Photoshop 6 for Windows Bible- P20 docx

539 Chapter 11 ✦ Full-Court Filtering Although Liquify certainly gives you plenty of ways to reconstruct distortions, pre- dicting the outcome of your drags with the reconstruct tool can be difficult. So if you don’t get the results you want after your first few tries, you may find it just as easy to revert the whole image and start from scratch. Wrapping an Image around a 3D Shape I’ve long maintained that three-dimensional drawing programs would catch on bet- ter if they were sold as plug-in utilities for Photoshop. Imagine being able to import DXF objects, add a line or two of text, move the objects around in 3D space, apply surface textures, and then render the piece directly to independent Photoshop lay- ers. After that, you could change the stacking order of the layers, edit the pixels right there on the spot, or maybe even double-click a layer to edit it in 3D space. Virtually every digital artist working in 3D visits Photoshop somewhere during the process, so why not do the whole process in Photoshop and save everyone a few steps? Experienced artists would love it and novices would take to 3D in droves. Frankly, my little fantasy isn’t likely to take form any time soon. Photoshop would have to modify its plug-in specifications, and some brave programming team would have to spend a lot of time and money producing an aggressive suite of plug-ins. Even so, Adobe seems to share my dream. Filter ➪ Render ➪ 3D Transform lets you wrap an image around a three-dimensional shape. Although the drawing tools are rudimentary, the spatial controls are barely adequate, and the filter lacks any kind of lighting controls, 3D Transform is a first tentative step in the right direction. Figure 11-43 shows exactly what 3D Transform can do. In each case, I started with the brick image shown in the upper-left corner of the figure. Then I wrapped the image around the three basic kinds of primitives permitted by the 3D Transform fil- ter — a cube, a sphere, and a cylinder. 3D Transform lets you add points to the side of a cylinder, as I did to get the hourglass shape. You can also mix and match primi- tives, as the final example in Figure 11-43 illustrates. Notice that in each case, 3D Transform merely distorts the image. It has no affect on the brightness values of the pixels, nor does it make any attempt to light the shapes (which is why I’d prefer to see it under the Distort submenu as opposed to Render). I added the shadows using Layer ➪ Layer Style ➪ Drop Shadow. To be perfectly fair, 3D Transform is not the first three-dimensional plug-in for Photoshop. That honor went out years ago to the Series 2: Three-D Filter from Andromeda (www.andromeda.com). Even now, Series 2 offers features that Photoshop’s 3D Transform plug-in lacks, including a wider range of numerical controls and lighting functions—but 3D Transform is easier to use. Note 540 Part III ✦ Selections, Masks, and Filters Figure 11-43: The 3D Transform filter lets you wrap an image (upper left) around each of three basic primitives (cube, sphere, and cylinder), a modified cylinder (hourglass), or several shapes mixed together. Using the 3D Transform filter Choose Filter ➪ Render ➪ 3D Transform to bring up the window shown in Figure 11-44. Less a dialog box than a separate editing environment, the 3D Transform window contains a wealth of tools and a preview area in which you can draw and Original image Cube Sphere Cylinder Hourglass Mixed primitives 541 Chapter 11 ✦ Full-Court Filtering evaluate the effect. There are a dozen tools in all, but they make a bit more sense if you regard them as members of five basic categories, itemized in the following sec- tions. Like Photoshop’s standard tools, you can select the 3D Transform tools from the keyboard (assuming that you have any headroom left to memorize the short- cuts). Shortcut keys are listed in parentheses. Figure 11-44: The 3D Transform dialog box contains a dozen tools that permit you to draw and edit three-dimensional shapes. Primitive shape tools Use one of the primitive shape tools to draw a basic 3D shape in the preview area. This is the shape around which 3D Transform will wrap the selected image. Cube ( M ): Use this tool to draw a six-sided box. Adobe selected M as the shortcut to match Illustrator, which uses M for its rectangle tool. And that M is based in turn on Photoshop’s marquee tool. Sphere ( N ): This tool creates a perfect sphere. Again, the shortcut comes from Illustrator, this time from the ellipse tool. Just remember, N follows M. (Ironically, S goes unused. Ain’t cross-application consistency a pain in the neck?) Cylinder ( C ): This cylinder tool draws your basic, everyday, dowel-like cylinders. But you can edit them to make lots of other shapes, as I explain in the upcoming “Cylinder editors.” Thankfully, Illustrator offers no equivalent for the cylinder tool, so we get a sensible shortcut, C. Camera controlsPrimitiveTools Preview area 542 Part III ✦ Selections, Masks, and Filters Basic edit tools The two arrow tools—the black select tool and the white direct select tool — enable you to change a shape by dragging it around or moving the points. Both tools work just like their counterparts in Illustrator: Select ( V ): Drag a shape with the black arrow tool to move the whole shape. If you know Illustrator, you already know about the weird V-key shortcut. If not, think of Photoshop’s own move tool. Direct select ( A ): Use the white arrow to move individual points. Dragging a point in a sphere resizes it. Dragging a point in a cube or a cylinder stretches or rotates the shape. Experiment and you’ll quickly see how it works. (Unlike paths, dragged points have no control handles. All you have to work with are anchor points.) You can switch between the black and white arrow tools by pressing Ctrl+Tab. But really, there’s no point. The white arrow does everything the black arrow does — just drag a segment to move the entire shape. In fact, there’s just one keyboard trick you need to remember: press Ctrl to temporarily get the white arrow tool when any other tool is active. If you know that, the other keys are redundant. Cylinder editors The three path-edit tools are applicable exclusively to cylinders. Why? Because cylinders can be modified to create a whole family of tubular shapes. Throw the cylinder on the lathe and you can make an hourglass, a goblet, a cone — in short, any shape with radial symmetry and a flat top or bottom. To make these shapes, you use the following tools: Insert point (+): Click the right side of the cylinder — unless you turn it upside-down, in which case you click the left side — to add a point. Then drag the point with the white arrow tool to move both sides symmetrically. It’s a virtual potter’s wheel. Remove point (–): Click a point you’ve added with the insert point tool to remove it. Don’t click any of the square points that Photoshop put in there or the program will whine at you. Convert point: The insert point tool adds circular smooth points that create continuous arcs in the side of the cylinder. To change the point to a sharp corner, click it with the convert point tool. Click again to change the point back to a smooth point. Moving in 3D space The next two tools are the most powerful and the hardest to use. They permit you to move the object in 3D space. When you switch to one of these tools, Photoshop Tip 543 Chapter 11 ✦ Full-Court Filtering renders the preview so you can see the image wrapped around the shape, as in Figure 11-45. Pan camera ( E ): Drag the image to move it up, down, left, or right. How is this different than moving the primitive with the arrow tool? This time, you’re moving the image in 3D space across your field of vision. (To be more precise, you’re moving the camera — which is your window into the image — while the object remains still.) As you move the image to the left, you see more of its right side. Move it up, and you see its bottom. Trackball ( R ): The trackball rotates the image in 3D space. Meanwhile, it’s ultimately a 2D control— you can’t move your cursor into or out of the screen; just up, down, and side to side— making it difficult to predict the outcome of a drag. Inevitably, you’ll end up exposing the back, empty side of a shape. When this happens, spin the shape by dragging against the grain. To spin the shape head over heels, for example, drag directly up or down. To spin the shape side- ways, drag horizontally. Don’t fret too much about moving through the 3D world; just watch how the program behaves when you move your mouse from one location to another. In time, you’ll see some very simple patterns that you can exploit to your advantage. Figure 11-45: When you select either the pan camera or the trackball tool, Photoshop renders the image inside the preview area. Rendered preview Tip 544 Part III ✦ Selections, Masks, and Filters The camera controls When you select the pan camera or trackball tool, Photoshop offers two Camera options on the right side of the dialog box. At first, the two options seem to do the same thing. A low value moves you in; a high value takes you out. But, in truth, they produce subtly different effects. Think of the Field of View option as a wide-angle lens and the Dolly option as a zoom lens, with both operating at the same time. A low Field of View with a high Dolly results in shallow shapes. A high Field of View with a low Dolly shrinks you to the size of a bug so that the depth is really coming at you. Basic navigation The last two tools in the 3D Transform dialog box are the standard hand and magnify- ing glass. They work just like their counterparts outside the 3D Transform dialog box: Hand ( H ): Drag the image to move it around inside the preview area. You can press either H or the spacebar to get this tool. Zoom ( Z ): Click with this tool to zoom in, Alt-click to zoom out. When any other tool is selected, Ctrl+spacebar-click and Alt+spacebar-click to zoom in and out. Layer before you apply When you press Enter, Photoshop merges your new 3D shape with the original image. Because the 3D Transform filter provides no lighting controls, the shape may be virtually indistinguishable from its background, as Figure 11-46 makes abundantly clear. And that, dear friends, is a giant drag. Figure 11-46: By default, the 3D Transform filter merges the 3D image into the original image, making for an extraordinarily subtle effect. 545 Chapter 11 ✦ Full-Court Filtering Luckily, you can force Photoshop to deliver the 3D shape on a separate layer. Here’s what you do. First copy the image to a separate layer by dragging it onto the page icon at the bottom of the Layers palette. Then choose Filter ➪ Render ➪ 3D Trans- form and click the Options button inside the dialog box. Turn off the Display Background check box, spotlighted in Figure 11-47, and press Enter. Figure 11-47: Copy the image to a separate layer and turn off the Display Background check box to make the area outside the 3D shape transparent. Not only will the 3D Transform filter restrict its efforts to the active layer, it will also make the area outside the 3D shape transparent, as in the first example of Figure 11-48. Then you can apply layer effects or other lighting techniques to distinguish the 3D shape from its background, as in the second example. Figure 11-48: After applying the 3D shape to a separate layer (shown by itself at left), I used the Drop Shadow and Inner Bevel effects to add some fake volumetric lighting to my goblet (right). Tip 546 Part III ✦ Selections, Masks, and Filters Color Plates 11-8 and 11-9 demonstrate some of the fun you can have with 3D Transform. In Color Plate 11-8, I relied entirely on the Drop Shadow and Inner Bevel layer styles to light the layered 3D goblet. I also added a bit of red to the goblet using Image ➪ Adjust ➪ Hue/Saturation to distinguish the layer from its sandy background. Color Plate 11-9 illustrates the merits of manual lighting techniques. After setting the goblet against a different background, I applied the drop shadow and haloing tech- niques that I discuss in the section “Selecting the Contents of Layers” in Chapter 12. I also applied the airbrush tool set alternatively to the Multiply and Screen brush modes to hand-brush some natural tinting. Finally, I darkened the top of the goblet with the help of the elliptical marquee tool. After drawing my initial marquee, I chose Select ➪ Transform to rotate and scale it into position, pressed Ctrl+J to send the selection to a separate layer, and applied the Multiply blend mode set to a low opac- ity. Admittedly, the finished effect involved a lot of effort, but it looks significantly more realistic than anything Photoshop can approximate automatically. Adding Clouds and Spotlights The remaining five filters in the Render submenu produce lighting effects. You can use Clouds and Difference Clouds to create a layer of haze over an image. Lens Flare creates light flashes and reflections (as I mentioned earlier). Lighting Effects lights an image as if it were hanging on a gallery wall. You can even use the unremarkable Texture Fill to add an embossed texture to a piece embellished with the Lighting Effects filter. Creating clouds The Clouds filter creates an abstract and random haze between the foreground and background colors. Difference Clouds works exactly like layering the image, apply- ing the Clouds filter, and selecting the Difference blend mode in the Layers palette. Why on earth should Difference Clouds make special provisions for a single blend mode? Because you can create cumulative effects. Try this: Select blue as the fore- ground color and then choose Filter➪ Render ➪ Clouds. Ah, just like a real sky, huh? Now choose Filter ➪ Render ➪ Difference Clouds. It’s like some kind of weird Halloween motif, all blacks and oranges. Press Ctrl+F to repeat the filter. Back to the blue sky. Keep pressing Ctrl+F over and over and notice the results. A pink cancer starts invading the blue sky; a green cancer invades the orange one. Multiple appli- cations of the Difference Clouds filter generate organic oil-on-water effects. To strengthen the colors created by the Clouds filter, press Shift when choosing the command. This same technique works when using the Difference Clouds filter as well. In fact, I don’t know of any reason not to press Shift while choosing one of these commands, unless you have some specific need for washed-out effects. Tip 547 Chapter 11 ✦ Full-Court Filtering Color Plate 11-10 shows some entertaining applications of the Clouds filters. With the foreground and background colors set to blue and orange, respectively, I applied the Clouds filter to a layered copy of the rose image. For maximum effect, I pressed Shift and chose the filter to create the top-left image in the color plate. I then pressed Shift and chose the Difference Clouds filter to create the purple mon- tage in the figure, and pressed Ctrl+F ten times to achieve the top-right image. Looks to me like I definitely have something growing in my petri dish. Yeah, so really groovy stuff, right? Shades of “Purple Haze” and all that. But now that I’ve created this murky mess, what the heck do I do with it? Composite it, of course. The bottom row of Color Plate 11-10 shows examples of mixing each of the images from the top row with the original rose. In the example on the left, I chose the Overlay option from the Layers palette. In the example in the middle, I chose the Screen mode. And in the last example, I chose Hue. This last one is particularly exciting, completely transforming the colors in the rose while leaving the gray (and therefore unsaturated) background untouched. Without a mask, without anything but a rectangular marquee, I’ve managed to precisely color the interior of the rose. Lighting an image Photoshop ventures further into 3D drawing territory with the Lighting Effects filter. This very complex function enables you to shine lights on an image, color the lights, position them, focus them, specify the reflectivity of the surface, and even create a surface map. In many ways, it’s a direct lift from MetaCreations’ Painter. But whereas Painter provides predefined paper textures and light refraction effects that bolster the capabilities of its excellent tool, Photoshop offers better controls and more light- ing options. The Lighting Effects filter is applicable exclusively to RGB images. Also, don’t expect to be able to apply 3D lighting to shapes created with the 3D Transform filter. Sadly, the two filters share no common elements that would permit them to work directly with each other. When you choose Filter ➪ Render ➪ Lighting Effects, Photoshop displays what is easily its most complex dialog box, as shown in Figure 11-49. The dialog box has two halves: one in which you actually position light with respect to a thumbnail of the selected image, and one that contains about a billion intimidating options. No bones about it, this dialog box is a bear. The easiest way to apply the filter is to choose one of the predefined lighting effects from the Style pop-up menu at the top of the right side of the dialog box, see how it looks in the preview area, and — if you like it — press Enter to apply the effect. But if you want to create your own effects, you have to work a little harder. Here are the basic steps involved in creating a custom effect. Caution 548 Part III ✦ Selections, Masks, and Filters Figure 11-49: The Lighting Effects dialog box enables you to light an image as if it were hanging in a gallery, lying on a floor, or perhaps resting too near a hot flame. STEPS: Lighting an Image 1. Drag from the light icon at the bottom of the dialog box into the preview area to create a new light source. I call this area the stage because it’s as if the image is painted on the floor of a stage and the lights are hanging above it. 2. Select the kind of light you want from the Light Type pop-up menu. It’s just below the Style pop-up menu. You can select from Directional, Omni, and Spotlight: • Directional works like the sun, producing a general, unfocused light that hits a target from an angle. • Omni is a bare light bulb hanging in the middle of the room, shining in all directions from a center point. • Spotlight is a focused beam that is brightest at the source and tapers off gradually. Color swatches Footprint Preview area Hot Spot Focus point Handles Trash icon Light icon [...]... champions, Photoshop 6 bears the standard with more gusto than any release since Version 3 Mind you, there’s still room for improvement For example, one day I hope to see Photoshop integrate parametric effects, in which filters such as Unsharp Mask and Motion Blur are fully editable, interactive, and interchangeable, on the order of Adobe’s full-motion editor, After Effects But in the meantime, Photoshop 6 s... the image Photoshop ✦ Shift+Alt+[: This activates the background layer (or the lowest layer if no background exists) 6 You have to pardon me for alluding to a feature out of order, but I thought you should note that Photoshop treats a closed folder in the Layers palette (better known as a layer set) as if it was a layer So every one of these tricks skips to or over the set in a single bound For the complete... Adobe’s full-motion editor, After Effects But in the meantime, Photoshop 6 s layers provide us with more freedom and flexibility than we’ve ever had before For those of your who are wondering what I’m talking about, permit me to back up for a moment The first and foremost benefit of layers is that they add versatility Because each layer in a composition is altogether independent of other layers, you can change... without Shift, Photoshop clones the selection and leaves an imprint of the image on the layer below Photoshop ✦ To create an empty layer — as when you want to paint a few brushstrokes without harming the original image — choose Layer ➪ New ➪ Layer or press Ctrl+Shift+N Or click the new layer icon at the bottom of the Layers palette (labeled in Figure 12-3) 6 ✦ When you create a new layer, Photoshop positions... Via Copy or Layer Via Cut command or click the new layer icon, Photoshop automatically names the new layer for you Unfortunately, the automatic names — Layer 1, Layer 2, and so on — are fairly meaningless and don’t help to convey the contents of the layer I mean, really, what kind of program doesn’t know a camera when it sees one? 559 560 Part IV ✦ Layers, Objects, and Text If you want to specify a... dialog box shown in Figure 12-4 Enter a name for the layer If you like, you can also assign a color to a layer, which is helpful for identifying a layer name at a glance Then press Enter (For now, you can ignore the other options in this dialog box.) When creating a new layer from the keyboard, press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+N to bypass the dialog box Alt works both ways, forcing the dialog box some times and suppressing... others The only time it produces no effect is when pasting or dropping an image Too bad — I for one would get a lot of use out of it Photoshop Figure 12-4: Press Alt to force the display of the New Layer dialog box, which lets you name the new layer When renaming a layer, only the Name and Color options appear 6 Renaming a layer used to be as simple as double-clicking on its name in the Layers palette... a time 561 562 Part IV ✦ Layers, Objects, and Text Tip If your image contains several layers — like the one back in Figure 12-1 — it might prove inconvenient, or even confusing, to switch from one layer to another in the Layers palette Luckily, Photoshop offers a better way With any tool, Ctrl+Alt+rightclick an element in your composition to go directly to the layer containing the element For example,... their name implies — sheets of pixels that you could edit and transform independently of each other But over time, layers have become increasingly more sophisticated Since the feature was introduced in Version 3, every major release of Photoshop has witnessed some kind of fantastic, and occasionally frustrating, layer enhancement Photoshop 4 forced you to embrace the feature by creating a new layer every... remains every bit as visible as ever Tip You can fill all pixels also by pressing Alt+Backspace for the foreground color and Ctrl+Backspace for the background color To fill the pixels in a layer without altering the transparency mask, toss in the Shift key Shift+Alt+Backspace fills the opaque pixels with the foreground color; Ctrl+Shift+Backspace fills them with the background color In both cases, the . layer-boosting champions, Photoshop 6 bears the standard with more gusto than any release since Version 3. Mind you, there’s still room for improvement. For example, one day I hope to see Photoshop integrate. meantime, Photoshop 6 s layers provide us with more freedom and flexibility than we’ve ever had before. For those of your who are wondering what I’m talking about, permit me to back up for a moment Figure 11- 46 makes abundantly clear. And that, dear friends, is a giant drag. Figure 11- 46: By default, the 3D Transform filter merges the 3D image into the original image, making for an extraordinarily