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Linking a Smart Object to a File in Adobe Photoshop

May 4, 2016

Linking a Smart Object to a File in Adobe Photoshop

In a previous post, I talked about how beneficial it could be to embed smart objects into a document in Adobe Photoshop. The reasoning I gave for this was that it would be helpful in, say, a magazine layout to have the ability to create “placeholder” images inside the overall file. If you didn’t have the full resolution image at a specific time, you could always place an object in the layout and call in the final image later on. That final image would take on the same transformations and alterations as the original placed object. It’s really an interesting post. If you’d like to read it, please do so. Especially if you handle any type of layout work.

Using Smart Objects as Placeholders in Adobe Photoshop

In today’s post, I’m going to talk about something similar to the topic I just described above. What I’d like to discuss is called Linking as opposed to Embedding. The two ideas are closely related but offer different advantages. When choosing one over the other, it’s important to recognize these advantages.

Placing an Embedded Smart Object

To kick things off, I’m going to go ahead and Place a photo into my empty document as a Smart Object. I’ll place it as an “embedded” file. To do this, I’ll head up to the File > Place Embedded menu item and select it. Again, if you aren’t all too familiar with Placing files as Smart Objects, I encourage you to read this post.

Place Embedded

When I do this, I end up with an embedded object that looks like this:

Place Embedded Smart Object

Since this new placement was transformed into a Smart Object, I can expand it to meet the edges of the document without any loss of quality. I set the document up as the same size as the image, so it should be perfect.

Transformed Smart Object

See, just as I suspected. Great quality.

If you want to learn more about Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop, be sure to read the posts I list below. They’ll give you a nice background on the topic.

What are Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop?

The Difference Between Duplicate Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop

Editing RAW Files as Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop

Converting Multiple Layers into a Smart Object in Adobe Photoshop

How Embedded Smart Objects Work

Once you place an embedded Smart Object into a document in Photoshop, the file is severed from its source and is now completely independent. If you make any changes to this Smart Object, the source file will remain as it was before you embedded it. You can save the document you’re working on in Photoshop, place it on a USB drive, walk down the road and work on it on your friend’s computer. In no way do you need to ever see the source file that you embedded from ever again. It’s been duplicated and the only version that matters is now stored inside the PSD file you’re currently working on. I say this with emphasis because it matters. This is one of the primary differences between bringing files into a document as embedded versus linked.

Placing a Linked Smart Object

To make things interesting, I’m going to head back up to the File menu, but this time, I’m going to select Place Linked.

Place Linked Smart Object

I’ll choose some gray text that I typed out earlier and saved as a PSD file. The text says “FLIGHT.” This means nothing. I merely wanted to create another document to demonstrate how it can be linked to.

Placing Linked Smart Object

I’ll apply the Linear Burn blending mode to it as well. This will give the text a cool appearance against the photo background.

Original Text

Now, I want to show you the difference in layer icons between Linked and Embedded Smart Objects. If we take a look in the Layers panel, we can see the two different styles. The first layer – the text file – has a small chain link icon and the second layer – the jet photo – has an embedded icon. Take a look.

Smart Object Icons

Editing the Linked Smart Object

I already told you that if we went ahead and made a change to the embedded Smart Object, no change would occur in the original source file for the embed. Let’s now look at what happens if we change the linked Smart Object inside of our working document. I’ll go to the Layer > Smart Objects > Edit Contents menu item and select it.

Layer Smart Objects Edit Contents Menu Item

As a quick workaround to the tediousness of choosing this menu item, I could have just as easily double-clicked on the smart object thumbnail in the Layers panel.

When either of these things are done, the original text layer appears as a new tab inside the workspace.

Text Layer Smart Object

From here, I can go up to the Character panel and choose the color picker. For the sake of demonstration, I’ll select something bold. Perhaps a dark red.

Changing Text Color

Now, I’ll save this text file by going up to the File > Save menu item and selecting it. I’ll also X out the text tab and go back to the document I was initially working on. I’d like to see the changes.

Updated Text Smart Object

Yup, I’d say that’s a change.

Okay, here’s the cool part. I’m going to show you two different views of my install of Adobe Bridge. I’m displaying inside of the folder that houses the files I’m currently working on. specifically, I’d like you to take a look at the text file. Before I made any changes to it, the text was gray. After I edited the color in Photoshop, from inside of my working document, the source file text changed to dark red.

Original Linked Source File

Updated Linked Source File

What this demonstrates is that if you change anything to a Smart Object after it’s been linked to another document, the source file is changed as well. This is the primary difference between embedded Smart Objects and linked Smart Objects. One doesn’t change the source and the other does.

Changing Embedded Smart Objects to Linked & Vice-Versa

Now that we know the difference between embedded and linked Smart Objects, I’ll show you how to update an embedded Smart Object to a linked one and a linked Smart Object to an embedded one. It’s very simple, so this should be fast.

The first thing I’ll do is right-click on either an embedded or linked layer in the Layers panel. Not the thumbnail, but the layer itself. When I do that, a menu appears. Inside that menu, there are a few choices.

Embed Linked & Convert to Linked

If you right-click on a linked Smart Object layer, your choice will say Embed Linked and if you right-click on an embedded Smart Object, your choice will say Convert to Linked. Whichever you choose will simply swap how you initially placed the file.

Packaging Files

What I’ve shown you above is all well and good, but there’s one huge problem. I suppose if you’re the only one to ever work on the group of files that you’ve embedded and linked, things would be fine. But what if you needed to email them to someone else to continue working on? Wouldn’t that break the placed linked Smart Objects? Yes, it would.

To work around this, Photoshop offers a feature that allows us to Package the group of files that are used in a project. It takes stock of which files are used and includes them into a folder of their own. This way, they can be sent off and shipped around without worry of them losing their links to one another.

To package a group of files, I’ll head up to the File > Package menu item and select it.

File Package

Note: This option only appears after you save the file. If it’s unsaved, the Package option will be grayed out.

Once I choose this item, I can select my destination.

Browse For Folder

Now, if I take a look in the folder I’m working on in Adobe Bridge, I can see the newly created packaged folder.

Packaged Folder

If I click into that, I’ll see the file I’m working on and another folder called Links.

Links Folder

And if I click into that, I’ll see the file that I placed as a linked Smart Object. Nice!

Linked File

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If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


The 3 Best Ways to Sharpen Photos in Adobe Photoshop

May 2, 2016

The 3 Best Ways to Sharpen Photos in Adobe Photoshop

The ability to sharpen photos in Adobe Photoshop has been available for a very long time. This ability has also gone through quite a few iterations. In the earlier days, we could choose one of the three more basic sharpening filters and either stick with what it gave us or sharpen again and again, using the same filter. Today though, we’ve got options. Lots and lots of options. And in my opinion, sharpening has come such a long way, it’s turned into sort an effect filter, as opposed to something that’s simply used to clean up semi-blurry photos.

In this post, I’m going to talk about the three best methods for sharpening photos inside Photoshop. The first one is good, the second is better and the third is even better than that. So, if you’ve got images that need some cleaning up, continue reading this post to learn something new about how to go about taking your photos to the next level.

The Sharpen Filters

Access to the first and third methods for sharpening photos can be found under the Filter > Sharpen menu items.

Sharpen Filters Menu Items

The second sharpening method we’re going to look at can be found under the Filter > Camera Raw Filter menu item.

Filter Camera Raw Filter Menu Item

I’m considering this second method one that Photoshop offers because it’s accessed through Photoshop and is a plugin that Photoshop uses. I’ll most likely write a few posts later on that cover the sharpening capabilities of Camera Raw, but for now, this topic will be filed under the Photoshop category.

If you look up two screenshots, you’ll notice that some of the sharpening filters contained under the Filter > Sharpen menu are simply words without the three dots after them. These are the filters that have been around forever. If you click on one of these menu items, the sharpening will be applied. If you do this and then look at your result and aren’t happy with it, you can either click the filter again or undo it. As you may have guessed, there’s not a lot of flexibility with these options. And if you can’t see the screenshot clearly, the items I’m referring to are Sharpen, Sharpen Edges and Sharpen More. Now, don’t get me wrong. For an overall picture cleanup and to add some crispness to it, these are great. For a preview and options, these aren’t. I still use these three filters all the time though, so don’t discount them too much. They just aren’t the three best options.

Tip: When you see a menu item in Adobe Photoshop that’s followed by three dots (Menu Item…), it means that, if clicked, a dialog box with further options will appear on your screen. If the menu item doesn’t have the three dots following it, whatever the function of that menu item is will be applied directly without further manipulation.

Unsharp Mask

As I go about editing the example photo with the following filters, I want you to take notice of what the options can potentially accomplish, rather than how they affect the photo I’m working with. Since every photo is unique, the potential of a filter is much more important than what’s going on in the screenshots that follow. Also, try to remember, or better yet, write down, what the options contained in the dialog boxes are capable of. You’ll be working with these in the future, so it’s a good idea to develop a mental background of the tools.

The first filter I’ll be covering is called Unsharp Mask. Before I show you anything, I’m going to be sure the view of the photo is at 100% inside Photoshop. This way, I’ll have an accurate pixel by pixel representation of what I’m about to work on. Next, I’ll move the photo around until something detailed is at the center of the screen. I wouldn’t want to sharpen a blue sky. I’d much rather see something that’s got some detail to it. Finally, I’ll head up to the Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask menu item and select it. What follows is the Unsharp Mask dialog box.

Unsharp Mask Dialog Box

Much of what sharpening filters do is create contrast between light and dark pixels. Photoshop looks for edges and defines those edges to the tune of your commands. This is why you see sliders in the dialog box above.

As you can see, we’ve got three sliders here. I”m going to go through what each one controls.

Amount: This slider controls how much a pixel is either lightened or darkened when it’s found to be along an edge. There are a few things Photoshop has to take care of here. First, it defines the edge and then, according to the position of the slider, it adjusts luminosity of pixels around it. If you keep the slider to the left, the pixels will be less altered and if you move the slider to the right, they’ll be more altered.

If there’s any grain in your photo, that grain will become accentuated. This is part of the reason I chose this particular photo to work with. I created some grain in the photo to show you what happens when you adjust the amount of sharpening too much. Take a look below.

Over Sharpening a Photo

By over sharpening the photo, you can see that we’ve lost some detail. Although, this may be a cool effect if it’s what you’re after. I’d say we need to push this slider back some.

Radius: When adjusting the Radius slider, you’re telling Photoshop where you want it to look when adjusting the pixels in the photo. A small radius (to the left) says that you want a small area around each pixel to be lightened or darkened and a large radius (to the right) says that you want a large area to be lightened or darkened. So basically, we now understand the controls for how much we want a pixel to be adjusted and how far the adjustment reach is supposed to be. I’ll go ahead and push the Radius slider all the way to the right to show you what happens when the radius is as large as possible.

High Radius Sharpening

In the case above, much more of the photo was altered. Instead of keeping the lightened and darkened pixels localized, they were spread out, adding contrast to a larger area of the image. Again, a neat effect if that’s what you want.

Threshold: When you adjust the Threshold slider, you’re telling Photoshop when to look at a pixel. Let’s say you have two pixels right next to each other. One is 90% white (light) and one is 10% white (dark). You can adjust the threshold to say that you only want Photoshop to look at and alter the brightness of a pixel when the difference between it and the one next to it becomes 80% white and 20% white. So, if you have two pixels, like there are in the first scenario, Photoshop would ignore them. But, if you had two more than fell in to the threshold of the second scenario, Photoshop would pick up on them and edit them according to the settings determined by the first two sliders. A low threshold (to the left) will tell Photoshop to edit more pixels and a high threshold (to the right) will tell Photoshop to edit fewer pixels. In the screenshot below, I pushed the slider all to way to the right, therefore sort of muting out the edges of the photo. There’s a higher threshold, so fewer pixels were altered.

High Threshold Sharpening

When you adjust all three sliders, you can acquire the sharpening you’re looking for, assuming there isn’t much noise in the photo. In general, you want a higher Amount (400), a lower Radius (0.3) and a very low Threshold (0).

Camera Raw Sharpening

If you head up to the Filter > Camera Raw Filter and select it, Adobe Camera Raw will open. Once open, head down to the lower left corner and click the drop-down box. Select 100%. Again, we want the most accurate view of our photo before doing any sharpening.

Adjusting View Size

Next, click on the Detail panel in the right column. It’s the third tab in from the left.

Detail Panel in Adobe Camera Raw

Inside this panel, we’re going to be focusing on the top Sharpening section. If you take a look, you’ll likely see some familiar sliders as well as some that aren’t so familiar. I’ll go over each slider below.

Amount: Same definition as above.

Radius: Same definition as above.

Detail: The Detail slider controls how much Camera Raw sharpens what’s called noise. It looks at the differences between pixels in very small areas and adjusts the contrast between them. So if you’ve got a photo with some grain in it and you push the Detail slider to the right, you’ll actually accentuate that grain. In general, you wouldn’t want this to happen, so you’d keep the slider to the left. Although (again), it could make your image look better in some cases, so you’ll need to experiment with it. In the screenshot below, I pushed this slider to the right as far as it would go. There isn’t much noise to sharpen in the photo I’m using. The noise has gotten so large, by this point, it would be considered specks.

High Detail Sharpening

Masking: If you push the Masking slider to the right and to the left, you’ll notice that not a lot happens. It’s not until you hold down the Alt (Option – Mac) key on your keyboard for you to see the true power of this tool.

Sharpening Masking Tool

I’ll copy and paste this tool’s explanation straight from Adobe:

Masking – Controls an edge mask. With a setting of zero (0), everything in the image receives the same amount of sharpening. With a setting of 100, sharpening is mostly restricted to those areas near the strongest edges. Press Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) while dragging this slider to see the areas to be sharpened (white) versus the areas masked out (black).

In simpler terms, with the Masking slider, you can control the general areas that you want sharpened in your image. And the view is ultra clear because of the fact that the image has changed to black and white. That’s pretty good.

If you’d like to see Adobe’s definitions for each of the sharpening sliders in Camera Raw, follow the link below.

Sharpening and Noise Reduction in Adobe Camera Raw

Smart Sharpen

In Photoshop, if you head up to the Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen, you see that a dialog box appears. This is the Smart Sharpen dialog. This tool is on par with the one found in Camera Raw.

Smart Sharpen Dialog Box

In today’s post, I’ll be covering only the top area of this dialog. The lower area, which controls shadows and highlights is beyond this post. That deserves a post all of its own. Also, the noise reduction section of the Detail panel in Camera Raw will be discussed at another time as well, since it’s a topic of it’s own. Although, I will be touching on noise reduction in this post below.

If you look at the above screenshot, you’ll see that the first two sliders are the same as what we’re now used to seeing. These are the mainstays. What’s new is the Reduce Noise slider, which works in conjunction with the first two sliders. If your photo has noise in it, you can push this slider to the right to lessen the visible noise. The reason this option is so powerful when it’s situated with the other two sharpening sliders is that you can see if you’re actually making the noise worse by adjusting the amount and radius of the sharpening. Otherwise, you’d have to make all these adjustments separately, which be quite the cumbersome task.

Another new feature that we’re seeing is the Remove drop-down box.

Remove Drop-Down Box in Smart Sharpen Tool

Inside this drop-down, there are three options:

Gaussian Blur: Use this option if you want Photoshop to try to remove an overall blur. This may be caused by a slightly out of focus camera or something like that.

Lens Blur: If you take a photo in which you were moving, causing slight blur, Photoshop can attempt to remove this type of blur when you choose this option. This is perfect when you want to correct camera shake.

Motion Blur: When you take a photo of an object that’s moving, you can sharpen that movement. Choose the Motion Blur option in the drop-down and Photoshop will attempt to take some of the blur caused by that movement out of the photo. What’s particularly powerful is having the ability to indicate which direction the movement is traveling. This option can truly assist when removing motion blur.

As with anything else in photo editing applications, I can’t tell you what to do to sharpen your photos. This post was meant to introduce you to the various options available in the three best sharpening tools in Adobe Photoshop. With the knowledge you gained here, you can decide, based on the type of sharpening your photo needs, which tool is the most appropriate.

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If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


Working with Channels in Adobe Photoshop

April 30, 2016

Working with Channels in Adobe Photoshop

In Adobe Photoshop, channels are sort of confusing. Before sitting down to write this post, I went back and forth for quite a while trying to reduce the amount of information into something that’s as easy to understand as possible. I think I have it, so I’ll begin writing about it. Be warned though, working with channels isn’t day-one stuff. It’s something you’ll likely get into as you progress through the intricacies of Photoshop.

I know what it’s like for someone who is new to this application. All they want to do is open an image, make some changes to it and get out. I get that. The thing is, there’s a lot to Photoshop that can greatly help you in your journey to become more proficient. Oftentimes, you’ll need to grasp the basics of a topic, simply to know it’s out there. You may never use it, but if you hear about it a few times and think it may be helpful later on, you’ll probably look into it in more depth as time goes on.

Photoshop has spent years building it’s tools in a way that allows the everyday user to avoid aspects that are complicated. I was watching a tutorial a few days ago that walked through the process of merging images together before Photoshop offered the ability to work with layers. This was back with Photoshop 2.5. Let me tell you, it was no easy task. If you’ve never heard of the Calculations command or the Apply Image command, consider yourself lucky. Fortunately, gaining an understanding of channels isn’t nearly as complex as the information in the video I sat through.

What are Channels?

In the most simple terms, channels are the building blocks of an image’s colors we see in Photoshop. If we limit this discussion to RGB images (there are many more topics, but I’ll tackle them in later posts), I can tell you that the three channels that make up a color image, Red, Green and Blue (RGB), consist of varying degrees of black, white and gray. When you combine the three grayscale channels, the result is a color image.

Now, if you’re anything like me, you’re scratching your head at the explanation I just gave you. Don’t worry, I’m going to talk further below. For now, just try to follow along. I’ll even copy and paste a blurb from Adobe itself on channels:

Color information channels are created automatically when you open a new image. The image’s color mode determines the number of color channels created. For example, an RGB image has a channel for each color (red, green, and blue) plus a composite channel used for editing the image. Source

How Do I Access Channels?

Accessing color channels is very simple. If you have the Layers panel open, you can click the Channels tab.

Channels Panel

Inside the Channels panel, you’ll see a composite channel and the three color channels. As I mentioned above, each of the color channels appears in grayscale.

If, for some reason, you don’t have the Layers panel open or if the Channels tab isn’t available, you can head up to the Windows > Channels menu item and click. This will open the Channels panel.

Window Channels Menu Item

A Closer Look at Each Color Channel

When you look at individual color channels in RGB mode, the lighter the shade, the more saturated that specific color is. For example, if we have a solid red image and we look at the Red channel for that image, it will appear white. The same goes for Blue and Green. If we select the Blue or the Green channels for blue and green images, respectively, they’ll appear white as well. For all the colors in between, they’ll appear different shades of gray. Let’s take a closer look now. I’ll go back into Photoshop and click once on the Red channel for the image I’m using for this post. By doing this, the Composite, Green and Blue channels will be deactivated. You can verify this by looking at the eye icon at the left side of those channels.

Individually Selected Channel

Now, if we take a look at the photo, we’ll notice that the areas that were most red are now white or whitish.

Red Channel

Let’s take a look at the Green channel. Notice how the whites, blacks and grays have shifted.

Green Channel

And finally, we’ll look at the Blue channel.

Blue Channel

Determining the Exact Amount of Red, Green and Blue in an Image

Sometimes, when you look at images through the gray areas of their channels, you get thrown for a loop. What you thought was blue or green or red comes out looking a shade of gray. The method I use for checking the exact measurements of these colors is through the Color Picker. I launch the Color Picker and use the dropper to select an area. Then, I look at the RGB fields in the picker.

Color Picker RGB Fields

In this case, I clicked on, what I thought was, the blue pencil. As it turns out, the blue pencil is actually a combination of red, green and blue.

Editing Channels Through an Adjustment Layer

I’m going to tell you that there are many methods available for turning a color image into a black and white image inside of Photoshop. Each has their advantages and disadvantages. It’s healthy to explore all of the methods because you’ll never know when you’ll need one over another.

If you look back to my post that covered creating a black and white photo in Adobe Camera Raw, things might look familiar here. Well, the concept is familiar, but the steps are slightly different. Below, I’ll explain how we can turn the above color image black and white and adjust each of the RGB channels to produce an image we can use.

To edit the three channels in question, I’ll be using an adjustment layer. The specific tool I’ll be taking advantage of is called the Channel Mixer. I can access the Channel Mixer adjustment by either clicking the icon in the Adjustments panel or by heading up to the Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Channel Mixer menu item and clicking.

Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer

Layer New Adjustment Layer Channel Mixer Menu Item

The benefit of using the top menu is that you’re able to name the adjustment layer via the New Layer dialog before creating the layer as opposed to naming it after it’s created.

Naming Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer

Whichever method you choose is up to you. Either way, the result will be a new adjustment layer. Also, once the layer is created, the Channel Mixer Properties panel will open.

Channel Mixer Properties Panel

To convert the color image to black and white, I’ll click the Monochrome check box in the Properties panel.

Monochrome Check Box Channel Mixer

From here, I can adjust any of the sliders I want. Since I’m going for a bold look, I’ll simply move the Green slider to the right a bit and the Constant slider to the left. If I had a more interesting image, I might do more to it. For this demonstration, this is fine.

Adjusting Monochrome Channels

Here’s the image after adjustment.

Black & White Version of Color Pencils

Since I created this black and white image by using an adjustment layer, I could always turn the adjustment on and off by clicking on the eye icon in the color layer in the Layers panel. It’s a non-destructive edit, which is why we use adjustment layers in the first place.

I wrote this post to give you a background on channels. I wanted to offer a glimpse of what they are and what they are capable of doing. I also wanted to demonstrate their powers through a real world example. I’d say this is a job well done. If you have any questions, I’m always here and I’m always will to help where I can. Thanks!

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If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


How To Adjust Photo Exposure in Adobe Lightroom

April 28, 2016

How To Adjust Photo Exposure in Adobe Lightroom

A lot of people think that when they edit photo exposure in applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom and Camera Raw, they’re simply adjusting the photo’s brightness. In a way, they are. But that’s not all they’re doing. Sure they’re reducing the brightness of overexposed areas and increasing the brightness of underexposed areas, but really, they’re also removing dullness, adding vibrance, color, crispness and contrast. They’re bringing areas that once weren’t visible into the realm of visibility. It’s actually quite an important task. One of the most important, in fact.

In today’s post, I’m going to walk through the steps necessary to edit the exposure of a photograph in Adobe Lightroom. The photo I’ve chosen was taken by me during a stay in Palm Coast, Florida. It’s not a terrible shot, but it can certainly be taken up a notch with some light editing.

Now, I want to let you know that Lightroom and Camera Raw are close cousins when it comes to editing photos. If you know one, you know the other. My personal preference is to use Camera Raw, but I can definitely get on board with the organizational capabilities of Lightroom. Lightroom is an all-in-one package when it comes to taking care of the post-processing of photographs.

I wrote a few posts a while back that cover today’s topic – but I wrote those posts for Camera Raw. If you read through them, you’ll see uncanny similarities between the two programs. Their Basic panels are virtually identical. I wanted to let you know this because you may want to read through today’s post and then check out the others I wrote earlier. It’s good to become well rounded when working with Adobe applications. Here are some links to my earlier posts:

Editing a Photo Using the Basic Panel in Adobe Camera Raw

Fixing Under & Overexposure With Adobe Camera Raw

How To Make A Photo “Pop” With Adobe Camera Raw

If you read through the posts linked to above, along with what I write below, you’ll be well versed in how to correct photo exposure issues with either Lightroom or Camera Raw.

Original Photo

Below is the original photo. As I said earlier, it’s not terrible. My goal for today is to bring some life to it by using only limited tools in Lightroom. Since I’m concentrating on exposure only, I’ll restrict myself to adjusting the Exposure, Contrast, Highlights, Shadows, Whites and Blacks sliders.

Original Example Photo

Editing Exposure

The first task I must complete is to analyze the photo. I need to take a close look at it to determine the reason I decided to bring it into Lightroom for editing in the first place. Since I’m working on exposure, I must have thought something was wrong with the lighting, saturation or contrast.

From looking through the various areas of the above photo, I think the issue is primarily that it’s slightly underexposed, although, there are some overexposed elements in it as well. If you look at some of the shiny areas of the leaves, and especially at the backside of the larger leaf toward the center of the photo, you’ll see that it’s washed out. I did some experimenting with that area earlier and I can tell you that the data is there. It’s just being hidden. I’m not confident that I can fix that particular area with these sliders alone, but I’ll give it a shot. What would really do the trick is an adjustment brush, which would allow me to reduce the exposure of just one area of an image. That’s a post for another time though.

Enhancing Photos with the Adjustment Brush in Adobe Camera Raw

Adjusting Exposure & Contrast

Since the photo is slightly underexposed and weak looking, I need to raise the exposure a bit. I’ll nudge the Exposure slider to the right just a small amount and then push the Contrast slider all the way to the right, in order to give the picture some vibrance.

Moving Exposure & Contrast Sliders

Adjusting Highlights

By moving just these two sliders, I made a substantial change. It looks better already. The thing is, by increasing the exposure and contrast, those overexposed areas of the leaves are now really overexposed. They’re virtually white. To deal with this, I’m going to push the Highlights slider all the way to the left, to reduce the highlights as much as possible. Remember, the Highlights slider controls highlights in a photo, not whites. Whites have no data to them while highlights do. If you reduce whites, you’ll simply gray what’s white. If you reduce highlights, you’ll reduce the white, or glare, that’s hiding the data that’s in the washed out areas. It’s sort of confusing, so it’ll take some experimenting with those two sliders to see exactly what I’m talking about.

Reducing Highlights

As you can see, by reducing the highlights, there wasn’t a huge change to the image. There is, however, more detail showing on the back of that one leaf though.

Adjusting Shadows

I like to think of shadows as those that are hiding the good stuff. So much of an image is hidden by darkness. It’s not completely obvious at first, but becomes plainly obvious when you start pushing the Shadows slider around. Under rocks, behind branches, in rooms you didn’t know were there – shadows are insidious and must be lit up.

I usually reduce the highlights as far as they can go and raise the shadows as far as they can go. Reducing highlights is relatively safe, but raising shadows can be dangerous. Too much and things start looking weird. In the case of this photo, I stopped about half way. I didn’t want to overdo it. But from what I did, some of what’s behind the vine came more into view.

Raising Shadows

Adjusting Whites & Blacks

When you adjust the whites and blacks in Lightroom, it’s sort of like you’re extending the previous slider’s abilities. These are roundabout methods for accentuating the outcomes of the Contrast, Highlights and Shadows sliders. I don’t want you to go nuts overthinking things, but if I push the Whites slider to the right some, it’s almost as though it’s a continuation of what the Shadows slider does. And if I push the Blacks slider to the left some, it’s almost as if it’s a continuation of what the Contrast and the Highlights sliders do. It’s interesting. Again, you’ll need to experiment with things for each photo. Each one is different and will require varying adjustments and strategies.

Adjusting the Whites & Blacks Sliders

The Final Photo

I’ll post the final, edited photo below. Again, I limited myself to using only a few sliders, but I think things appear much better than they did earlier. I wasn’t able to fully correct the underside of the leaf because that’s an isolated area, but I may tackle that in a later post. For now, the photo has much more contrast, color and crispness.

Final Photo

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Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Lightroom


Inverting & Coloring with the Magic Wand Tool in Adobe Photoshop

April 27, 2016

Inverting & Coloring with Magic Wand Tool in Adobe Photoshop

When it comes to selecting nice solid areas of a photograph, nothing beats the Magic Wand Tool. It’s fast, accurate and customizable. In reality, there aren’t many alternative tools in Adobe Photoshop that are as intuitive and flexible as this one is.

In today’s post, I’m going to introduce you to the Magic Wand Tool. I’ll show you where to find it, how to adjust some of its settings in the options bar and then how you can go about using it in a real life project. For the project, I’ll be using the photo you see above. Don’t worry, I’ll be throwing in a few cool tricks to give you more of a feel of what you can do once you’ve got something selected.

Original Photo

This is the original photo I’ll be using for this post. I already edited it in Adobe Camera Raw, so it’s got some more contrast and color than the original did. It’s the perfect picture to demonstrate how the Magic Wand Tool works.

Cigarette Smoke

How To Access the Magic Wand Tool

In order to access the Magic Wand Tool, you’ll need to head over to the left vertical toolbar. From there, it’s in the 4th slot down, under the Quick Selection Tool. To get to the Magic Wand Tool, you’ll need to drag the Quick Selection Tool out to the right and then select the tool below it.

Magic Wand Tool

I’ve got the location of the tool circled in red in the above screenshot.

If you’ll notice, when you select the Magic Wand Tool, the options bar at the top of Photoshop will change. I’ve got the appropriate one enclosed in red below.

Magic Wand Tool Options Bar

Magic Wand Tool Options

Before we begin anything, we need to become familiar with the options of this particular tool. It’s with these settings that we’ll obtain the most accurate selections.

Since I’ve already covered the first four options (the type of selections) in previous posts, I’ll skip them here. For now, just know that when you first begin making any selections with the Magic Wand Tool, be sure that the first square is chosen – the New Selection square. And if you roll over the three others to the right of this one, you’ll quickly realize what they do. If you want to learn more about these options, please read this post:

Selecting Text with the Magnetic Lasso Tool in Adobe Photoshop

Sample Size

The next option you’ll need to concern yourself with is the Sample Size.

Magic Wand Tool Sample Size Option

This option controls exactly what it sounds like it controls – the sample in which this tool is to bind it’s selection to. If it’s to use only one pixel as a sample, that’s very limited. The selection will be very small. If you increase the number of pixels that are included in the sample, the selection will grow. If you choose the largest sample size, currently 101 by 101 average, you’ll be taking a sample of the average tone and color of an area. You’ll need to experiment with these averages to see which best fits your own project.

To demonstrate how Sample Size can impact a selection, I’ll show you a few screenshots. In the first screenshot, the Sample Size is set to Point Sample. This is where the selection tool tests the tone and color of only 1 pixel (directly from the center of the small red circle). This is the selection that’s made.

Small Sample Size

If I increase the Sample Size to something more moderate, such as 11 by 11 average, the tool is testing the average tone and color of an 11 pixel by 11 pixel area. Here is the resulting selection.

Medium Sample Size

Finally, if I increase the Sample Size to the largest setting, the 101 by 101 average, the tool tests the average tone and color of a 101 pixel by 101 pixel area. This is the resulting selection.

Large Sample Size

As you can see from the above screenshots, the selected areas grew alongside the increase of the sample size.

Tolerance

The Tolerance option is the cousin of the Sample Size option. Here’s how it works – the Tolerance option setting is the data Photoshop uses to decide which tones and colors of an image can be used in a selection. If we set the Tolerance value to 1, Photoshop will only use the one tone and color from the one pixel that’s clicked. Again, the selection area will be very small, unless, of course, there are many solid areas in the image (and a solid area is clicked on). If we raise the Tolerance value to 20, Photoshop will use the tone and color of the 1 pixel that’s clicked, and in addition, will use the tones and colors of any pixels that are 20 shades darker and 20 shades brighter than that 1 pixel. As you may have already guessed, the selection area would be larger this time around. If we increased the Tolerance value again, the same thing would happen and the selection area would continue to grow.

I was going to include screenshots of this happening, just as I did above, but when I did this, the screenshots look almost identical to those above, so I left them out. It’s really the same concept.

Anti-Alias

Anti-aliasing is a simple concept to understand. In the most basic sense, it’s the smoothing out of something. If you make a selection with this option unchecked, the selection edges may be somewhat jagged. If you check this option off, Photoshop will smooth out the edges by averaging their values. Picture it this way – if your selection area is figuratively black and white, Photoshop will look for some gray to moderate the sharpness of the selection edge blockiness.

This isn’t something you should concern yourself with too much. My advice it to keep this option checked. It’ll make your selections look better overall.

Contiguous

Whether the Contiguous option is turned on or off can have huge consequences. The demo photo for this post will show you exactly what those consequences are.

The definition of contiguous is: sharing a common border; touching. So, if the Contiguous option is checked off, any selection made will be localized, even if the same tonal and color values are found elsewhere in the image, but are separated by a division. Take a look at this screenshot. I’ll keep the Contiguous option checked.

Contiguous Selection Made

I clicked on an area of black below the smoke. As you can see, only that black area is selected. Now, I’ll uncheck the Contiguous box and click in the same area.

Contiguous Option Not Selected

Look what’s selected now. Not only the one area that’s identified by Photoshop, based on the option values in the options bar, but all similar areas. The fact that they’re divided and separated by lines and objects no longer matters. Personally, I keep the Contiguous option checked off because I like the control of making a selection and then holding down the Shift key on my keyboard to expand that selection. I don’t like it when it’s expanded automatically.

Sample All Layers

By default, Photoshop only looks at the visible layer you’re making a selection in. If you check the Sample All Layers box though, Photoshop will analyze and select from any layers you happen to have included in your project, whether they’re visible or not.

The Selection Project

In this final section, I’m going to run through a quick project that can help you understand how the Magic Wand Tool can assist with making selection in an example photograph, such as the one I’m using in this post. You may have already come to the conclusion that smoke is one of those tricky things to select in Photoshop. It’s got weird edges and is filled with tons of colors and gradients. Let’s just say, if I wanted to select the smoke, I’d be sitting here for a good part of the day.

My goal with this project is to select and change the color of the smoke in the photo. I’m not concerned with what color I change it to – I merely want it changed. And since there are solid areas of the photo, I’m going to use them to my advantage.

Making My Selections

To ultimately select the smoke areas of the photo, I’m going to select the top or bottom solid black area with the Magic Wand Tool. I’ll set my Sample Size to 5 by 5 average, the Tolerance to 10, keep Anti-aliasing and Contiguous activated and turn off Sample All Layers. Once I have one large solid black area selected, I’ll hold down the Shift key on my keyboard and select the other large solid black area. This is the output. Look closely at the marching ants.

Solid Areas Selected

Currently, the smoke is not selected. The large black areas are. To make everything but the large black areas selected, I’ll head up to the Select > Inverse menu item and click.

Select Inverse Menu Item

This will simply reverse the selections. What’s not selected will be and what’s selected won’t be. Here’s the output of that.

Smoke Selected

Making an Adjustment

Now that the cigarette and the smoke are selected, I’ll go to the Hue/Saturation icon in the Adjustments panel and click on it. That will create an adjustment layer and will pop the corresponding Properties panel open. From there, I’ll simply move the Hue slider to the right.

Creating Adjustment Layer

This changed the color of the smoke without changing much else. Job well done. It was simple too, when the principles of the selection tool were followed.

Pink Smoke

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Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


Quick Keyboard Shortcut Guide For Blending Modes in Adobe Photoshop

April 25, 2016

Quick Keyboard Shortcut Guide For Blending Modes in Adobe Photoshop

After working with blending modes in Adobe Photoshop for a while, you’ll come to realize that navigating between the different modes can become quite cumbersome. Don’t get me wrong – it’s not like getting from one to the next with your mouse is tragically difficult or anything, but I think most designers, editors and photographers would agree that if they could somehow jump from one to the next using keyboard shortcuts, they could speed up their workflow quite a bit. Especially if they are avid blending mode people.

When I edit photos, I oftentimes limit myself to a few blending modes. If I’m aligning duplicate layers, I use the Difference mode. If I’m changing the style of a photo, I may take advantage of the Multiply, Screen or Overlay modes. Realistically though, there aren’t many more than what I just listed that I use on a regular basis. I think this is a case for many of us. If we typically take advantage of only three or four blend modes, why not learn and memorize some keyboard shortcuts that have the potential of speeding up our editing and designing?

In this post, I’m going to show you three things. First, I’m going to list out the keyboard shortcuts that can quickly navigate you to any blending mode you want in Adobe Photoshop. No more wandering over to the Layers panel with your mouse to click that drop-down box and clicking one after another after another. Learn as many as you want. The choice is yours.

Second, I’ll let you know about a quick shortcut that will allow you to quickly cycle through the blending modes, one after another, the way they’re listed in the drop-down. This is a fast tip that you’ll remember forever.

Lastly, I’ll give you a link that will send you to a page that covers all of Photoshop’s default keyboard shortcuts. This is the granddaddy of them all list. You may want to bookmark this post because there’s going to be some good content in it.

Blending Mode Keyboard Shortcuts

As promised, I’m giving you the list of blending mode shortcuts. This is the the basic one that will cover almost everyone’s needs. There’s actually another one that can be found here that covers a few more. Just scroll down to the Keys For Blending Modes section. Again, 99% of us only use a few of these. Just concern yourselves with one or two for today and then more as time goes on. I find that writing them down on a sticky note and attaching that to my computer or monitor helps.

Also, the following shortcuts are for Windows users. If you’re a Mac user, simply replace the Alt with Option.

Normal: Shift+Alt+N
Dissolve: Shift+Alt+I

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Darken: Shift+Alt+K
Multiply: Shift+Alt+M
Color Burn: Shift+Alt+B
Linear Burn: Shift+Alt+A

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Lighten: Shift+Alt+G
Screen: Shift+Alt+S
Color Dodge: Shift+Alt+D
Linear Dodge: Shift+Alt+W

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Overlay: Shift+Alt+O
Soft Light: Shift+Alt+F
Hard Light: Shift+Alt+H
Vivid Light: Shift+Alt+V
Linear Light: Shift+Alt+J
Pin Light: Shift+Alt+Z
Hard Mix: Shift+Alt+L

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Difference: Shift+Alt+E
Exclusion: Shift+Alt+X

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Hue: Shift+Alt+U
Saturation: Shift+Alt+T
Color: Shift+Alt+C
Luminosity: Shift+Alt+Y

Cycling Through Blend Modes Quickly

Back when I had no idea which blend modes did what, I used to quickly cycle through them all with my keyboard to get more of a grasp of what was going on. I’m not sure if this helped me at all because I don’t recall ever choosing one over another. I think there was a bit of a lack of commitment in those experimental days. Either way, quickly flying through all the blend modes, in order, can be helpful. It’s for this reason that I’ll give you the keyboard shortcut to do this.

Click Shift++ to cycle down the list of modes and Shift+- to cycle back up. Also, be sure to select a tool that doesn’t use blending modes itself. Since these keyboard shortcuts work on all blend modes, if I were to select the Brush Tool or the Paint Bucket Tool and then use these, their modes would change, not the one in the Layers panel. I like to click the Move Tool (V) before cycling through the Layers panel modes. Unless, of course, you want to use the other tool modes. That’s up to you.

Now, I do want to share something else regarding cycling through the blend modes. If you head over to any blend mode drop-down and click a mode with your mouse pointer and then click your up arrow or down arrow, you’ll be able to quickly move up and down the list. The difference between this method and the one I just told you about above is that you’ll need to use your mouse at least once for this one, which sort of negates the logic behind keyboard shortcuts. I’ve seen people coast through their keyboards like it’s nobody’s business. The last thing they want to do it click something with their mouse if they can help it.

More Adobe Photoshop Keyboard Shortcuts

The last piece of information I’d like to share with you today is a link to Adobe’s master list of keyboard shortcuts for Photoshop. You should definitely save this page because these shortcuts may come in handy down the road, especially when you want to create custom ones inside your own Photoshop install.

Default Keyboard Shortcuts in Adobe Photoshop

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Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


Using Snapshots to Save Versions in Adobe Camera Raw

April 24, 2016

Using Snapshots to Save Versions in Adobe Camera Raw

The Snapshots panel in Adobe Camera Raw controls one of those hidden features that you’ll use over and over again, once you discover it’s there. It’s tucked away, sort of as an afterthought, over at the right side of the right column. I’m not sure why it’s all the way over there because, plainly put, it’s awesome.

In today’s post, I’m going to explain what Snapshots are inside Camera Raw. I’ll also explain their benefits. Then, I’ll go through a demonstration of how snapshots can be used in your every day workflow. I’m telling ya, I’m excited because this is good stuff!

What are Snapshots?

If you’ve ever worked in Git, you know exactly what version control is. If you’re a designer or photographer, who has absolutely no idea what Git or version control is, you’ll definitely know what is means to open an image in a photo editor, make some changes, save those changes under one name, make some more changes, save the file again under another name and so on. To be more precise, version control is this:

Version control is a system that records changes to a file or set of files over time so that you can recall specific versions later.

Think about it this way – and I’ll use the boat image at the top of this post as an example. Say I opened the boat image in Photoshop and adjusted the color. I wanted to output this file just like this for my website. Then, a friend of mine asks me for the same picture in black and white for his website. I’d have to open the file again, change it to black and white and save the original under a different name. After that, another friend asks me for the same picture, but this time, in two-tone. Hmmm…to do this, I’d have to open the original color file, change it to black and white and then two-tone and then save the original under another name. At the end of it all, I might end up with three files that are named like this:

boat.psd
boat-black-white.psd
boat-two-tone.psd

If I took these photos in RAW mode (which I always should) and they were 25MB each, I’d have just used up 75MB of my hard drive, just for a few changes to one file. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a wildly inefficient use of hard drive space.

What about this? Let’s say there was a way to open the same file, make some changes to the color, save those changes as a snapshot, make the same photo black and white, save those changes as another snapshot and finally make the same photo two-tone and save those final changes as a snapshot and then close the file. One file, three versions, three outputs. Now we’re back to the single 25MB of space used. This is reality and it’s all in Camera Raw. It’s also in Lightroom, but I’ll talk about that another day.

Snapshots have different benefits for different people. Personally, I enjoy editing a file many different ways. I like to see how it looks with one set of changes and then I like to see how it looks with another set of changes. If I were to save all these changes as different files, I’d be stuck in some massive disorganization. Clients oftentimes like to see various versions of the same photo as well, so sometimes designers, editors and photographers are forced into different outputs of the same file. You never know which one the client is going to like the best, so you end up saving the source file many times over – each to cover the change that was made to the original.

Finally, Camera Raw has a small issue with having a horrible undo feature. I think it’s fairly non-existent. Sure, you can click Ctrl+Z a few times and go back a step or two (if you’re lucky) while using some select tools, but I wouldn’t rely on that. It’s hit or miss. Many folks prefer to edit and take snapshots as an alternative to the lack of the ability to undo.

To summarize, Snapshots in Camera Raw are a handy feature that allows you to save file space on your hard drive, let’s you experiment with different versions of the same file and gives you some flexibility to undo some changes if you don’t like where things are heading.

Creating Some Snapshots – A Demonstration

In this section, I’m going to go through the process of editing one photo a few times while taking Snapshots along the way. It’s super simple, so feel free to follow along with your own image as you read this.

The first thing I’m going to do is open the photo I’m interested in working on in Adobe Camera Raw. If you need help doing this, you can check out one of my earlier posts:

How To Open Files & Photos Into Adobe Camera Raw

After the photo in question is open in Camera Raw, I’ll make some edits inside of the Basic panel.

Photo Edits Inside Basic Panel

These aren’t any crazy edits or anything, they’re merely some standard changes I usually make to images.

Now, I’m going to consider this the “color” version of this image. I’d like to save these changes. To do this in Camera Raw, I’ll click on the Snapshots panel button.

Snapshots Panel

Once I’m in the Snapshots panel, I’ll create a new snapshot. To do so, I’ll click on the New Snapshot icon that’s at the bottom of the panel.

New Snapshot

When I do that, the New Snapshot dialog box appears, where I can fill in the name of the snapshot. I’ll call this first one Color (after the changes I made). Then, I’ll click OK.

New Snapshot Dialog Box

After that, I’ll notice that my snapshot has been saved as a line in the Snapshots panel.

Line in Snapshot Panel

Since I want to experiment with three different versions of this file, I’ll make some changes twice more and create two more snapshots. First, I’ll change this photo to black and white. I’ll head into the HSL/Grayscale panel and check off the Convert to Grayscale check box.

HSL Grayscale Panel

I’ll make some changes in this panel and then go back to the Snapshots panel and create a new snapshot. This time, I’ll call it Black White.

Black & White Snapshot

As you can see, there are now two snapshot lines in the Snapshots panel.

Finally, I’d like to create a duo-tone version of this image. To accomplish this, I’ll click on the Split Toning panel and make a few adjustments.

Split Toning Panel

The last step with this one is to create yet another snapshot in the Snapshots panel. I’ll call this one Two Tone.

Two Tone Snapshot

Now there are three snapshots in the Snapshots panel. If I click on any one of these, the image will immediately change to that version. And as you can see, all this data is being stored inside this one file. It’s in the metadata somewhere.

The best part of all this is that if I want to export any of these versions of the image to Photoshop for further editing (or save them outside of Camera Raw), all I need to do is click on whichever snapshot it is I want to export and click on the Open Image or Save Image buttons down at the bottom of the application. It’s that simple. I actually did this to create the leading image for this post. I opened each of the three versions of the file into Photoshop to put them all together.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask. I absolutely love comments.

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Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Camera Raw


What are Layer Masks in Adobe Photoshop?

April 23, 2016

What are Layer Masks in Adobe Photoshop?

There are a few core pillars of what makes Adobe Photoshop great. Layer masks are one of those pillars. Using these types of masks allows for all sorts of creativity and like many other areas of Photoshop, their limit is completely up to the user. The problem many folks have, however, is that they oftentimes don’t fully understand what a layer mask is. I can remember back to my early years constantly hearing those words, but never really knowing what anyone was talking about. I would use the more readily understood tools, such as the eraser and opacity slider.

In this post, I’ll explain what a layer mask is inside of Adobe Photoshop. I’ll be brief as to keep things as simple as possible. Then, I’ll go through an example of what these masks can do. Within that example, I’ll talk about why masks are so much more valuable than the Eraser Tool and why you should consider never using the eraser again.

What is a Layer Mask?

First off, there are two different types of masks in Photoshop. The first is the Layer Mask and the second is the Clipping Mask. I’m going to limit this post to a discussion about the layer mask. I’ll leave the clipping mask for another time.

In the most basic sense, a layer mask is a tool that allows a user to erase, to a varying degree, part of a layer. The value of using a mask is that it’s non-destructive. Let me give you an example (I’ll go through all this below too). Say you have a photo. Say that you apply a layer mask to the photo layer in Photoshop. You decide that you want to remove one particular area of the photo, so you click on the Brush Tool, change the color that will be applied through the brush to black and then paint the area of the photo that you want gone. This would be pretty much the same steps you would take with the Eraser Tool, if you chose to take that route.

A few moments later, you decide that you made a mistake. You now want all of the areas that you removed with the Brush Tool back again. Well, all you would need to do to recover the lost data is to change the color that you’d apply to white and brush back over the area that’s gone. Magically, it would reappear.

When you manipulate layer masks, you don’t actually change any data. You simply hide it. When you use a selection tool or a brush tool inside of a mask, you don’t remove the pixels you want hidden. You change their opacity. This is quite valuable because if you ever want those pixels back, you can recover them quickly.

Now, if you tried to recover data you removed via the Eraser Tool, you’d be out of luck. I suppose you could step back all the way to the point you erased those pixels, but that’s not very practical. It’s much better to use masks.

Applying a Layer Mask

In this section, I’m going to demonstrate how to apply a layer mask to a layer. Then, I’ll fool around a bit with some different shades of white through black to see just what happens.

First, I’ll apply a mask. To do this, I’ll head down to the bottom of the Layers panel and click the Add a Mask icon. It’s the rectangle with the dark circle inside of it.

Add Mask Icon

Once I do that, I’ll notice a mask box appear in the layer that I selected earlier (in this case, the only one).

Mask Indicator in Layer

Changing Visibility Inside the Mask

Like I mentioned above, one of the goals of using a layer mask is to change visibility of a particular area. So with that in mind, I’d like to do some experimenting. Now that I have the mask applied to the layer, I’m going to select three distinct areas with the Rectangular Marquee Tool and I’ll fill those areas with three different shades. The first one will be only 20% white, the next will be 50% white and the last will be 80% white. Let’s see what they look like.

Different Mask Opacities

As you can see, we’ve got three different opacities. The first almost hid all of the area. I know you can’t see it very well, but there is a bit left. The second is more visible, with the mask hiding half of the visibility and the last area is the most visible. The mask only hid 20% of the layer. If I used 100% black in one of the areas, I would have completely hidden the area and if I used 100% white in one of the areas, there would be no change. It wouldn’t hide any of the layer. There’s an easy tip to remember which shade hides and which one reveals.

I can’t see in the dark. I can see in the light. It’s that simple. Black hides and white reveals.

Lastly, let’s take a look at the layer with the mask in it.

Layer Mask in Use

If you look closely, you can see the actual shades that are filling in each area. They’re right inside the mask area of the layer.

Hiding & Getting a Larger View of a Layer Mask

I’ve got a few cool tips for you when it comes to working with layer masks. The first one hides the mask. Let’s say that you applied a mask and hid some areas of a photo, but want to view the original, unmasked, photo again. What can you do? Well, if you select the layer in question over in the Layers panel and then hold down Shift on your keyboard and click the white mask box with your mouse, a big red X will appear in the layer. The mask will also be turned off.

Hiding Layer Mask

To activate the mask again, simply repeat the above steps.

Now, if you wanted to get a really big view of the masked area of the layer, you can do that too. All you need to do is hold down the Alt key on your keyboard and then click the mask. This time, the mask area itself will overlay the work area. You’ll get a nice large view.

Enlarged View of Layer Mask

Again, to revert back to a normal view, simply repeat the above steps.

Masking with an Adjustment Layer

The first method I used (above) was to apply a mask directly to a layer using the mask icon in the Layers panel. There are other methods for applying masks as well. In this section, I’m going to apply one that has a lot of versatility. It’s via the Adjustments panel.

The first thing I’m going to do is to select an area of the image with the Elliptical Marquee Tool. Since there’s only one layer, I don’t need to concern myself with selecting the layer. If there were multiple layers, I’d need to do that. I’ll set up some guides to assist me with keeping my selection centered.

Elliptical Selection in Guides

Now, I’ll head over to the Adjustments panel and click the Hue/Saturation icon. When I do this, a new adjustment layer appears in the Layers panel and the Properties panel for this adjustment pops open.

Hue Saturation Adjustment Layer

I want you to take notice of something very important here. If you look inside the adjustment layer in the Layers panel, you’ll see the mask box. Inside that box is a black background and a white oval. If you remember back to an earlier section of this post, I told you that black hides and white reveals. So, in this case, the black area is going to hide the changes I make inside the Hue/Saturation panel and the white area will reveal them. And if I get confused because the mask area inside the Layers panel is too small, I could always enlarge it.

Large View of Adjustment Layer Mask

Remember that I gave the instructions for how to do this above?

Since my adjustment layer mask is now set up, I can make a change to the layer. I’m going to push the Saturation slider to the left so it reads -75%. Here’s what happens to the photo.

Reducing Layer Saturation

You can see that only the initially selected area is affected by the reduction of saturation. This is because of the mask I created by using the Elliptical Marquee Tool.

Inverting a Layer Mask

If I ever felt that I wanted or needed to reverse the effects of a mask, I could easily invert it. Do do this, I’ll double-click on the mask itself in the Layers panel and then, inside the Properties panel that appears, I’ll select Invert.

Mask Properties Panel

This is the result of inverting the mask. Now, the small mask box in the Layers panel is reversed, so the white (reveal) is on the outside and the black (hide) is on the inside.

Inverted Mask

Masking with the Brush Tool

In this final section, I’d like to demonstrate how you can edit a mask with the Brush Tool. Since the edge of my original selection is hard, I’d like to soften it. I’d also like to enlarge the area a bit.

I’ll head over to the Brush Tool and select it. Then, I’ll go up to the options bar Brush Preset Picker and adjust the brush Size and edge Hardness.

Brush Preset Picker

Next, I’ll open the Color Picker and change the shade to black. I want black because I would like to hide some of the desturated area.

Color Picker

Finally, I’ll trace the edge of the oval inside the photo with the brush. This will soften and enlarge, just as I wanted.

Masking with the Brush Tool

I’d say that’s pretty cool.

If you have any questions or comments, I’m all ears, so please leave them down below. I always reply, so please feel free to contribute.

——

If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


Using Smart Objects as Placeholders in Adobe Photoshop

April 21, 2016

Using Smart Objects as Placeholders in Adobe Photoshop

If you’ve ever put multiple images together in a layout of some sort, this post may be of great help to you. What I’m talking about here are, perhaps, layouts for postcards, magazines, newspapers, etc…the types of things that you’ve well specified, but haven’t yet obtained the final images for. In cases like this, it’s oftentimes helpful to put the entire project together with placeholder images and then replace those images, or swap them out for the real ones, later on. This type of thing is totally doable and very simple. It’s actually just a few more steps than you would have taken otherwise.

In today’s post, I’m going to show you how to place specifically sized photos into a project as Smart Objects. Then, I’ll demonstrate how to replace those Smart Objects with other images. The new images will need to be of the same dimensions as the originals, but the neat thing is, they’ll follow any transformations given to those originals. Don’t worry, I’ll explain exactly what I’m talking about down below. Let’s just say – if I place one picture in a project as a Smart Object and then transform it multiple times, I can replace that picture with another and the same transformations will be applied to the new one with no additional work on my part. It’s really cool.

Beginning the Project

To kick things off, I’m going to create an empty document with the dimensions of 1000×667 pixels. This is what I typically use for this blog. Next, I’m going to head up to the File > Place Embedded menu item and select it.

File Place Embedded

When I do that, I can navigate to the folder that holds my images. Now, I want to let you know that I’ll be working with 5 images today. I’ve already sized all of them to 1000×667 pixels. I’ll be placing 4 images in the document initially and then I’ll use the final image for the replacement demonstration.

Place Embedded Dialog Box

Placing an Image

When I select an image from the folder and click Place, it’ll appear in my new document. It’ll also be placed as a Smart Object and will be transformable. Take a look at the layer in the Layers panel. You can see the small Smart Object icon in the layer. Actually, when you initially place the image, the Smart Object icon won’t be visible in the Layers panel. It’s not until you hit Enter on your keyboard to accept the placement that the icon appears. This screenshot is right after I placed the image. Take notice of the image layer in the Layers panel. There’s no icon.

Placing Image as Smart Object

And this screenshot is after I hit Enter on my keyboard to accept the placement. Now the Smart Object icon appears.

Accepting Smart Object

From here, I’ll go through this step and few more times until 4 images are placed in my document.

Images Placed as Smart Objects

Now, if you aren’t familiar with how awesome Smart Objects are, I suggest you read my posts on the topic. It’s worth it to get caught up on this stuff because Smart Objects are the cat’s meow and can help your editing out immensely.

What are Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop?

Converting Multiple Layers into a Smart Object in Adobe Photoshop

Editing RAW Files as Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop

The Difference Between Duplicate Smart Objects in Adobe Photoshop

Creating My Layout

I’m going to do a bit of transforming to these Smart Objects now. I’m going to reduce their sizes by 50% and arrange them in the corners of the document. I’ll also add some thin white lines to separate each of the pictures. There’s nothing special about this step. I’ve done a lot of transforming on this blog, so if you want to read up on it, please feel free.

Using the Transform & Free Transform Tools in Adobe Photoshop

As a small tip, the fastest method for transforming these layers is to select all of them at the same time, hit Ctrl+T on your keyboard to turn on Free Transform mode and then type 50% in the Width and Height fields in the option bar. When that’s done, simply hit Enter on your keyboard. This will resize everything, making life much easier.

Free Transform Percentage

All Layers Selected

I’ll then arrange the images like I mentioned above and add the white lines. Here’s what I have so far.

Using Smart Objects as Placeholders in Adobe Photoshop

Replacing a Smart Object

So far, what I’ve done in this project has been setup. The real power comes in this section. I currently have four Smart Objects that have been “placed” in my document. What this means is that each of these Smart Objects can be considered a placeholder. Since I initially placed the photos as Smart Objects and then transformed them and repositioned them, if I want to replace any or all of the Smart Objects with the same initially sized photo or photos, I could do that. Any new photo will be positioned in the same spot as the one I’m replacing and will appear as a Smart Object with the same transformation properties. In this project, all I’ve done is resized the layers, but if I had done many more transformations, they would all apply to the new Smart Object as well. This is why this method is so valuable. It’s a time saver.

I’ve decided that I don’t like the bird image. I have another image that’s 1000×667 pixels and I’d like that in my layout instead. To swap out the bird and bring in my new image, I’m going to first select the layer I’d like to replace over in the Layers panel, then head up to the Layers > Smart Objects > Replace Contents menu item and select it.

Layers Smart Objects Replace Contents

When I do that, the folder with my images pops up again, allowing my to select the cat photo.

Replace Contents

Once selected, I can click Place and watch what happens.

New Layout with Replaced Smart Object

Check that out – the bird is gone and the cat has arrived.

And if I take a look at the Layers panel, I can see that the Bird layer has been replaced with the Cat layer. The best part is, the Cat layer has been automatically resized and is positioned exactly where the Bird layer was. That’s pretty awesome.

New Layer

I’m sure you can see the benefit of this. With this method, you can prepare layouts far ahead of time, with no need of the final, high resolution images. When you get the images, you can easily swap out the placeholder photos with the new ones.

——

If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop


How to Change the Canvas Checkerboard in Adobe Photoshop

April 19, 2016

How to Change the Canvas Checkerboard in Adobe Photoshop

Through the years, there have been a good number of instances when I’ve wanted to change, or customize, the color or size of the checkerboard transparency background of my canvas in Adobe Photoshop. Most of the times, it’s been because of conflicting colors. And by conflicting, I mean far too close to one another. If my image has a lot of light gray in it and the background checkerboard has a lot of gray in it, it becomes a chore to differentiate between the two. It’s for this reason, I update the transparency background until it offers a much different feel – simply put, so I can tell the difference between it and the layer I’m working on.

In today’s post, I’m going to walk you through the necessary steps to update or customize your checkerboard canvas area. Luckily, there aren’t many of them, so you’ll find the task fast and easy.

A Bad Workspace

I’m going to start things off by showing you what a bad workspace looks like. I’ve gone ahead and customized the checkerboard so it’s very dark. The reason I did this is so it shows little differentiation between it and the photo I’ve decided to use.

Dark Transparency Checkerboard

I also shrunk the opposing color squares a bit. This makes it an even worse situation. Now, imagine having to work on the lower left corner of the image. What if you were trying to select something or paint something else? Can you imaging how difficult that would be? I’d say I need to lighten the background up a bit so I can get a better visual of what’s going on.

Customizing the Canvas Transparency Checkerboard

To fix this situation, I’m going to head up to the Edit > Preferences > Transparency & Gamut menu item and select it.

Edit Preferences Transparency & Gamut Menu Item

When I do this, the Preferences dialog box opens up. More specifically, the Transparency & Gamut section of the Preferences dialog box appears.

Preferences Dialog Box

Adjusting Grid Size

The first thing I’m going to do is to adjust the Grid Size. To do this, I’m going to click on the Grid Size drop-down menu and select something other than Small. That’s what it’s currently set to. For demonstration purposes, I’ll choose Large. What’s great is that I get a preview of what things will look like if I click OK in the dialog box.

Adjusting Grid Size

Adjusting Grid Colors

Now that the grid size is nice and large, I can go ahead and change the Grid Colors so they stand out from the image layer. I have a few options here. I can either customize the colors by clicking on the two color boxes that are located in the Grid Colors area or I can simply click the Grid Colors drop-down menu to select something that’s already been created for me. I’ll choose the latter option.

Adjusting Grid Colors

As you can see, this selection (Light) is quite similar to what Photoshop’s default looks like. It also differentiates nicely from the image layer.

Default Grid Size & Colors

Honestly, I find the large setting slightly annoying to look at. I’m going to revert back to Photoshop’s default settings. They are Grid Size: Medium and Grid Colors: Light. I think those settings will work best for this project. Let’s take a look.

Default Grid Size & Colors

As I mentioned above, customizing your transparency grid checkerboard is really easy. It can be done in a matter of seconds, once you get used to it. It’s helpful to become familiar with this option because there may be occasions when you need to distinguish between the background and your layer.

——

If you’ve enjoyed today’s post and found it helpful, please share it with a friend. Also, if you’d like to continue learning and would like our posts sent directly to your email inbox, simply sign up for our newsletter. We’ll send each and every post directly to you. Thanks!

Filed Under: Design Tagged With: Photoshop

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