Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers phần 8 ppt

471 Layers, selections and masking Chapter 9 1 The easiest way for me to illustrate the power of the Warp transform is to take a made-up fl ag layer and use the custom warp controls to distort the fl ag shape to make it appear as if it were fl apping in the wind. In the Layers panel view shown here, you can see that I had the fl ag layer and a shadow layer above it. I began by selecting both these layers before converting them into a Smart Object. 2 I then went to the Edit menu and selected Edit ➯ Transform ➯ Warp. The default option is the Custom mode, where I had access to the bezier control handles at the four corners of the warp bounding box. These could be adjusted in the same way as you would manipulate a pen path to control the outer shape of the warp. Here, I was able to drag the corner handles and click inside any of the nine sectors and drag with the mouse to manipulate the fl ag Smart Object layer, just as if I were stretching the image on a rubber canvas. 3 I was able to adjust the warp so that the fl ag was twisted in on itself to reveal the reverse side of the fl ag. You will notice below how the distorted fl ag existed as a Smart Object layer, where the two layers that make up the fl ag design were both warped in unison. 2 I t h e n w e n t to t h e E d i t m e n u a n d se l ected E d i t ➯ Tr a n sfo rm Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 472 Figure 9.41 The Layer ➯ Arrange submenu. Figure 9.42 The Layer ➯ Align submenu. Figure 9.43 This shows the move tool Options bar in alignment/distribution mode. Note that the alignment options (shaded blue) will only become available when two or more layers are selected, and the distribution options (shaded green) are only available when three or more layers are selected. Arrange, Align and Distribute shortcuts Note here that all the Layer menu and Layers panel shortcuts are listed in a separate appendix which is available on the DVD as a PDF document. Transforms and alignment When you have more than one layer in an image, the layer order can be changed via the Layer ➯ Arrange submenu (Figure 9.41), which you can use to bring a layer forward or send it further back in the layer stacking order (you can also use the keyboard shortcuts shown here). If two or more layers are linked, these can be aligned in various ways via the Layer ➯ Align Linked menu (Figure 9.42). To use this feature, fi rst make sure the layers you want to align are selected, are linked together, or are in a layer group. The Align commands can then be used to align the linked layers using the different rules shown in the submenu list. i.e. you can align to the Top, Vertical Centers, Bottom, Left, Horizontal Centers or Right Edges, and the alignment will be based on whichever is the top-most or left-most layer, etc. There is also the Distribute submenu, which contains an identical list of options to the Align menu but is only accessible if you have three or more layers selected, linked, or in a layer group. The Distribute commands allow you to distribute layer elements evenly based on either the Top, Vertical Centers, Bottom, Left, Horizontal Centers or Right axes. So for example, if you had three or more linked layer elements and you wanted them to be evenly spread apart horizontally, and you also wanted the distance between the midpoints of each layer element to be equidistant, you would select all the layers and choose Layer ➯ Distribute ➯ Horizontal Centers. Rather than use the layer menu options you can also click on the Align and Distribute buttons in the move tool Options bar (Figure 9.43). Generally, I would say the Align and Distribute features are perhaps more useful for graphic designers, where they might want to precisely align image or text layer objects in a Photoshop layout. F igure 9 . 4 3 This shows the move tool Options bar in alignment/distribution 473 Layers, selections and masking Chapter 9 1 The following steps show how I created a kaleidoscope image from a single shoe image that was cut out using a vector mask (see pages: 484–486). 2 I dragged and placed this layer in a new image document, with the layer aligned to the guides shown here. I then converted the layer to a Smart Object (I did this by going to the Layers panel fl y-out menu and chose ‘Convert to Smart Object’). Photograph by Davis Cairns. Client: Red or Dead. Using transforms to create a kaleidoscope pattern Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 474 3 I duplicated the Smart Object layer by dragging it to the New Layer button in the Layers panel. I then selected ‘Free Transform’ from the Edit menu and positioned the central axis point on the point where the two guides cross, and dragged outside the bounding box to rotate the layer. I held down the S key as I did this, to constrain the rotation to 4 x 15° increments (i.e. rotated it 60°). 4 I repeated this exercise four more times until I ended up with the kaleidoscope pattern image shown here. You can also apply such Repeat Transforms using the CSt LSt keyboard shortcut. 475 Layers, selections and masking Chapter 9 5 I then clicked on the Add New Adjustment/Fill button in the Layers panel (circled) to add a radial Gradient Fill layer just above the Background layer, using the colors shown here. 6 Lastly, just for fun, I selected all the shoe layers and clicked on the Align Bottom Edges button in the move tool Options bar. This aligned all the shoe layers to the layer with the bottom-most edge. Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 476 Smart Objects One of the main problems you face when editing pixel images is that every time you scale an image or the contents of an image layer, the pixel information becomes degraded, and if you make cumulative transform adjustments the image quality degrades quite rapidly. If you convert a layer or a group of layers into a Smart Object (Figure 9.44), this stores the layer (or layers) data as a separate image document within the master image. The Smart Object data is therefore ‘referenced’ by the parent image and edits that are applied to the Smart Object layer (such as a transform adjustment) are applied to the proxy only instead of to the pixels that actually make up the layer. With Smart Object layers you can use any of the transform adjustments described so far (including warp transforms) plus you can also apply fi lters to a Smart Object layer (known as Smart Filtering). What you can’t do is edit a Smart Object layer directly using, say, the clone stamp tool or paint brush, but you can double-click a Smart Object layer to open it as a separate image document, where you can then apply all the usual edit adjustments before closing it, after which the edit changes are updated in the parent document. Figure 9.44 You can promote a layer or group of layers to become a Smart Object. A Smart Object becomes a fully editable, separate document within a Photoshop document. The principal advantage is that you can repeatedly scale, transform or warp a Smart Object in the parent image without affecting the integrity of the pixels in the original Smart Object document. Edit Contents Save Smart Object Smart Filters If you go to the Filter menu, there is an option there called ‘Convert for Smart Filters’. What this does is to convert a selected layer to a Smart Object, which this is no different from choosing ‘Convert to Smart Object from the Layers panel fl y-out menu. With Smart Objects you can apply most Photoshop fi lters (including some third-party fi lters), but not all. However, you can enable all fi lters to work with Smart Objects by loading the ‘EnableAllPluginsforSmartFilters.jsx’ script. I’ll be explaining how this is done later, in Chapter 10. 477 Layers, selections and masking Chapter 9 1 We’ll now examine in more detail how you would use a Smart Object in Photoshop. Here is a photograph of a book that shows a couple of my promotional photographs, where let’s say I wanted to place the male portrait image so that it matched the scale, rotation and warp shape of the photograph on the right-hand page. 2 I used the move tool to drag the photograph across to add it as a new layer and then went to the Layers panel options and chose ‘ Convert to Smart Object’. This action preserved all the image data on this layer in its original form. I then went to the Edit menu and chose Free Transform. Because the layer boundary exceeded the size of the Background layer, I had to zoom out in order to access the corner handles of the Transform box. Quick tip In these situations it is useful to remember that you can use the C0 L0 keyboard shortcut to quickly zoom out just far enough to reveal the transf or m bounding box handles. Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 478 3 I then scaled the Smart Object layer down in size so that it more closely matched the size of the photograph on the page. I also dragged the cursor outside the transform bounding box, in order to rotate the photograph roughly into position. 4 After that, I clicked on the Warp button in the Options bar (circled). This allowed me to fi ne-tune the position of the Smart Object layer, by using the corner curve adjustment handles to modify the outer envelope shape. I then moused down inside some of the inner sections and dragged them so that the inner shape also matched the curvature of the page. 479 Layers, selections and masking Chapter 9 5 I was then able to edit the Smart Object layer any way I liked. To do this, I went to the Layers panel fl y-out menu and selected ‘ Edit Contents’. An alternative option was to simply double-click on the Smart Objects layer in the Layers panel. In the example shown here, I added a Text layer plus a Curves adjustment layer to turn the photograph blue. I then closed the window and as I did so this popped the prompt dialog shown here, reminding me to click ‘Save’ in order to save and update the master Smart Object layer. 6 Here is the fi nal image in which I added a Curves adjustment layer in a clipping group with the Smart Object layer so that the shading matched that of the original photograph on the page. Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 480 Photoshop paths The selection tools are nice and easy to use and many people will quite happily use Color Range and the quick select tool to make selections of the bits they wish to edit in a photograph. Other times, you might get by painting on a quick mask to defi ne a selection. However, if you are editing anything other than low resolution images there will be times when the standard selection tools just won’t give you the precision you are after. It’s times like these when you really need a more accurate way to defi ne an outline, and this is where the pen tools and vector paths come in. Granted, it’s not easy to master the pen tool, but if you are planning to work with large fi les, you will fi nd it quicker to draw a path and convert this to a selection rather than rely on the selection and paint tools alone. Figure 9.45 shows a summary of how a pen path can be converted to a selection or a vector mask that isolates an object. Figure 9.45 An active path can be converted to make a selection. You can also use a path to make a vector mask (from the Layer menu choose Add Vector Mask ➯ Current Path). Selections to paths An active selection can also be converted to a path by clicking on the ‘Make work path from selection’ button at the bottom of the Paths panel. Alternatively, choose the ‘Make work path’ option from the Paths panel fl y-out menu. [...]... Blur filter settings and vary the background layer focus 501 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Other ‘Add Noise’ options ‘Add Noise’ options are already included in a lot of Photoshop features such as the Brush options, Gradient Fill layers and the Lens Blur filter (See Figure 10 .8) Figure 10 .8 A number of Photoshop dialogs contain a Dither option This shows the Gradient Fill dialog,... learn, but for some people it can become rather distracting once you have got the basic hang of how to follow a complex outline using the various pen tools Figure 9.51 The easiest way to get accustomed to working with the pen tool is to go to the Pen Options in the Options bar, mouse down on the Pen Options (circled) and check the ‘Rubber Band’ option 483 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers. .. as you deselect the work path and try to create a new work path 485 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 2 With the work path active and white as the foreground color in the tools panel, I clicked on the Add New Adjustment Layer button in the Layers panel and selected the Gradient Fill option I chose the foreground color (white) to transparency gradient and added this as a linear gradient... filters that are in Photoshop, I have concentrated here on just those filters that I believe are useful for photographic work, everyday production jobs and creative output I will also show you ways you can use the Smart Filters feature to extend your filtering options 487 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers RGB only filters You will notice that most of the effects filters work in RGB mode only... right Again, you can drag the center point in the Filter dialog to match the center of interest of the image you are about to filter 489 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Gaussian Blur The Gaussian Blur is a good general purpose blur filter which can be used for many purposes from blurring areas of an image to softening the edges of a mask Figure 10.3 The Average Blur can be used to merge... selected each of the wheels, copied each one to a new layer, used a Free Transform to make them circular and then used the Spin Radial Blur filter to add circular movement I then reversed the transform on each layer so that I ended up with a convincing circular spin on each wheel 491 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Surface Blur Box Blur Shape Blur Figure 10.4 This shows, from top... in the photograph 493 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Smart Filters/Smart Objects When you go to the Filter menu and choose ‘Convert for Smart Filters’, you are basically doing the same thing as when you create a Smart Object So, if a layer or group of layers have already been converted to a Smart Object, there is no need to choose ‘Convert for Smart Filters’ Third-party plug-ins... time in order to save the Smart Object adjustments back to the parent document 497 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Enabling Lens Blur as a Smart Filter Smart Filters are mainly intended for use with value-based filters only, such as the Add Noise or Unsharp Mask filter They are not intended for use with filters such as Lens Blur (as shown here) because the Lens Blur can sometimes make... Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Applying Lens Blur to a composite image To finish off this section on the blur filters and Smart Filters, here is a short step-by-step example showing how I applied the Lens Blur filter as a Smart Object to make the background in this composite image appear out of focus 1 For the following steps I took two separate photographs and created a mask for the outline... that you click on the Paths mode button and leave this as your new default Figure 9.47 The Path tutorial file which can be found on the DVD Figure 9. 48 Simply click with the pen tool to create straight line segments 481 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Figure 9.49 To draw a curved segment, instead of clicking, mouse down and drag as you add each point The direction and length of the . your fi ltering options. Essential Filters for Photo Editing Chapter 10 Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 488 Filter essentials Most Photoshop fi lters provide a preview dialog. ne-tune the outline of the vector mask . Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 486 2 With the work path active and white as the foreground color in the tools panel, I clicked on the. shading matched that of the original photograph on the page. Martin Evening Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers 480 Photoshop paths The selection tools are nice and easy to use and many people