Photoshop Elements 3 Solutions: The Art of Digital Photography- P4 pdf

Thelarger circle shown above and to the left of the sampled color is the mouse cur-sor, which you can move around to select a lighter color.. Figure 3.18: Select a color left that is bri

Figure 3.17: Before using the Dodge tool (left) After using the Dodge tool (right).

To use the Brush to whiten teeth:

toolbar Click the lightest section of a tooth Now click the foreground color

the Color Picker Select a color that is brighter than the sampled color On theleft in Figure 3.18, you can see the sampled color shown in a small circle Thelarger circle shown above and to the left of the sampled color is the mouse cur-sor, which you can move around to select a lighter color When you click thecursor on a color, that color appears in the upper half of the color rectangle tothe right of the color slider, with the sampled color appearing in the lower half

of the rectangle

Mode to Lighten and the Opacity to 15–20 percent

Figure 3.18: Select a color (left) that is brighter than the tooth (right).

To fix a tooth with the Liquify filter:

Choose an appropriate brush size and a relatively low brush pressure.

experimenta-tion, but you can shrink the gaps between teeth, fill in a missing piece of

enam-el, or straighten a crooked tooth

In Figure 3.19 you can see how I’ve fixed two teeth by using the Liquify filterand the Bloat tool

Figure 3.19: Before applying the Liquify filter (left) and after (right).

Selectively Removing Wrinkles and Blemishes with the Healing

Brush

Personally, I like wrinkles; they show character and maturity However, I know that

not all wrinkles are caused by age and character Many times they are unwanted

arti-facts of a high-speed contrasty film or harsh lighting

Getting rid of wrinkles and removing blemishes and other unwanted artifactsfrom the face is especially easy with Photoshop Elements’ Healing Brush tool, which is

similar in practice to the Clone Stamp tool You start by clicking and defining a source

Then you “paint” over the area you wish to replace or “heal.” But the Healing Brush

tool does much more than simply duplicate and replace pixels It matches the texture,

lighting, transparency, and shading of the sampled pixels to the source pixels The result

is often a seamless blend that leaves little or no trace of the original underlying flaw

To use the Healing Brush tool to eliminate wrinkles or other small skin blemishes:

target In general, it’s a good idea to pick a size 30 percent or so larger than thecrease of the wrinkle or circumference of the blemish Hard-edged brushes areusually more effective than soft-edged ones The Healing Brush tool applies acomplex blending algorithm to the edges of the brush, and a soft-edged brushadds a variable to the equation that makes the results unpredictable

Mode: Normal Choosing “Replace” basically turns the Healing Brush toolinto a Clone Stamp tool, which isn’t what you want for this exercise.Source: Sampled The Pattern choice blends a chosen pattern over the targetarea, which isn’t useful for this kind of cosmetic healing.

Aligned You can go either way with this setting depending on the size andlocation of the flaw you are healing Selecting Aligned means pixels aresampled continuously, always at a relative distance from the target

Deselecting Aligned means that after you click to define a source,Photoshop Elements will use that initial source point as a reference whenyou click and paint with the Healing Brush—no matter where you move onthe image It will continue to use the original defined source even if yourelease the mouse button and click another target area

Use All Layers Select this if you want to sample data from all visible layers.Select All Layers is particularly useful if you want to keep your originalimage untouched In this case, simply create a new layer (Layer  New Layer), make it active, and follow the subsequent steps for using theHealing Brush tool The healing will occur on the new layer, leaving theunderlying layer untouched When you are completely satisfied with your

you can save the layered PSD file

the Alt/Option key and clicking Now click and hold the mouse, and paint overthe wrinkle or blemish When you release the mouse, the Healing Brush goes towork If the area you painted over is large, it may take time to complete thehealing process If the healing is acceptable, you are finished If not, use the

just a matter of changing the brush size to get it right Sometimes, if the areayou want to heal is adjacent to a detail with strong contrast—for example aneyelid or a lip—you’ll need to isolate the target area with a selection and thenapply the Healing Brush tool

I used this method to remove the wrinkles shown in Figure 3.20 and to removethe blemishes shown in Figure 3.21

Figure 3.20: Before (left) and after (right) using the Healing Brush tool.

Figure 3.21: Before (left) and after (right) using the Healing Brush tool.

Keep in mind that wrinkles are technically shadows on a digital image If youwant to diminish their appearance—and not get rid of them completely—you can just

lighten them up

To use the Dodge tool to reduce wrinkles:

appropriately sized, soft-edged brush If needed, magnify your image so thewrinkles fill the screen

with the brush Don’t go too far Before you make a final judgment, you shouldzoom back to normal magnification That way, you’ll have a more objectiveview of your work

Diminishing and Straightening the Nose

Wide-angle lenses or oblique camera angles can make a nose seem much larger than it

is Again, the Liquify filter is a good way to diminish an unnaturally large nose—or tostraighten a crooked one

To use the Liquify filter to diminish or straighten a nose:

the entire nose Select a brush pressure less than 50 Hold the cursor over thenose and click incrementally until you get the effect you want

into a straighter position

I used a combination of these techniques to achieve the effects shown in Figures 3.22 and 3.23

Figure 3.22: Before applying the Liquify filter (left) After applying the Liquify filter (right).

Figure 3.23: Before applying the Liquify filter (left) After applying the Liquify filter (right).

Making People Glow

In the “old days” I used to stretch a nylon stocking over my darkroom enlarger lens to

give a portrait a glamorous, dreamy glow It’s easy to simulate this look with

Photoshop Elements

Look at the difference between the images in Figure 3.24

Figure 3.24: The original photo (left) It’s easy to create a softer look (right).

Here’s what I did to create the softer effect:

You can copy a selected layer by choosing the Duplicate Layer command eitherfrom the Layer menu on the main menu bar or from the Layers palette menu

You can also duplicate a layer by selecting it and dragging it to the New Layer

selected layer—but not the thumbnail—and choose Duplicate Layer from thepop-up menu Mac users can do the same by Ctrl+clicking the layer bar

Gaussian Blur) The exact amount of blurring will depend on the size of yourimage In the case of this image, I chose a Radius of 30 pixels from theGaussian Blur filter dialog box

(see Figure 3.25) (You can also experiment with the Soft Light, Hard Light, andScreen blending options.) I diminished the Opacity setting in the Layers palette

to 90 percent, which gave me the effect I wanted Again, the exact opacity thatlooks the best will depend on your image

way the effect blurred the clothes To selectively remove the effect from that

the blur effect from the tie and shirt (see Figure 3.25)

As you can see in Figure 3.26, the effect also works well in grayscale To softenthis image, I followed the same steps; however, before I began, I desaturated the image

by choosing Enhance  Adjust Color  Remove Color from the main menu bar I alsochose Screen, instead of Soft Light, from the Blending Mode pop-up menu anddropped the Opacity setting to 25 percent I also could have turned the color image

Grayscale from the main menu)

Figure 3.26: The soft-focus effects work with a black-and-white image as well.

Creating a Grainy 35mm Black-and-White Look

What do you think of when you see an old, grainy, black-and-white print? To me it

evokes the ’60s and ’70s and movies like Blow-Up Whatever The fact is, it’s easy to

simulate this grainy, gritty look with Photoshop Elements

That’s what I did to a contemporary color photo I took of TechTV guest hostand Apple Computer cofounder Steve Wozniak (see Figure 3.27)

Figure 3.27: The original color image (left) The image after applying desaturation and the

Noise filter (right).

Here’s how I created the effect I wanted:

Brightness/Contrast)

filter dialog box, I chose Gaussian rather than Uniform to authentically cate the erratic size and shape of the film’s silver halide crystals To prevent theintroduction of color, I selected the Monochromatic check box (see Figure 3.28)

dupli-I played with the Amount setting until dupli-I got the look dupli-I wanted dupli-In this case,

30 percent was about right

Figure 3.28: The Add Noise filter dialog box and settings.

To duplicate a similar effect, you can also try the Mezzotint filter (Filter 

the way the image looks, but some people may prefer the Mezzotint look

Creating a Digital Fill Flash

It’s common to take a picture of a person against a bright background However, ifyou don’t use a fill flash or specifically expose for the skin tones, a face will turn into asilhouette (see Figure 3.29) Photoshop Elements includes a useful Shadows/Highlightscommand that does a good job of creating a digital fill flash, balancing the foregroundwith the background (In earlier versions of Photoshop Elements, a less sophisticatedversion of Shadows/Highlights was called Fill Flash.)

Figure 3.29: Before applying Shadows/Highlights, the face is too dark (left) After applying Shadows/Highlights (right), both the face and the background are fine.

Here is what I did to fix this picture of San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds:

look right I also left the other settings alone

Note: One of the most effective ways of emphasizing the features of someone is to late their face from the background If you shoot a portrait with a longer than normal focallength and a wide f-stop, the background will naturally fade out of focus However, when thisshooting this way isn’t possible, or if you inherit a photo with a distracting background, youcan use Photoshop Elements to save the day Later in the book I’ll show you how to use

Selective Focus.”

Making Distorted Faces Normal

Facial distortion is often caused by inferior optics or by the inherent effect of

wide-angle lenses It can also be caused by illness or certain prescription drugs I’ve noticed

that some faces are more puffy in the morning than later in the day, or at certain times

of the month Whatever the cause, if the distortion is unwanted, you can use

Photoshop Elements’ Transform tools to compress and reshape a face

Figure 3.30 shows an example of distortion caused by poor optics In this case,artist Tom Mogensen used a digital video camera at a San Francisco Giants baseball

game to capture a still image frame of the legendary Bobby Thomson and Debby

Magowan, the wife of one of the owners of the Giants Instead of selectively fixing just

one face, as I did in the preceding example, Tom applied a global fix to the entire

image

Figure 3.30: This distortion is global (left) and affects the entire image After applying the

TransformDistort command, the image looks normal (right).

Here is what he did:

side handle toward the center He went back and forth until the faces looked

of the options bar The results are shown on the right in Figure 3.30

Figure 3.31: Jonathan and his family before (left) Jonathan and his family after (right).

Here is what I did to go from the before shot to the after shot:

soft-edged brush from the options bar I set the Mode to Normal and theOpacity to 80 percent I made sure that All Layers was selected in theoptions bar

Stamp tool (To take a sample, click the desired area while holding theAlt/Option key.) I then brushed Jonathan’s head, filling it with the hair from hisson This new set of hair was painted on its own layer, keeping the realJonathan intact for future reference (see Figure 3.32)

Figure 3.32: The new hair is on its own layer.

Note: If you are getting serious about retouching and restoring photographs, I highly ommend Katrin Eismann’s Photoshop Restoration & Retouching (New Riders, second edition2003) It’s written with Photoshop in mind rather than Photoshop Elements, but it is a verypractical book that will give you easy-to-follow techniques for resurrecting old photos,improving portraits, and touching up glamour shots

Getting a person to relax is essential to taking a good portrait And before they can relax, youmust relax too If you are nervous or unsure of yourself, your subject will respond according-

ly Make an effort to smile, be confident, and at least act like you know what you’re doing Ithelps also to know ahead of time where you will be shooting the picture Scout out a quietspot with good light (natural light outside or by a window works well) and a simple, unclut-tered background Many digital cameras enable you to instantly view a picture on an elec-tronic display Show your subject a few shots and engage them in the process Before youknow it, that fake smile will disappear and be replaced by a real one

Changing Color, Tinting, and Trimming Hair

My hairdresser, Robert, tells me that most of the colorizing he does is really lightening

and darkening certain parts of the hair to model or mold it The secret, he says, is to

lighten the front part so it creates a glow around the face while darkening the back to

bring out the highlights in the front He also adds streaks of light and dark to give the

hair a sense of depth All of this is easy to do in Photoshop Elements Look at the

dif-ference between the images in Figure 3.33

■ Figure 3.33: Before (left) and after (right) adding highlights.

Here is what I did to add the highlights:

the dialog box shown in Figure 3.34 Here I chose Color Dodge from the Modepop-up menu and selected Fill with Color-Dodge-Neutral Color (Black) I

Figure 3.34: By selecting a new layer with these settings, you can literally paint highlights onto an image.

the options bar and set the Mode to Normal and the Opacity to 4 percent Inthe Color Picker at the bottom of the toolbox, I selected white for the fore-

front, airbrushing lightly until I got the right amount of “modeling.”

This time in the dialog box, I chose Color Burn from the Mode pop-up menuand selected Fill with Color-Dodge-Neutral Color (White) I named this layerShadow I applied the Airbrush tool to this layer, but this time I painted theback of the hair with a black foreground color instead of white Figure 3.35shows all my layers after painting with the Airbrush

Figure 3.35: Highlights and shadows are painted onto their own layers.

It’s also easy to add color to hair by using the Color Replacement tool

Compare the two images in Figure 3.36

Figure 3.36: Hair before using the Color Replacement tool (left) and after using Color

Replacement (right).

Here’s what I did to go from the first image to the second:

chose the following:

Mode: ColorSampling: ContinuousLimits: Contiguous Discontiguous will work too

Tolerance: 30 percent A higher percentage replaces adjacent pixels with abroader range of color values A lower percentage replaces only a few adja-cent pixels with similar color values

cursor changes to the Eyedropper when moved outside the Color Picker Youcan also choose a color directly from the Color Picker.) After selecting mycolor I clicked OK.

brush to apply the color to the hair

My friend Tracy took the photo on the left in Figure 3.37 of her husband,Chris, in their backyard in Chico, California Tracy told me that she wanted to see herhusband without the gray “And, oh, by the way,” she asked, “could you trim hisbeard as well?”

Figure 3.37: Chris in real life (left) Chris with his beard trimmed and all of the gray removed (right).

This is what I did:

Midtones and the Opacity to 50 percent

The results are shown on the right in Figure 3.37