

1. Open chosen image. No copy necessarily need be made.

2. Go to the menu bar to the ‘Select’ tab and scroll down to ‘Focus Area‘.

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3. Once you’ve clicked that, the new window will pop-up and the effect will begin to render. It may take a few seconds. Under the ‘View’ selection tab in that window, I like to choose one which will allow me to see what’s under the mask, but it’s your choice.

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4. Most of that can be left as is, but the points to pay attention to are the brushes on the left, the ‘Parameters’ slider, and ‘Refine edge.’ The top brush allows you to add back into focus, and the lower brush removes from focus. You can get as close as you like by using the slider and then refining with the brush. Use Refine Edge when you’re about done to more seamlessly blend the mask to avoid harsh edges, generally using the ‘Smooth’ slider.

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5. Once you’re satisfied, you can hit OK, and allow it a moment to render. When it’s finished, go to Select>Inverse to select the defocus area, and from here you can add any adjustment layers and tweak as you please. If you notice some harder edges,work around this by selecting a brush, low flow like around 5%, and brush in or out the areas to blend the layer to what you want.

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Finished Examples:

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After Edits on Left

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After edits, on right

Thoughts

Now of course, as goes my typical disclaimer, it’s entirely your license to goes as strong or soft with these edits as you like. I’ve found that busy backgrounds like this pose more of a masking issue on the auto mode but nothing that some manual labor can’t sort out, and with nought but a little time. If you have any troubles or questions, don’t hesitate to hit me up and I’ll do my best to guide you.

 

CREDITS: All photographs shared by Kishore Sawh are copyrighted and have been used with permission for SLR Lounge. Do not copy, modify or re-post this article or images without express permission from SLR Lounge and the artist.

Before & After Photoshopped Images – An Ethical Dilemma

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Typically on the weekends, I’ll share some Photoshop tutorial or another for more reasons than I will explain here. Some of which though happen to be that you, our charming and loyal audience, asks for it, and also I think the world would be a better place should retouching skills be brought up a notch. There are few things in photography quite as cringe worthy as poor Photoshopping, but that statement on its own is a loaded one; who is to say what is good or bad? On what criteria is that based?

As I see it, there are two cornerstones of judgement here: one is on technical execution, no matter what the execution is intended, and the second, based around how far we take it. The two often come together as it’s the idea of many that the technical execution is poor if the photo isn’t taken far enough. Or vice versa, of course. Smack in the middle of this question lies the debate on the purpose of Photoshop retouching, and the ethics of it.

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There is no shortage of heated banter on either side, as either has legions of people with strong opinions. The prototypical argument against is often the precedent that very Photoshopped images set for our youth’s body image ideals – apparently we’re in a time where body dysmorphic disorder is rampant, and some would have you believe Photoshop is largely to blame.

Whatever side of the fence you’re on, you likely have strong opinions on the matter, especially if you have children, from what I’ve seen. Photographer Karl Taylor, has created a short video where he takes a model, naturally beautiful and in little need of enhancing, and shoots her in 4 different ways: natural window light no make-up, studio light no make-up, studio light with make-up, and then that image retouched. (Video below).

Thoughts

It’s interesting to see how Karl illustrates it all so simply, and to see the progression, if you can call it that, from natural to retouched. There’s an accompanying blog post to the video which you can find here, and is worth a look to see all the opinions of the commenters.

[REWIND: Photoshop's New 'Focus Area' Tool Makes For Easy Masking & Great Portraits]

I personally think many aspects of Karl’s retouching went too far; I don’t like the reshaped lips (possibly contoured with light), the eyebrows I find are overly filled in, and mostly I feel the lack of shading around the mouth makes it appear as though the lips are just stuck on. I’ve seen Karl’s other work and he’s no stranger to more subtle retouching, and no doubt this was illustrative for argument’s sake also.

I don’t see the trouble in adjusting an image at all, to get rid of the imperfections we wouldn’t normally pick up and then some, especially given modern photo resolution. Just how far depends on the occasion. I also don’t feel it’s the job of marketers to entirely nurture the young and impressionable. That’s a harsh statement, but it’s my opinion. For centuries art has been painted, and sculpted, and photographed to an ‘ideal,’ with nothing poor to say for it, and people were left to use their own judgement.

What are your thoughts on the matter?

There’s a lot more informative, and instructional information to be had from Taylor, and you can find it on his site, and his YouTube Channel.

Source: ISO1200

How to Change Hair Color In Photoshop

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It is, perhaps, the most common style manipulation that most people do – changing hairstyles. From cuts, to styling, and of course, coloring, hair tends to be something we (almost all of us) have, that can affect a dramatic aesthetic difference with relative ease.

There are bounteous reasons why you might want to alter hair color in your images. You may be going for a specific color palette for the entire shoot to adhere to a theme and the model doesn’t have the right shade required or a wig; perhaps the model in question recently changed the color of their hair and it’s not right for the shoot; maybe the photo was captured in a way that dulled or gave the hair a hue that is unwanted; or of course, you’d just like to see what you or someone else may look like as a test before heading to the salon. Thankfully, it’s not difficult for this alteration to be done in Photoshop, and Phlearn’s Aaron Nace will guide you through.

Things To Consider

From the start, Aaron makes it clear that it’s distinctly easier to manipulate and change the color of light hair, versus dark, and especially black. He says going from black hair to blonde is a terribly arduous task and as such it’s not touched upon in this tutorial. The darker the hair the less information there is to alter, and thus less detail, which makes the render appear less real.

[REWIND: Before & After Photoshopped Images - An Ethical Dilemma ]

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He also is sure to point out that with a color change it’s important to beware of over saturation. In order to keep the result realistic, there will need to be different levels of lights and darks, along with variances in the hues themselves, and saturating too much is a road to fake looking hair.

Nace suggests opting out of the ‘Hue Saturation’ adjustment layer and instead opting for that of ‘Selective Color,’ as it allows for more subtle control. That’s just one of the side tips Aaron divulges in the video, which has other small bits that many aren’t aware of, but are tremendously helpful and applicable in other Photoshop dealings, such as how to copy/apply a layer mask setting easily from one layer to another.

It’s one of Aaron’s great videos explained with care and detail, and as always, easy to follow along with. If you are a fan of Aaron’s teachings (and who isn’t?), be sure to check back here for updates, and follow along with Aaron on YouTube and Phlearn. You should also consider becoming quickly adept at Photoshop with the Phlearn Photoshop 101 & 201 sets as they are very comprehensive, and will have you doing things with Photoshop you may have otherwise thought too complex, or didn’t even know you could do.

Source: Phlearn

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