Photoshop House of Cards

Photoshop Tips and News - at Roberts Photo News

2011-10-27T23:07:00.000-04:00

If you're interested in getting related photography news along with your Photoshop tips,
RobertsPhotoNews.com is a great resource.

Included in the monthly newsletter are:

Photoshop Tips
Inspiring Stories
Book Reviews
Product Reviews
A Top 10 Tips Column
and more!

Here's a copy of the intro video

Create Custom CD DVD Case Template

2011-08-27T14:37:00.000-04:00

Create Custom CD or DVD Cases Fast!

We all have collections of CD's or DVD's
getting tossed around without their case right?

Next thing we have to throw them out
because they're too scratched to use.

Or, with the holidays coming, maybe we want
to create our own photo CD to give as a gift?

Here's a cheap, easy way to create your own
custom CD or DVD holders using Photoshop!

Use my template.

http://tinyurl.com/4cdcase

Using the link, just download
the Photoshop template and replace my artwork
with yours.

Use your inkjet printer to print on 8.5 x 11
standard paper, cover stock, or index.

Cut, fold and you're done!

Might just save a CD or make a great gift.
Or promotional product idea. Create custom cases
or designs for local business. Who knows!

Enjoy!

Chinese Photographer Bungles Photoshop Paste

2011-07-01T11:17:00.001-04:00

Photoshop Paste Problem?

There's a right way to do Photoshop. And then, there are so many wrong ways to do Photoshop.

This photo represents a huge gaff for the Chinese photographer blamed for its creation. Apparently the photographer thought he could improve his original two shots by bring all three government road officials into one scene.

Unfortunately, he forgot that in order to effectively and seamlessly paste someone or something into a new scene you must physically connect them in some way.

Typically, we'll use a shadow of their body, or at least some darkening of the surroundings near their feet.

If we are going to sit them on something, or have them lying down we'll need to be sure to add both shadows or darkening AND some appropriate scrunching of their clothes at the contact points.

The key element to "Cut and Paste" Photoshop is that when complete you should not be able to tell. That means considering the quantity and quality of light between the two original photographs, as well as matching the direction of the light, and as we see here, grounding your subject into the new scene with shadows.

A tough public lesson to learn for this Chinese photographer, but hopefully, knowing these key points will keep you from ultimate embarrassment later on.

You can view the full story by Laura Rozen | The Envoy – Thu, Jun 30, 2011

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/envoy/fake-photo-fallout-chinese-officials-embrace-social-media-171223649.html

SOLVING THE PHOTOSHOP PUZZLE

2011-03-28T09:40:00.004-04:00

Sometimes, we know something is missing, but we just don't know what.

Photoshop is good at hiding stuff. Consider how many toolbar options there are. Consider how many sub-menu options are under each one of those. And how many drop-down box choices are even still under those. It's staggering!

But it gets worse.

Beyond what's on your desktop program, ready to use, Photoshop keeps a vast amount of options stored on your hard drive, (usually your C -drive) but not loaded onto your desktop version for immediate use. It stores all kinds of additional brushes, actions, filters etc. for use only when you need (and load them manually) into your current program.

The PUZZLE FILTER is a good example. You already have the capability to create a puzzle, but you probably never knew it. That's because it's one of those hidden (on your C-drive) files that you have to call up when you want it.

To create a puzzle from any photo, load your photo into Photoshop in the usual manner, then create a duplicate layer and name that layer PUZZLE.

Next, go to the FILTER menu and choose TEXTURE
Under that, choose TEXTURIZER

You'll now see a little drop-down box. Click the arrow and then click on LOAD TEXTURE
If it's your first time, you'll have to tell Photoshop where to find the file. Go to COMPUTER - C-Drive - PROGRAM FILES (or PROGRAM FILES (x86) and find PROGRAMS - ADOBE - PHOTOSHOP

Double click on the PHOTOSHOP file folder and look for a folder called PRESETS
Open that folder and look for PUZZLE.

Select the PUZZLE folder and click the button at the bottom marked LOAD

[You'll only have to go through this long procedure once.
Next time, you'll only need to click LOAD TEXTURE.]

Now, you'll see the dialog box you want to create your puzzle.
SCALE lets you determine HOW BIG the pieces are
RELIEF set the depth (or shadow darkness) of the piece edges
(You can also change the light direction and have an option to INVERT your choice)

That's it.

If you want to get fancy with a 3-D effect like the photo shown above. Create a new layer under your puzzle layer, and give that a cardboard color and a bit of texture or pattern to look realistic.

Then, go to your puzzle layer and cut out one or more pieces. You can use the pen tool for most accurate results, but I find the MAGNETIC LASSO tool works just fine for most things, if you remember to click often to set your points.

Once you have the selection complete, go to LAYER - NEW LAYER via CUT to remove this piece. Use the move tool to give it a new location and then give it some shadow to separate it from the photo for that 3-D effect.

==========================================

While this tip is not included in the Original Photoshop Recipe Book, you will find hundreds of other great Photoshop tips for users of all versions in my "PHOTOSHOP RECIPE CARDS" book.

Why "LEARN" Photoshop...

just follow the recipes for great photos every time!

See why everyone's lovin' these

RECIPE CARD shortcuts...

Get your book today at: http://photoshoptipcards.com

===========================================

Creative Photography Tricks Revealed

2011-01-22T12:55:00.000-05:00


from CreativePhotographyTricks.com

Creative photography can add a whole new dimension and enjoyment to your photography.

It can turn so-so photos into stunning works of art. It can create interest in your work through online communities and in your own local community.

If you’ve lost interest in your hobby, or are struggling to come up with new projects that excite you, or you just want photography to be more fun, you owe it to yourself to explore the possibilities of adding a few creative photography tricks to your repertoire.

Nothing beats the feeling you get when the “oohs and ahhs” start coming as folks look at your creative photos. It has been said that we humans need praise and attention for good mental health as much as we need vitamins and minerals for good physical health.
Learning just a few new creative photography tricks is a great way to get your RDA of attention and praise.

It’s literally just a click away!

I’ve just opened a website that’s makes it fun and easy for you to get started in creative photography. In no time at all, you’ll be creating super cool photos to amaze and confound your friends. You’ll be their hero and leave them drooling in awe, bug-eyed at your new found skills!

Maybe you'll make a bit more cash with your new creativity too!

Best of all, it really helps us expand our Photoshop skills as we learn and play with these creative photography tricks.

Here’s a link to the new website…click on over and have a look!

http://creativephotographytricks.com

Text... Your Way!

2010-12-15T08:48:00.000-05:00

Text...options beyond the Photoshop menu.

Many times you'd like to have your text in bold, or italics, but the options aren't offered in the Photoshop selection dropdowns. If you accept these limitations, you'll be forced to compromise.

But it doesn't have to be this way! You can have it YOUR WAY!

In the case of italics, you simply type your text, then right click on the text layer in your layers palette and select RASTERIZE LAYER. That will change your "text" into a "shape". (Be sure your spelling is correct because after you rasterize you can no longer change the individual letters or font without starting over).

Once your layer has been RASTERIZED (turned into a Photoshop shape) you can then use EDIT>FREE TRANSFORM to slant your text into italics. Hold down the Ctrl key as you drag your top corners to the right and you can achieve any degree of italic slant.

BOLD text can be achieved by simply making a copy of your text layer and changing the BLEND MODE on your new (top) text layer to MULTIPLY. And/Or, you can use the same method we used for italics, RASTERIZE to create a shape layer and then use TRANSFORM to make it just a bit larger too.

Photoshop gives us a lot of great gifts to work with, but it's nice to know we can still exchange them for what we really want. Options...who among us would not like more?

Robert Schwarztrauber

http://photoshoptipcards.com

Reminder...Only a few days left to get your "Photoshop Recipe Card" book in the FREE Holiday Gift Box. Order by this Sunday (Dec. 19) to insure delivery by Christmas.

3 Quick and Useful Photoshop Tips

2010-12-11T01:25:00.000-05:00

Everybody's busy at the holidays (including me!)
so here's just 3 quick tips that will speed you
on your Photoshop way - so you can get back out
there and finish your shopping!

1…Make a New Document from a Layer
To create a brand new picture from any layer,

go into the Layers palette and choose Duplicate Layer.

Then, change the document setting to "New”, say OK,

and begin working fresh on a new picture file from there.

2…Layers Palette or Tool Bar Getting in the way?

Press “Tab” to make them magically disappear.

Press "Tab" again and they’ll come back.

3…How’s the view?

Expand your viewing and work options by pressing the letter ‘F’

to toggle through your view options up to full screen.

That's it!

Go on now. There's is no more. Oh, wait. There is one more thing...

Until next time...remember to really take time to enjoy the holiday season because, as the late Andy Rooney used to say, "Life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer it gets to the end, the faster it goes."

We all could use just a little more time.

Robert Schwarztrauber

http://photoshoptipcards.com

Photoshop Creative Art with Filters

2010-12-02T08:16:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, the best way to learn is to play!

The video above offers a fun way to use Photoshop Filters to create your own stunning art collection.

Photoshop is more than just a photo fixer. It's a powerful creator too!

Best of all, you'll be learning all sorts of useful Photoshop tips, tricks and techniques using layers, masks and blend modes while you're having fun!

No worries here mate! You can't ruin your photo because it's 100% Photoshop generated. And Photoshop does all the work with your artistic guidance!

Have a peek at the video. Then, for more inspiration, you can view additional samples on my web gallery at: http://robertschwarztrauber.weebly.com/photoshop-creative-art.html

Have fun while you learn and play with Photoshop Filters!

Robert Schwarztrauber

Then...be sure to order your Photoshop Recipe Card book today!
Now, shipped in their very own gift box thru December 25th.
Makes a great gift for less than 20 bucks!
http://photoshoptipcards.com

Happy Thanksgiving!

2010-11-25T00:54:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving
one and all!

Luckily, I was able to convince this fowl creature to give me his camera, before he smartly turned and swam off to safety. Far better to have the photo, than to talk about the one that got away.

While I'm certainly thankful for the coming of digital photography, and for the creative expression Photoshop provides, I am most thankful for the community of fellow artists and enthusiasts who allow me to share my passion with them. Thank you for your readership and contributions.

And I am thankful for all the many talented artists who share their work across the internet to inspire, to teach, and often just to amuse us with the products of their photographic and editorial skills.

So, to thank you for stopping by on this day of celebration, I will share with you not a tip, but a bit of artistic inspiration and amusement. I hope you'll enjoy the work these talented artists have created with the technology at hand, but mostly with the greatest gift that they got for free...their creative minds.

Here is a link to their work. Enjoy!

http://www.thephotoargus.com/inspiration/42-magnificent-photo-manipulation-examples-that-will-inspire-you/

Actions...Consistant, Time-Saving Results

2010-11-15T09:13:00.000-05:00

Everyone laughed at Bill Gates. Crazy they thought. A computer in everyone's home? What for? All they do is multiply and subtract numbers at lightening speed.

But nobody's laughing at Bill now! Bill realized how much more potential computers really had. Now, in addition to being our favorite creative tool, they are also the worlds favorite communications device.

But still, at it's core, the computer is great for performing acts of repetition. And sometimes we need that in Photoshop.

Whether we want to process a folder of 100's of photos or just repeat a special effects process that someone else created, we can do that with Photoshop Actions. At the push of a button!

Enjoy this introduction to Photoshop Actions in the video below.

Lightening Fast Word Graphics

2010-11-15T08:44:00.000-05:00

In the previous post, I promised to tell you how to create word graphics for Photoshop with lightening speed. It's a great tip I picked up from legendary Photoshop guru Matt Kloskowski, of NAPP fame.

Hope you enjoyed that shortcut. But the fun doesn't have to end there! Get really creative by playing with the blend modes. Add shadows, bevels, and highlights. Create a clipping path, add a filter, distort with free transform.

As the holiday season approaches, I'm reminded that it is so much fun to give. That's why I give these tips!

And...that's why giving your favorite photographer a gift-boxed copy of the nationally popular "Photoshop Recipe Cards" is one of the most affordable photography gifts you can give this year.

Check out the new holiday gift offer over at:
http://photoshoptipcards.com

10 Most Common Workflow Elements

2010-11-09T10:44:00.000-05:00

Whenever I'm asked to teach someone Photoshop, I always start with the work flow techniques I find most useful. After all, learning how to seamlessly apply the LIQUIFY tool will hardly be a good use of time if the most basic elements of your photo are out of whack.

So, here in this post I'll tell you my Top 10 Most Used, most essential techniques for creating great images. These are 10 common elements that I use 100% of the time when I edit an image in Photoshop - and why. In just a general order of importance:

1. LEVELS - under LAYERS - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - LEVELS

To set the overall photo exposure (lightness or darkness). Use the histogram image to drag the light (rt slider mark) or dark (left slider mark) in to just touch the edge of your histogram image. If you go beyond the touch you will be clipping pixel from your image. Sometimes that's OK, just a word of caution.

2. CURVES - under LAYERS - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - CURVES

This allows me to add just a bit of contrast to create a more intense image. I've covered this elsewhere on the blog so I just restate that it basically puts just a slight "S" curve to the diagonal line. Also, I'll use CURVES to adjust the white balance if needed. Just click the white eyedropper and then sample somewhere on your photo that is supposed to be white. Zoom in if needed. The white of someones eyes are often good reference points (but not if it's you're buddy who was out drinking all night!)

3. CLONE STAMP - in the tool palette by your eraser and paintbrush. Hardly ever get an image without some spot, pimple, reflection, shadow, ghost, or intrusion that doesn't need to be covered up.

4. Ctrl-J The ultimate layer duplication shortcut. What more can I say?

5. FILTER - OTHER - HIGH PASS, my preferred sharpening method. Use Ctrl-J to duplicate the layer you wish to sharpen. Once in, slide the marker to the left until most of the color is gone (usually pretty low on the scale, <10.) Click OK. Change the blend mode on this layer to OVERLAY. Adjust the blend mode opacity to less that 100% if it looks too sharp. Use Ctrl-E to merge this new layer down over your original and you're done.

6. MASK - the layer mask (icon that looks like a rectangle with a white circle in it) when added to a layer let's you selectively paint in or out the parts of that layer that you do not want seen. Painting with the BLACK brush will hide (or MASK) anything on that layer. 100% opacity will mask completely. Use less that 100% to fade the hiding or blend to the surroundings. But it's reversible! If you want to change what you did with black, paint it back using white!

7. RECTANGULAR MARQUEE - it's the crop before the crop. Use the rectangular marquee to copy portions of your image to a new layer for further editing. Until you figure out just how much of the photo to keep, the rectangular marquee gives you time to play with your image a bit and still undo your changes. Once you use crop, all the surrounding area of your photo, down through all the layers is gone.

8. Ctrl - New Layer Icon - this puts a new layer BELOW the one currently active. Photoshop will put your new layer always directly above the one currently active unless you give it a modifying command like Ctrl. I use this mostly for background coloring, isolating layers, previews, or creating frames or borders.

9. Ctrl - Alt - Shift - E - this command will merge all the visible layers together into one, like FLATTEN, but with one critical distinction...all the previous layers remain in their original state. Flatten is a true merge, all of your layers will be combined into one layer which means you will lose the ability o go back and make changes if you don't like the way they blended. However, Ctrl-Alt-Shift-E will create the composite just like FLATTEN, but will do so without actually removing all the layers. It's like a great reversible PREVIEW of flatten, before the actual flatten. To use: Create a new blank layer at the top of the layers stack, then press together Ctrl-Alt-Shift-E.

10. CROP - almost everybody needs more Crop. The great photographer Robert Capa once said, "If your photographs aren't good enough, you're not close enough." Well, if at the Photoshop editing stage, there isn't anything we can do to physically get closer to our subject, but we can simulate the effect of closeness by zooming in. Compose your photo using the Rule of Thirds and the CROP tool to get rid of any elements that distract from the story your photo was supposed to tell.

That was a long post, but hopefully helpful.

At the risk of running on, I would be remiss if I didn't tell you that from now (11/9/2010) until December 24th the beloved PHOTOSHOP RECIPE CARD books will be shipped in their very own FREE GIFT BOX!

So whether you order for yourself, or for that special shutterbug on your Christmas List, these cards will make a wonderful holiday gift. Just click on the link here > PHOTOSHOP RECIPE CARDS< or the RECIPE CARD ad at the top right.

In my next post, I'll show you how I created that crazy word graphic above in less than 30 seconds!

Robert Schwarztrauber

2010-10-23T00:39:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I promised if you stayed tuned I'd have a great Photoshop deal for you.

Shane Goldberg, an expert Photoshop teacher,
sent me an email the other day I knew I'd
have to share with everyone.

Rather than drone on, he's given me permission
to share that email with my readers here...
================================
Hi Bob,

I need your help.

I've got 600 Photoshop Elements Training DVD's in my garage.
I HAVE to get rid of them (for a number of reasons) NOW!!!

They were selling for $89.95 but they're getting older now
and there's new versions of Elements out now etc.

Anyway, here's the link it's directly to Paypal.
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=MWEBZDCDCEQF6

I want you to have one even if you don't own Elements as
there are 85+ video tutorials on there, practice images
and the DVD is a GREAT Christmas present! (it's shrink wrapped
and professionally produced)

So for $10 that will cover my shipping and you get yourself
a killer DVD for yourself or someone special ;)
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=MWEBZDCDCEQF6

Have a great day, Hope you can help me out!

Thanks heaps,
Shane
PhotoshopZoo.com

p.s. You can order as many as you want, i've got stacks of them!

p.p.s if you have any questions let me know shane@photoshopzoo.com
=======================================================
He says...

This DVD includes...

85+ Awesome Video tutorials on everything from:

    * Organizing & Tagging your photos
    * The Tool palette (all about the tools!)
    * Tips, Tricks & more cool stuff
    * Color - Hue & Saturation (color adjustments)! Very cool
    * Layers, Layer Masks etc.
    * Digital Photo Editing
    * Cool Effects in Elements
    * and Productivity Techniques....

That's it over 6 hours of awesome video tutorials
=============================================

Looks like a great deal to me!
I got mine without hesitation.

For $10...how could you go wrong?
You'd have to learn something right?

Just to be upfront, there's nothing in this deal for me.
I have no ties to Shane, monetarily or otherwise, beyond
my respect for his work. I just thought it was a deal
that was too good for any Photoshop student (and aren't
we all really?) to pass up.

But, he's movin' them out before his wife does
it for him. So this offer won't last long.

Stretch your ten dollars and get this DVD.
Here's the link once more:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=MWEBZDCDCEQF6

by Robert Schwarztrauber

Stretching for Elements Users

2010-10-21T19:38:00.000-04:00

Stay tuned...

I'm planning something big for my oft neglected Elements users.
If all goes well you'll be very happy with me by the end of this week.

If all doesn't go well, at least you'll know I tried.
I'm thinking about you.

============================================
While you're waiting, I hope (if you haven't already)
you'll take a couple minutes to help me with
my research project on the effects of Photography
on those who do it.

It's a simple 10 question, multiple choice survey.
It's completely anonymous.
No names. No emails. No offers.
Pure and simple research. 10 questions.
And unlike school, no one fails.

Why not take a minute (while you're waiting)
to give me your take on Photography?

Here's the link:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BMG3WNP
===========================================

Thanks and Stay tuned!

Control Your Photoshop

2010-10-15T11:29:00.000-04:00

I still remember the joy I felt
when I realized that I finally "got it".

After months of frustration,
opening then just as suddenly
closing Photoshop, in a huff
because I couldn't figure out
how to make it work,
the day finally came when
I could edit a photo.
Poorly at first. But my
learning curve rose sharply
from there.

Control had shifted. Now I was in control!

And so today I bring you some of my favorite
CONTROL keyboard shortcuts
to help you tame the Photoshop beast.

And, I'll show you where to get a PDF list of
all the Photoshop keyboard shortcut commands
for your system.

And, If you haven't yet contributed to my
research study on what photography means
to you, I'll give you that link again. It will help
me tailor my messages and tips to your desires.

So first, here are my favorite "Control Freak"
keyboard shortcuts...

Ctrl-J Duplicate the current layer
Ctrl-E Merge your current layer to the one
          directly below (merge down)
Ctrl-H Stop those "ants" from marching
    Repeat to make them start again
Ctrl-Z Undo your last command
Ctrl + Zoom in
Ctr l-   Zoom out
Ctrl- Left mouse click on Layer Thumbnail
   (creates a selection of the entire layer
with marching ants and everything!)
Ctrl- Click on create New Layer icon to
   put your new layer BELOW the current one
Ctrl-Alt-Shift-E Create a new layer then use this to
                          Merge all active layers together
                          (it's like flatten all layers but the individual
                           layers are preserved so you can still
                           go back and make changes if you wish.)

Well, that should help you take control and gain some speed
in your editing.

======================================

I hope you can help me in my research, The results
have been very interesting so far. It's just 10 simple
multiple choice questions in an anonymous online survey
hosted by SurveyMonkey. I'll be sharing my findings
here in a later post so make your thoughts known!
Here's the link, it will just take you a minute
and help me a lot...

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BMG3WNP
====================================

Finally, If you want a complete PDF of all the
keyboard shortcuts for:

* Adobe Photoshop CS4
    * Adobe Photoshop CS3
    * Adobe Photoshop CS2
    * Adobe Photoshop CS
    * Adobe Photoshop 7
    * Adobe Photoshop 6
    * Adobe Photoshop 5
    * Adobe Bridge & Adobe Camera Raw

Go Here:
http://morris-photographics.com/photoshop/shortcuts/index.html

That's it for today!
I hope you took time to complete the survey above.

Look 10 Years Younger...in Less than 30 Seconds!

2010-09-19T11:25:00.000-04:00

Babies know the secret to looking young...it's softer skin!

In today's quick tip I'll give you the fastest way to turn back the hands of time on those of us who no longer wearing our original birthday suits. The fastest Photoshop way, that is.

Here's a tip ripped straight from the pages of "The Original Photoshop Recipe Book" Page 41 to be exact.

Skin Soften with High Pass Filter

Step 1: Duplicate your background layer
Step 2: Change the new layer's BLEND mode to OVERLAY
Step 3: Go to FILTER > OTHER > HIGH PASS
Step 4: Set the pixel value to 9.5 and click OK
Step 5: Press CTRL-I to invert the layer (photo will get blurry)
Step 6: Begin reducing the layer OPACITY until a nice skin smoothness
is obtained.
Step 7: Add a layer mask and paint with a soft brush (color:black)
over features that should be sharper (like eyes, inner lips, teeth, hair, etc)

In less than 30 seconds you can remove years from the faces of those you love. (or those you are trying to sell portraits to!)

BONUS: This will also help to diminish the appearance of stray hairs across the face, acne blemishes, scars and blotchy skin! A 30 second cosmetic surgery!

Be sure to sign up for my Photoshop Tip Group using the form in the right-hand column. That way you'll never miss out on the ONE tip that might have saved your project!

Also, be sure to join us on my new Facebook Group. It's called "Photoshop Friends". Just type that into your Facebook search (without the quote marks) to find us. Share your favorite photos with us!

Also, if you like this post and want to see more like it, be sure to click the [f] in the toolbar below to "Like" this on FACEBOOK. Thanks!

FONT SHAPES SAVE TIME

2010-08-16T10:53:00.002-04:00

I'd often wondered what the use was for those shape fonts.

Arial, Times Roman, even Helvetica and Courier I understood. I could read those letters.

But Webdings and Wingdings? To me they were just shapes and nonsense.

Until I learned the secret!

They are shortcuts to drawing shapes by hand.

Need a square box? Webdings "C"
Need a cube? Wingdings "Q"

Works especially well if you need multiple repeating shapes in a straight line...ooh! So easy!

Think of the patterns or backgrounds you could create.

Here in this photo I used the Yin-Yang symbol to disguise the out-of-this-world critter. Can you guess what is is?
(Hint: It's actually facing up, not down!) Leave a comment so folks see how smart you are!

So next time you're looking to add some creative design elements, think crazy fonts for a BIG time savings.

Added benefit is you have two ways to change the size. Use the FONT size in the toolbar. Or for more versatility as an actual SHAPE design, right click on your TEXT layer and choose RASTERIZE. That will turn your text into an actual shape where you can use EDIT>TRANSFORM or FREE TRANSFORM. However, remember that once you rasterize you cannot go back to edit the character as TEXT.

For future reference, I'd suggest creating a sample page where you select each font and go across the keyboard from top to bottom, left to right. Then, when you need a shape you just look at your template and select.

Here's one page I created as example:

Have fun with it. It's a great shortcut when you don't want to draw free-hand or use PATHS to draw your common shapes.

Everyone is welcomed to share these tips freely as long as they are copied in whole included and credited to me, Robert Schwarztrauber and ideally with the link back to http://photoshophouseofcards.blogspot.com

Or use the convenient sharing links below.

The Greatest Photoshop Tool

2010-07-21T10:43:00.000-04:00

The greatest Photoshop tool can't be found on any toolbar or menu.

It's seldom talked about in any manual, tutorial, or DVD.

However, when used well, it can completely transform and elevate your photos. And draw favorable attention and applause from those who view your work. Happily, this tool doesn't even require that you have any great Photoshop skills to use it.

That one extraordinary tool is your imagination.

Consider the sample photo above which contains only three simple elements:

1. A colorful photo of a woman (marching in a parade)
2. A photo of my arm holding a paint brush
3. A color-filled rectangle (with a portion erased)

Essentially it's two cutouts and a drawn colored box. Two techniques easy to master with any assortment or combination of tools in Photoshop.

And once I have the cutouts I can re-use them in any number of different scenes. Even create a series of prints.

Sure you say, imagination is great. But I'm just not very creative.
I can never think of what to make.

Fortunately, there is a way to boost your powers of imagination.
It's EASY and it's FUN!

One of the simplest ways is improve your imagination, your thinking, your ideas about what's possible is to surf the net. There are hundreds, thousands of websites you can go to to see what others are doing. To get ideas.

My favorite happens to be Flickr.com because of it's variety. Surf around, join some groups once you hone in on a style that interests you.That's how I got hooked on OOB's (out-of-bounds). Essentially photos within photos that take on a 3-D look.

Next time you're feeling creative, but lacking in ideas to get started, look around. Fire up your imagination by surfing around a while. Or go the museum and get a feel for the composition and colors used by the masters.

Not to create a poor copy of someone else's work, but to stimulate the almighty power of your brain.

Then dice up some old photos that aren't good as a whole and use those pieces to create yor own Photoshop masterpiece.

The mind. It's a terrible thing to waste.

And one of your greatest Photoshop tools.

NOTE: While you have to build your own imagination, I can help you build all your other Photoshop skills with the new, PHOTOSHOP RECIPE CARDS. It's one of the best, and most inexpensive resources available for putting the full power of Photoshop at your fingertips.

With PHOTOSHOP RECIPE CARDS you don't have to learn Photohop, you just DO IT!

If you'd like to get more information, just click the link below:
http://photoshoptipcards.vpweb.com/New--Photoshop-Recipe-Cards.html

Sponge for Pop

2010-07-16T12:23:00.000-04:00

First off, I want to thank everyone who helped make the new
Photoshop Recipe Cards sell out it's first printing!

The instant success of the new book lets me know I'm on the right
track to giving you the tips and tricks you need to succeed with
Photoshop. In a format that works best for YOU.

Today I want to show you a very simple trick for adding that
extra bit of "POP" to the eyes.

First, as always, duplicate your layer. That way, if it gets messed up
you can always just delete that layer and start over without having
destroyed your original work.

Right click on the dodge tool (looks like a little push pin under the paint bucket).

Choose the SPONGE tool.

In the options toolbar, set the MODE to SATURATE.
Then, set the FLOW to around 50%

Select a round, soft-edge brush just slightly smaller than the iris of the eye. (Best to zoom in on the eye for most accurate work.)

Click on the eye and you'll see an immediate improvement.
The results are cumulative, so if you don't see enough change just click on it again. If that's too much, you can always go to the EDIT menu and choose FADE.

Often, what I'll do is click once with the brush, then reduce the size by about half, and then click again. Gives it kind of a gradient change.

Remember, like the dodge and the burn tools, the SPONGE changes are permanent and can't be undone. (only faded immediately after the tool is used). That's why it is best to always use on a separate layer, then you can delete and start over if you like or play around with the opacity and blend modes to get the results you like.

The sponge tool is not just for eyes. Works for lips too. Or anything you want to add a little "POP" to.

Conversely, you could set the MODE to DESATURATE and reduce the distraction for a color that might be too bold in your scene.

Try a little SPONGE to add "POP" on your next photo.

(You can click on the sample photo above for a better look).

NOTE: The second printing of the Photoshop Recipe Books has arrived.
If you missed out because I underestimated the intial demand, you can still get your copy now at : http://photoshoptipcards.vpweb.com/New--Photoshop-Recipe-Cards.html

Robert Schwarztrauber

Know Shadows

2010-06-17T10:40:00.000-04:00

Shadows.

Like so many things in Photoshop there
are numerous ways to create a shadow
effect.

Previous I had discussed duplicating the object, desaturating, blurring and putting on a layer under your subject. Then adjusting with the move tool.

That method works great.

But sometimes you just want a quick and easy little touch of shadow.

And that's where the oft forgotten "BEHIND" brush mode comes in.

Most often we use the brush tool in its default mode of NORMAL.

But right next to your brush tool selection box is the MODE selection drop-down box. In there you will find the option of BEHIND which will let you paint behind something. Perfect for shadows. BEHIND mode lets you paint but the paint will only show where there are no opaque pixels.

If you already have a transparent background you're all set. Just go ahead and use the brush to paint in your shadow. Set the brush to a very soft edge and an opacity of about 30%. I used a soft square brush for the example above.

Sometimes, as was the case with this example, you need to first move your shadow subject onto its own transparent layer. Then you can go ahead and paint in your shadow. If you were to try to paint on the original that has a white background (completely opaque) when you try to brush you will see nothing happening. Remember, in BEHIND mode the brush will only paint where the area is transparent. It will not paint over opaque (in this case white) pixels.

It's not for every case. But sometimes you just need a quick shadow technique. Maybe you can think of other uses for this cool, paint behind technique?_

Be sure to click on the example above for setting and layer details.

Photoshop World

2010-06-17T01:09:00.002-04:00

Need a planet...fast?

Or a tie dyed shirt?

Quick background?

Here's the fastest way
to get everything you need
with just a few clicks.

First, on your color pallet, select two contrasting colors.

Here I used a light and dark blue for the rear. A light and dark red-ish color for the front orb.

Once you have those, open a new layer and use:
FILTER > RENDER > CLOUDS

If you needed a quick background you can stop here. You have it.

If you needed an overlay for some clothing or perhaps a little sky character, you can stop here too. It's just that fast!

If you wanted a planet, there's one more step.

Go to FILTER > RENDER > LIGHTING EFFECTS
Use the settings below as a guide, but you can play with them until it looks best for you.

(Click the settings pictured above to enlarge if needed)

That's it. We're done.

In those few simple steps you have created your own
Photoshop World.

Great New Photoshop Tips!

2010-05-29T10:44:00.000-04:00

Well I apologize for not getting more great Photoshop Tips posted lately. But just because I didn't post, doesn't mean I wasn't thinking about you!

Truth is, so many of you who bought the Original Photoshop Tip Cards wrote in with suggestions on how they could be even better, I've spent the last month putting all your great suggestions to use. While y'all loved the tips, most of the changes you wanted centered around keeping the cards organized and easy to find when you needed them. While index cards have been in use for over 100 years, sometimes their "looseness" creates problems.

Great News!

Soon, you'll be hearing about the new, improved version of The Original Photoshop Tip Cards.

This new, improved format features 20% more material. It's jam-packed with easy to use new Photoshop tips to make creating stunning images faster and easier than ever.

Plus all your tips will stay in order in the new Plastic Comb Binder.

This new binding sytems along with a new table of contents assures you'll always find the exact tip you need when you need it. The comb binding also lets your cards lie perfectly flat while you work. Larger fonts let you easily read as you work. And, the flexible comb binding will let you add additional pages easily as they become available.

I'm just waiting on the printer now. If you're interested in getting your hands on this book, be sure to sign up at the right if you're not a member already. Joining is free and members are always the first to get the latest tips, updates, news and private special offers. So sign up today!

Stay tuned!

Replicate Layer Styles with Ease

2010-03-05T22:50:00.000-05:00

Today's quick tip can make your Photoshop work faster and easier.

If you've ever spent tedious, meticulous time getting a particular layer style just right, and then wanted to replicate that same style on another layer, this tip is for you.

Instead of trying to redo each setting (ie. drop shadow, bevel and emboss, contour levels, etc) simply hold down the "ALT" key and drag your effects to the new layer and drop'm.

All of the settings will be applied to your new layer just as they were on the original layer.

Now that's quick and easy!

My kind of Photoshop!

by Robert Schwarztrauber

Photoshop Conversion to Black and White

2010-02-17T00:18:00.001-05:00

The great thing about Photoshop is there are almost always several ways to accomplish the same result.

The bad thing about Photoshop is we often get confused with all the different ways there are to accomplish the same result.

One technique that often makes good pictures better is turning your digital colored photos into Black & White images.

"Why do that," you ask?

Sometimes, the many different colors or patterns in a photo distract from the overall appearance. Or, sometimes you want to feature only one particular aspect of a scene - and that can be done with selective color. That's accomplished when you turn the original image to black & white and then allow only your chosen feature(s) to be in color.

Here is a reminder of the most popular ways to turn a colored image to black & white:

Image - Adjustments - Desaturate

Image - Adjustments - Gradient Map (preferred for preserving details) be sure palette set to default B/W

Image - Mode - Grayscale

Image - Adjustments - Threshold (absolute black or white, no grayscale here)

Layer - New Adjustment Layer - Hue/Saturation (move saturation slider max. left) good for selective color by later using layer mask to bring areas back to color

and for the more artistic look...

Filter - Sketch - Chrome

Filter - Sketch - Conte Crayon

Filter - Sketch - Graphic Pen

Filter - Sketch - Halftone Pattern

So next time you've feel the need to go Black and White, plan a few extra moments to try out something new.

From Mess to Marvelous!

2010-01-12T08:58:00.002-05:00

Click the Pic for a Bigger, Better Look!

Michelangelo, the famous Italian sculptor said, “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.”

Perhaps as modern photographers we could find a similar expression in, "I saw the angel in the digital image file and Photoshop'd until I set her free." Not nearly as poetic as Michelangelo, but I think appropriate.

Here's just one more, I promise that will be all the culture for today...He also said, “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.”

I think this is true of our photographs too. Using Photoshop as our chisel, we should be able to manipulate and form just about every image into something of beauty. After all, we must have seen something of beauty in the photo or else why would we have taken it in the first place? Just because we couldn't fully capture the maximum beauty with our camera and lights, doesn't mean the beauty's not there. We just need to work it a bit with our Photoshop tools.

With enough cropping, creative use of filter, brush, and adjustment layers we should be able to release the beauty.

I've attached a recent example that shows this. On the left above, is the mess I started with. I began shooting with only a vague concept of what I wanted. Actually, the theme was something blue. Blue umbrella, blue towel, blue eyes on the top center model.

After about 25 -30 shots of different poses and lighting, I really wasn't "feeling it" so I quit shooting for the night.

I opened the photos to preview and chose this one to Photoshop and began work to "reveal" the beauty trapped within.

Here are the steps and tools I used to go from mess to marvelous...

1. Heavy Gaussian Blur to hide the table and white backgrounds, layer mask to un-blur the face and umbrella.
Not enough, so I went to....
2. Filter - Render - Lighting Effects - Omni to center light on the top model and blacken out surroundings.
Good, but the skin tone of the mannequin is too flat, needs texture
3. Filter - Distort - Ocean Ripple, not bad, but needs more texture still
4. On a copy of the original layer, Filter - Distort - Glass, blend mode to overlay above the Ocean Ripple.
5. Looks good, but needs more intense colors, so on a copy of the Glass layer, Filter - Blur - Gaussian Blur, mid range, then change the blend mode to overlay so it doesn't blur - it just intensifies the color, and reduce to 50% opacity, to tone done the color just a bit.
6. Finally, a bit of playing around with different crops, and...
7. a 50% gray adjustment layer to selectively darken and lighten areas

There were probably 5-10 other good photos I left in that image. I could release them with different cropping and PS tools centered on other areas, but the umbrella, the glass filters that give it a wet look, and her "blue" expression all seemed to work together for this image.

So don't be too quick to give up on your images because they're not exactly what you had hoped for when you held the camera. You've got a lot of power tools in Photoshop. Much easier than a hammer and chisel.

Release the beauty within! Turn your mess into marvelous!

Blending Layers

2009-12-28T16:46:00.004-05:00

As the current year nears it's seamless blend with the next, it reminds me of a useful Photoshop tip. Imagine that.

Often times we'd like to superimpose an image over some object, shape or text. This can add lots of pizazz to an otherwise ordinary image. Text is always one item that benefits greatly from this technique.

So how do we do it?

It takes two to tango and it takes two layers for this technique. The image or photo you want to superimpose over the text should be on the higher layer with the text layer just below.

Once you have your two layers in place, hold down the Alt key and put your cursor on the line between the two layers on your layers palette. Your cursor will turn into two overlapping circles with an arrow. A simple Left click on the mouse completes the equation.

Works to superimpose over text or shape objects in their natural state. This technique will not work however, if those layers have been rasterized.

Here's hoping that as 2009 blends seamlessly into 2010, you will be adding yet another wonderful layer to your life.

Happy New Year!

Something Else You Can Do With Photoshop

2009-12-14T22:31:00.006-05:00

Photoshop is excellent for turning not-so-good photos into good ones, and for making good photos great.

And that's a great use of the software. But it can be used for so much more!

Business cards, promotional flyers, ads, greeting cards, or you can create, complete digital books for online viewing or purchase and/or hardcover printed books.

I invite you to take a look at what's possible when you begin to think creatively about your Photoshop skills.

Recently, I designed a children's book using only Photoshop. I used LEGO toy scenes which portrayed prosperity quotes from the masters.

Each scene was built using the colorful LEGO toy pieces. Once built to give visual representation and easier understanding for kids, the scenes were photographed and the actual text of the quotation was overlayed. One page from the book, which is especially appropriate for the holiday season, is shown here on this post .

There are over 105 inspirational, motivation, educational tips in all.

And though it's built as a children's book, parents read and learn as well! Special moments are created you're reading it together with your kids!

You can get more details about this book at:

http://helpbobhelpkids.com

But I digress!
No surprise there!

There are templates, far too numerous to mention, which can be very helpful in putting together the media you need, whether it be business cards, note pads, promotional flyers, ads, photo books, etc.

Vistaprint has many templates available for use, even if you only use them as templates for design. You don't have to buy your finished product there. I have used them many times and always find they produce and deliver as promised.

Previously I did 90% of my work in Microsoft Publisher and 10% in Photoshop. Now I'd say it has flipped to 90% in Photoshop and 10% in Publisher. And I loved Microsoft Publisher. Still do. But adding the photo element to your designs really makes them stand out.

Or should I say, outstanding!

So next time you need stationery of one kind or another, or just feel the urge to create something unique and wild, like a book...

Consider giving Photoshop the business!

Since it is the season of giving I offer two Photoshop Tips

1. Remember to fully explore the menu options.
~ Open all the brush palettes by clicking on that little, right pointing arrow at the top of the brushes box.
~ Explore all the different gradient choices the same way.

Just 10 minutes spent each time you open PS, exploring new menus, will give so much added dimension and interest to your work.

2. Here's one I used a ton while making the book...
Have you ever dragged an image from one photo to another, only to find that the dragged photo opened so, so big on your workspace? And then you wanted to used EDIT-TRANSFORM to shrink it down but it was SOOOO BIG you couldn't find the handles or guides to shrink it?

Here's the trick!
Anytime you have selected a function which involves moving your layer, you can use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-0 (that's "control-zero"). PS will automatically reduce the size of your images to allow you to find the handles.

That's it for today!

Happy Holidays to Everyone!

Robert Schwarztrauber

PS: The holiday stress can often bring us down.
If you find you need a bit of inspiration or motivation be sure to check
out my new book and the special promo which runs through Dec.24th.
Here's the link again: http://helpbobhelpkids.com

or you could visit my new blog for the book...

http://buildingblockbooks.blogspot.com/2009/12/get-building-blocks-of-prosperity-today.html

Until next time...Let's go Photoshop something!

Have a Happy and Safe Holiday Season!

Shortcuts Are Less Scary

2009-10-27T22:10:00.003-04:00

Photoshop can be a lot less scary to work with and a whole lot faster to use when you know a few simple shortcuts.

Here are some commonly used keyboard shortcuts that are frighteningly simple to apply:

Alt-Backspace: will fill any layer completely with the foreground color shown on the pallet

Ctrl-Backspace: will fill any layer completely with the background color shown on the pallet

Alt-Shift-Backspace: will fill any pixel area with the foreground color...great if you've just drawn a shape with the marquee tool or selected a figure with the lasso tool. Could be useful for creating shadows too!

Ctrl-Shift-Backspace: will fill any pixel area with the background color.

And how about two useful text tips...

1. Say you've just created a line of text, but it's not positioned where you want it. You don't need to go out to the Move Tool (arrow). Simply grab the mouse and move the cursor away from your text.
Then, left click and drag your text to wherever you like.

2. You've positioned the text where you want it, but now you don't like the color. No problem. Simply move your cursor to the beginning or end of your text line, left click the mouse and drag across your text to highlight it. Now you can go up to the toolbar and click on colors to alter the one shown on screen.

OK, that's not really big news. But if you found it frustrating that you couldn't SEE the new color you selected because of the highlighting, stay tuned! I have a nice keyboard shortcut for you that will save you time and aggravation.

Press, Ctrl-H to temporarily turn off the visual highlighter so you can SEE your true text color.

That's all for today. See, nothing to be afraid of.

When you have a guide to walk you down the creepy dark corridors of Photoshop, it can actually be kind of fun! Let Photoshop Tip Cards be your great BIG FLASHLIGHT, lighting your path through the scary maze that Photoshop can become.

3 Second Fix for Layers

2009-09-22T21:32:00.006-04:00

In the previous post I promised to give you a quick, 3 second fix for changing layers that you drag over to create a composite photo.

Take this photo...please! :)

This was composed of many separate base layers: the 1.dog, 2.the cat, 3.the bird, 4.the sunset over lake background, (one of Scott's, NewPhotoBiz backgrounds) 5.the waves, 6.transparent inner frame, 7.black inner mat...and more.

Getting all those layers to match in terms of color, lighting, texture, etc. can often be a hassle. But with this quick and easy way to adjust one layer, without effecting all the others, your work will be much simpler.

Like most things Photoshop, there are many, many paths one may take to reach the desired end result.

But here is my quick, 3 second fix for layers that that just don't fit. Fit well with the other layers that is.

Rather than do something destructive to the layers you drag in, one of the simplest ways to alter just one layer in your composite starts with duplicating the layer (shortcut, hold down "Ctrl" key plus the letter "J" or Ctrl-J)

Then, change the blend mode on your new, duplicated layer from "Normal" to say, "Overlay" or "Softlight" From there adjust the Opacity of that layer to lighten or darken your subject on just that layer. That's a really quick way to lighten or darken your dragged-in subject to match the surrounding scene -without effecting any of the other layers.

Of course you can also use any of the other layer adjustments too. Filters, lighting styles, blur, you name it.

When you've got it looking just right, you have two options. Leave it just as it is, on two layers.
Or, if you can stand commitment, merge the two layers together. Merge IS advised if you feel you are going to be moving things around. Otherwise, it may be hard to get the original layer and the duplicate lined up later. Certainly, if you don't want to commit and merge them together, you could LINK them together so they move in tandem.

Save Big Time with Cut-Outs

2009-09-20T21:40:00.008-04:00

Unfortunately, we can't always get our subjects and our scenes in the same place at the same time.

Thankfully, we have Photoshop to fix that problem!

Case in point, my daughter's husky puppy looks just adorable with this sleigh (from NewPhotoBiz 1.0). Sitting in, rather than pulling it!

Originally, the puppy was photographed outdoors, in the backyard. The background was green grass and bushes.

The challenge was to remove said dog from the green grass to create a clean image that could be transferred to this sleigh scene.

If you've ever tried to cut fur from grass cleanly I know you're going to love this tip. A tip I got from Scott Voelker, creator of the NewPhotoBiz 1.0 program.

(Click On Photo Above for a Better View of Details)

Here it is...use the background eraser tool. The key is to set the parameters. Here's what I use:

Protect Foreground Color...check the box, this allows the eraser tool to cut out (delete, erase) anything that is not the color you select. In this case, I would use the eyedropper to click on an area of white fur to set the foreground color (protection). Sometimes, depending on your lighting and subject, you'll need to keep changing the foreground color you're protecting as you move around your subject. Like here when I cut around her pink tongue, I had to reset my foreground color to match her tongue, rather than her white fur. Then, once past, I returned the foreground color to white to protect her fur.

Tolerance. I set mine here at 50%. This tells PS how close to your foreground color it must protect. Since the fur color does vary a bit in white colors, but is very different from the green grass I want to erase, 50% worked well. However, if you're trying to cut out say a girls green dress from green grass, you might want to work with (set) a little less tolerance, say only a 10% tolerance (or variation) so PS doesn't confuse the grass with the dress and accidentally erase the dress too. Test, use "undo" to go back if you find it's erasing more than you want it to.

Limits. This will depend a lot on what you're working on. For fine detailed cutting in a photo where the colors vary greatly as in this puppy example, FIND EDGES will likely work best. If you have a lot of solid colors, perhaps Contiguous (connected) of Discontiguous (separated) might be faster for you

Sampling. In cutting out hair (or fur) I find that setting it to ONCE works best. Set it to the hair color and work around your subject.

Once you have your parameters set, chose a brush that works best for your situation, I usually start with a feathered brush, and start mouse-clicking that brush around the edges of your subject. If you've done it right, like magic it erases everything from around your subject, yet leaves even the finest hairs and whiskers! You might have to go around again to catch any stubborn areas, or use one of those spikey brushes to get into awkward areas.

Coming Next...Ever drag a subject from one photo into another and then wish you could change something about that layer. Maybe it's too light, too dark, not sharp enough. But you don't want to damage it, or go back to your original to fix it then move it back over?

Quick 3 second fix...next post!

Free Tips, Free Cards, Free-For-All!

2009-09-07T10:55:00.008-04:00

Happy Labor Day!

I hope today finds you celebrating Labor Day by not doing much labor!

But instead, having FUN!

Today I want to help you do less work, Photoshop-wise, by giving you time-saving, work-saving tips.

Just a few short tips because I want time off too! And you don't want to spend all your time reading and trying to do difficult stuff today.

So here we go!

Text Tip #1... Normally when you click on the text icon (T), once you start typing a new layer is created. But if you're doing multiple text layers, often you start typing on an old layer where you didn't intend to.

Hold down the SHIFT key while you click on the T to guarantee you'll get a new text layer every time.

Text Tip #2... You often want to see several Font options before you select the one that's perfect for your project. The easiest way to do this is...

Type your text, highlight it, click in the FONT description box on the tool bar to highlight that, then just use the UP/DOWN arrow keys. As you scroll through it will automatically be changing your text.

Catchlights...Need a quick fix for giving life to those "dead" eyes that have no catchlight reflection? In the brush palette choose STAR 14 pixel. It actually looks like a slice of pie. Perfect for adding that sparkle to lifeless eyes.

Open a new layer, choose white for the color, size your brush then click to apply over the eye. Choose a layer blend mode that looks best, (overlay?) vary the opacity and viola! You've got eyes that dazzle!

OK, I promised to keep it short so you (and I) can go play.

But stay with me for this SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!

I know following this Labor Day, many folks will have no job to go back to tomorrow. Layoffs are at astronomical levels. Many folks are wishing they had someway to restore the income they once enjoyed, someway to take care of their families, protect their homes and their health.

If you are one of those people, I have great news! Since you're here I'm guessing you must be familiar with Photoshop. And that leads me to believe you have a camera.

The great news is you need just one more thing (it's not expensive) to create your own Photography Business!

You need Scott Voelker's NewPhotoBiz 1.0

It has everything you need, all the tips, tricks and secret shortcuts for creating a PROFITABLE photography business...this week! Best of all you can download it and get started TODAY!

But it gets even better! To help you along even more, when you click the links on this page to read more and then order NewPhotoBiz 1.0 I'll send you a FREE deck of Photoshop Tip Cards!

Yes...a FREE deck of Photoshop Tip Cards, 52 cards packed with the best and most popular Photoshop edits, tips, tricks and secret shorcuts. I want you to have every advantage as you claim your independence and begin to restore your finances. I want to help you grow your own business so you never again have to depend on some company or boss to toss you crumbs.

Labor for yourself now! Labor for your family! Labor at something that's FUN!

Create beautiful portraits of children and pets in your community. With Scott's program, you'll have everything you need. Including his secret weapon forum described in the previous post.

Remember, to get your FREE card deck, (a $19.95 savings) you must order NewPhotoBiz 1.0 by following the links from this page. That's the only way for me to be notified of your purchase by Clickbank so that I can send you your FREE cards. Click here now to get started.

Get Paid to Play with Photoshop

2009-09-06T08:02:00.004-04:00

It's so much fun creating images, we could just sit for hours and doodle away with our Photoshop tools.

(read in this article for a link to some cool water effects you can play with for free!)

But just imaging how great it would be if we could GET PAID to just sit for hours and doodle away with our Photoshop tools?

Well, now you can!

Actually, it's been almost a year now since Scott Voelker released the first product that makes it easy for ANYONE to create stunning images using Photoshop...and sell those images for BIG BUCKS...like the precious dog photo shown here.

I've mentioned his product many times before on my blog (one of the very few products I promote -because it's just so good). It's called NewPhotoBiz 1.0

It's more than just easy to use professional Photoshop templates that you can add your child and pet portraits into (saving yourself $1000's of dollars in props). Although that's a great way to seperate yourself from all the other photographers out there...and charge a lot more for your prints!

And it's more than a business-in-a-box (or now, a business-in-an- instant download!). Even though it contains a complete and proven system for new photographers to get customers.

Here's a little secret he doesn't tell you much about.

The number one thing stopping most amateur photographers from stepping up to the professional level and selling their photos for big profits, is FEAR.

Like most artistic types, we photographers are always asking, "Am I good enough?" "Is my photo really worth $1000?"

Well, not only does Scott give you the digital tools to be great, but his secret weapon is the forum he provides for those who purchase the NewPhotoBiz package.

And here's why that forum is worth far more than the modest cost of the NewPhotoBiz system.

Because it takes away the fear.

Wouldn't your confidence go through the roof if you could have professional photographers critique your images before you presented them to any customers?

And wouldn't your skills grow exponentially if those same professional photographers would offer you their years of experience, their tips, tricks and secret weapons for creating the best images ever, while never compromising your own unique style?

And wouldn't it be great if they did it for free? And how much better would it be if there were lots more "amateurs" there, just like you and you could watch and learn as they have their photos critiqued too? And you could get ideas about what the hot selling photos are. And you could get FREE marketing advice. Or you could just get someone to tell you you've created a really great photograph.

Now that's priceless.

While it's fine to sit and create fabulous images using Photoshop, I'll tell you from my own experience, it's much more fun to GET PAID to do it! When you get Scott Voelkers NewPhotoBiz you get everything you need to make that happen.

But even if you want nothing more than to create the most memorable images of your own children or pets, the modest cost of his program (which includes access to his secret weapon for vastly improving your photography skills...THE FORUM) Scott's program is easily worth 10 times what he charges. Because if you hired a photographer to create just one of the adorable images you can create with the NewPhotoBiz program, you'd easily pay him or her $1000 for just one big wall print.

When YOU get his program, you can create all the photos you want...at a fraction of that price!

Want to be a better photographer? Want to learn dozens and dozens of photography and Photoshop tips? Want to get professional critiques of your work?

Want to know if you're actually good...and how good?

Get the NewPhotoBiz program now and see for yourself... just click here!

Here's just one sample of the great information available when you participate.
It's a link I got from the forum moderator (for FREE!) along with a critique of one of my photos...it has really cool water effects you can add as filters in your Photoshop program.

http://www.flamingpear.com/flood.html

My best Photoshop tip for today is: Get someone to pay you to play!
And that's what you get (and more!) with Scott's NewPhotoBiz 1.0

Cheapest Ring Light Ever!

2009-09-05T10:45:00.009-04:00

While technically not a Photoshop tip, I am all about saving you time in your Photoshop edits. And it goes without saying that if you get the light right the first time you'll spend less time fixing it (or adding it) later in Photoshop.

Here in this diagram you'll see the amazingly simple and inexpensive ring light, made from 8 LEDs, that I used to photograph the strawberry in the color-change tip below.

All you need is a set of 10 LED lights that can be turned on continuously ($10+s/h) and a strip of adhesive velcro that wraps around your lens. ($3).

They provide an amazingly bright, even light that wraps around your subject. Really great for macro work. The tutorial said that the white balance might be weird, so I shot in RAW, but when I opened the files, I didn't need to make any color adjustments at all to compensate for the LED lights. (note: in the strawberry color change below, I did boost up the leaf color, yes, but that was because I already had bad color to begin with, not because of the LED light)

Here's a link to the cool website that showed me how to do it, and where to get the LEDs.
(another note: The website didn't say this but, the inexpensive LED supplier is in Honk Kong so, in my experience, it does about 10-14 days for delivery)

http://www.diyphotography.net/studio-at-home-introduction-to-led-lighting

Lots of other great tips there too...so take your time and browse around.

Consider adding these inexpensive LEDs to your camera bag. Used individually, as an additional spot light (highlighting the apple stem) or in groups like this ring light LEDs are
an inexpensive way to custom light your subjects. And so portable and lightweight too!

Let your imagination run wild!

And keep watching this week as I add more links to cool websites (other than my own!) where you can find great tips and inspiration. And more reasons to open up that Photoshop!

And don't forget to visit http://todaysphoto.org to view great scenes from photographers around the world...and get Rick's take on "The Original Photoshop Tip Cards".

Or for even more convenience, you can view TodaysPhoto.org right here at the bottom of this very blog page. Scroll down right now and check it out for your own self!

Easy Watermark Stamp

2009-09-05T09:44:00.004-04:00

For maximum time savings it's important to automate as many repetitive actions as we can.

Watermarking, or copyright stamping our photos is one of those chores.

An easy way top automate this function is by creating a BRUSH that actually IS our watermark stamp.

Did you know you could create your own brushes? Not just for watermarking, but for painting or drawing or erasing with any shape you need and can create.

Basically, you use any of the text, shape or photo or drawing tools you wish, select any or all combinations with the marquee tool then choose EDIT-DEFINE BRUSH, choose a name for your creation and say "OK".

To begin, open Photoshop, go to FILE -NEW.
In the pop-up box be sure to check the box to make your background TRANSPARENT. (unless you want it with a white background, if so, then choose that option)

In this example for watermarking or copyright stamping photos, I chose the Copyright symbol from the shapes drawing icon, then added, on another later my name in Palace Script MT (strong).

I then merged the two layers together and used my rectangular MARQUEE tool to select everything together.

Once selected go to EDIT -DEFINE BRUSH. You'll get a pop-up box allowing you to name your new brush. Then, click "OK".

Now, whenever you want to apply a watermark to your photos, simply select your creation from the BRUSH pallete, (just like you would a round brush, but you'll have to scroll to the bottom of the list to find your new brush creation). Pick your brush color, and opacity, and flow then "CLICK" on your photo and like magic your signature stamp will appear.

Use the slider to adjust your signature size just like you would any other brush.

If you feel you want to tilt or make your selection vertical, simple create a new layer over your photo, stamp that with your brush then use EDIT-FREE TRANSFORM to position your brush or size it any way you like. If resizing this way, be sure to hold down the shift key as you resize to preserve the proportions.

Color Change -Quick and Easy 3 Step

2009-09-05T08:27:00.009-04:00

Have you ever wanted to change the color of something in your photo, but not change the color of everything?

Here's some simple ways to do that and still maintain all highlights and other lighting characteristic of your subject.

In this example, the leaves needed a bit more color, but I certainly did not want to make everything greener!

First, select the area you wish to change using your favorite selection tool, ie. magic wand, lasso etc. However you do it, get those ants to dance around your selection.

Second, go to

LAYER-NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER-HUE/SATURATION

...or, LAYER-NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER-COLOR CHANGE

...or, LAYER-NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER-SELECTIVE COLOR

Once you say "OK" to the pop-up box, the ants will disappear from around your selection but you will now have a masked layer (allowing changes to occur to only your selected subject).

Third...You may now begin to move the sliders until you achieve the color you wanted. You may also repeat the process (stacking layers), mix or match the color changing options, vary the opacity or lighting since each is on it's own separate adjustment layer.

Taking this a bit farther, you can see that by using the selection tool and LAYER-NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER, you can selective change a zillion things about your selected subject (anything that comes up as an option under the NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER).

Now that's a quick and easy 3 step!

Glowing Your Own Produce

2009-08-25T09:21:00.005-04:00

Yes, that's right! Not growing, but GLOWing your own fruits and veggies.

This fun project can keep you busy for hours. It starts with a trip to the grocery store to buy your subject material.

Begin with the end in mind. What we are going to do is hollow-out our fruit or veggie and then send the flash through it to create the effect of glowing shown here in this golden apple photo.

Apples of all colors work well. Peppers, oranges, eggplant work well too.

Anything with a colorful quality, with a firm and translucent outer skin could be a candidate. It should also be close to or larger in size than your speedlight.

A helpful tip if you are doing apples is to buy a lemon as well.
Apples quickly start to turn brown as you cut out the middle in preparation for the photo, but if you coat the inside with lemon juice it will help keep the apple white much longer. ( if brown it tints your flash-thru in an unpleasing way)

Once home, examine your fruit for its "best side". Next, plan your attack.

The inner fruit must be removed, hollowed-out, to clear the way for the flash to shine through and give it that glow.

In the example here I just cut the fruit in half to begin coring, then used two small pieces of Scotch tape to put it back together for shooting. Next time, I'll not cut in half, but rather have my cut lines at 10 o'clock and 2'oclock on the rear side to better hide the lines from the front camera angle. You may need to touch up a little in Photoshop if your seam or tape can be seen.

You don't have to be perfectly hollow, you don't want to puncture the skin on the photo side.

Once you have both pieces hollowed, take the rear half and cut a rectangular slot (1/2"wide by 1" tall) at the position where your speedlight can shine through as both the apple and flash rest on the table. If you're shooting something like a pepper that is mostly hollow already, you can skip the steps above and just start here with the slit in rear.

Next, place two pieces of gaffers tape over your speedlight to limit the flash to just the inside of your subject. Duct tape will work too. Drape some black material behind your scene (a simple sheet will do) and the set your subject on the table with the speedlight directly behind it. Masked slit to fruit slit. A wireless triggered speedlight offers more flexibility of camera position, but shown here is a basic wired version with camera on tripod.

Next set your focus and take a shot. Tweak.

You can play with the flash amounts, zoom in, zoom out. Higher or lower angle. Compare different surface materials for how they reflect the glow. If you're shooting in mixed lighting consider using camera RAW to more easily adjust the lighting later. The shot shown here was under florescent, normal room lighting.

However, when doing the apple I noticed the stem wasn't getting enough light. So I just spot-lighted it with the LED of my keyring!

Experiment! Be creative! Have fun!

Be sure to click on the photo above to better view details of the set up.

While I don't discuss shot set-ups like this in my Photoshop Tip Cards, the cards sure come in handy for creating the highest quality images AFTER you take your best shot. Spend your time with the camera...not at the computer fixing later. Photoshop Tip Cards offer the fastest path to fine finished photos. Save time by getting your Photoshop Tip Card Deck today!

Makin' Rainbows

2009-08-14T11:39:00.014-04:00

Sometimes, we gotta make our own luck!

Rainbows can be pretty elusive. But often times they can add just the right colorful something to our photographs…even if we weren't at the right place, at the right time.

Fortunately, making them is not so hard when you know the secrets!

To begin, create a blank layer above your background image.
Open the gradient tool (under the paint bucket) and then click on the arrow in the top toolbar to open up the different gradient styles. Use the arrow at top right to open another text dialog box with options.
Choose "Special Effects"

At this point you'll have just a few options. Choose the rainbow looking one at the end. It's called "Russell's Rainbow"

Next, click on the rainbow gradient style in the top tool bar. It will open up this adjustment dialog box for the gradient filter. Click and drag the "GRAY" slider slightly toward the rainbow colors until "LOCATION" say 75% Click "OK"

One last thing before we apply our rainbow, in the top toolbar, just to the right of the colorful gradient rainbow style, click the second black/white icon to make our gradient draw "RADIAL"

Now we're ready to draw.
Whole holding the SHIFT key to make a perfect circle, click and drag a line up your photo. Just as you'd apply any gradient. When you release the mouse and shift keys, the magic appears. A perfect circular rainbow.

Use EDIT> TRANSFORM to create the size you need and move it into position. Once you have it positioned, we'll go ahead and remove the parts we don't want.

You can use your favorite method for removing the unwanted rainbow parts.
I prefer the LAYER MASK method of erasing, just in case I want to reposition my rainbow later, but you can certainly use the ERASER tool as well.

Two final steps you can use to suit your taste.
Apply a Gaussian blur filter to soften the rainbow a bit.
Change the blend mode on the rainbow layer to SCREEN.

But please, as with everything Photoshop, feel free to experiment with all the blend options available to achieve the right look for all your favorite subjects.

A word of caution though. Remember to account for the lighting conditions in your photo if you're going for realism. The sun should be coming from behind your camera position and be less than 45 degrees in the sky. Ideally, the scene conditions would imply that certain mix of sun and moisture that is usually present when we see rainbows.

To have more tips like these sent right to your email, be sure to sign up for my Tip Card Group.
Better yet, don't wait for tips! Get some for your own self ...right now!
Get a complete deck of "The Original Photoshop Tip Cards" at http://photoshoptipcards.com

Draw Your Best with Photoshop

2009-07-27T23:44:00.014-04:00

Many drawing tools, when used to their maximum potential, can help us get through our workload faster and be more creative too.

Today I'll focus on tips for one tool that's used a lot, the marquee tool, and one that many are unsure of, the line and shape drawing tools.

Let's begin.
How to Draw Rounded Rectangles

Grab the rectangle Marquee tool and draw out your rectangle to size.
Go to SELECT -MODIFY - SMOOTH
A dialog box will pop up. Set the radius to determine how much to round the corners.
Start with 20 for most medium sized rectangles.
Larger sizes will obviously need a bigger radius, small sizes less.
=========================================================
How to Draw Perfect Squares

Grab the Rectangle Marquee tool
Hold down the SHIFT key as you draw for a perfect square
=========================================================
How to Draw Perfect Circles

Grab the Elliptical Marquee tool
Hold down the SHIFT key as you draw for a perfect circle

Tip: If you press the SPACEBAR before releasing any commands
(left mouse button or shift key) you can easily reposition your drawn shape by moving the mouse. Once you let go however, it's harder to adjust.
==========================================================
Draw Circle from the Center Out

To draw proportionally from the center out, hold down the Alt key in addition to the other commands. The circle will begin to draw outward from the start position of the cursor, rather than pull from the edge.

==========================================================
Draw a Straight Line

Grab a drawing tool (its the icon located directly under the TEXT (T) icon).
Choose the line tool, then hold down the SHIFT key to draw a straight line in the foreground color indicated.
( draw by left mouse clicking and dragging across the page)

Draw with other shapes as well, by right mouse clicking on the drawing tool icon, then select the shape. Position your cursor (looks like a +) on your workspace and drag to draw.

Once you get comfortable with the drawing tools you'll notice your speed will increase right along with your creative confidence.

Step-by-step instructions make it easy to create!

You wouldn't try to bake a cake or cookies from scratch without a recipe. Would you?

Photoshop Tip Cards are your recipe for success!

The Photoshop Tip Card Deck is your recipe for creating delicious photographs...the kind of photos all your friends and family will drool over! (Now there's a pretty picture!)

It's the simple way to start creating great photos, fast!
Be sure to get yours today at: http://photoshoptipcards.com

Photoshop Filters - Bring Out the Artist in You

2009-07-24T23:55:00.011-04:00

One of my favorite things about Photoshop is that it lets me choose between being a photographer and being an artist.

Being a photographer I'm pretty comfortable with. I feel I can handle a camera as well as most, although I'm constantly reminded by those more seasoned, that I still have a lot to learn. And I accept the challenge.

As far as being an artist? Not so good. I used to dabble at painting...and it always looked like a dabble. From that experience I learned that if I wished to express my vision, I'd better put down the brush and go get my camera.

Now, Photoshop let's me be both!

Truth be told...sometimes I don't take a great picture. Shhhh!

But when I draw upon the powers of Photoshop, that same, not-so-great photo can become a really wonderful piece of art to display.

This one here is an example. Overall, the photo was a decent "snapshot". But it really wasn't as crisp and clear as I would have liked and I wasn't happy with the look of the water.

So here's what I did.

I cut the girl from the photo and added a color-tinted (pinkish) gradient overlay across the water and then lightened the top, right corner to give it a more of a sunset feeling.

Next, I returned the young lady to the photo and then applied a filter over the entire photo that I thought appropriate, Ocean Ripple. (Filter - Distort - Ocean Ripple) Now it had that artsy, canvas look. (which worked really well to hide the lack of clarity!)

With minimal blending, using the non-destructive layer-mask dodge and burn method, the photo was complete. Except for the addition of a complimentary frame, created using the technique found in Fool-Proof Frames.

And viola! In just a few minutes time I changed a so-so photo to a wonderful piece of art!

Photoshop lets you save some really marginal pictures and turn them into something to treasure.

Next time you have a photo that you wished was sharper, better colored, or just lacks that certain something, consider saving it with one of the many creative filters available in Photoshop. Have fun and experiment.

Who knows? Photoshop might let you be an artist too!

Worldwide Photo Walk 2009

2009-07-22T21:27:00.006-04:00

Last Saturday, July 18th, more than 32,600 photographers set off on foot in 900 PhotoWalk events around the world.

This was the second annual event put together by Scott Kelby and the National Association of Photoshop Professionals.

It's designed to bring pro and amateur photographers together to explore and exchange ideas in communities the world over. Groups of 50 local participants, lead by a team leader, head out on a two hour expedition to take photos within their designated territories.

This was my first event, and although I did not feel I had captured any photos which I should submit for the worldwide prize drawing (2 are allowed from each participant) I did meet some interesting folks...and get a lot of exercise!

My educational discoveries for this week were how to create realistic looking Gold overlays (as shown on the text in the butterfly photo I took on the walk- above) and a reminder to always be sure to sharpen your photos...if not in the camera then certainly in post-processing.

I used to believe there were only two types of photos that could not be saved by Photoshop.
1.Photos that were "blown out", where extreme light areas left no detail, and
2. Photos that were blurry.

I've revised my thinking of late after discovering a plethora of effective techniques for removing, or should I say "correcting" blur. Of course if you sneeze while taking the photo, that kind of extreme blur will be your burden to carry. Sharpening has limits. But if it's that faint fuzziness that means an eye is not too clear, or your image appears a bit hazy...don't just toss it away.

Save it with one of the many sharpening tools available in Photoshop.

Here are a few I've posted previously or included in the tip card deck:
Sharpen with High Pass Filter
Sharpen with Gaussian Blur
The Unsharp Mask

Photoshop Tip Cards are shipping around the world thanks to my readers.

If you haven't gotten yours yet...what are you waiting for!
They truly are, "A Photoshop Seminar in Every Box!"
(only I saved you the high-priced fee...and took all the notes for you!)

There's still time. Start playing with a full deck today at:
http://photoshoptipcards.com

Cut, Paste, Blend with Ease

2009-07-10T01:08:00.002-04:00

After posting my parakeet/cat photo I was asked, "How'd you blend the cat into the background so well?"

I'll start by saying that I hate the eraser tool for all but the roughest cutouts. Maybe it's a guy thing, but it seems to involve too much commitment! Once you erase it -it's gone. (except for a lengthy history backtracking)

For most "erasing" I prefer to use a Layer Mask.

While on the active layer (the one you want to blend or "erase")
click on the Layer Mask icon (second from the left on your layers pallet, gray square w/circle). This will create an invisible mask over your image based on the background color currently selected. If you show WHITE as your default background, your mask will appear WHITE next to your image on the layers pallet.

The "magic" is, if you now paint with a BLACK brush while on your WHITE mask, your image will be "erased". In other words you won't see your image through the mask. It is still there, but your mask won't let you see it.

It really becomes a non-destructive erasing. And you can vary the opacity of the brush to better control how much you "erase". Or a better term would be "hide". Lowering the opacity toward the outer edges can help you BLEND your image very smoothly.

Here's the best part for me, you're not committed! If you find that you've gone too far, you can paint with the opposite color to get your image "un-masked". So if you painted with BLACK to hide your image, paint over again with WHITE (the same color as your Layer Mask) to return your image to view. You can vary that WHITE opacity too if you just want to bring a little of your image back into view.

Here's a screen shot of how the parakeet/cat photo was created.

If you look at the cat, Layer 2, you see the cat cutout and to the right of it is the layer mask (WHITE). Then you see a circle of BLACK that was painted on around the outer edges of the cat, in varying opacities. When you look at the big photo preview you can't see those area behind the black. You only see what I want you to see.
And that is the area in the center, the cat's face -which is still WHITE on the mask.

Using soft-edged brushes, of varying opacities on a Layer Mask can really help you Blend images from one photo to another.

In this photo, in order to make the cat appear "dreamy" (or nightmarish as some would argue!) I simply changed the BLEND MODE to Soft Light at 70% after completing the mask.

Start using a Layer Mask to blend instead of the Eraser tool. You'll gain much more control and better looking images too!

Play with a Full Deck

2009-06-29T10:57:00.009-04:00

Just a quick note to let you know...

The full deck of Photoshop Tip Cards in now complete!

Now, you too can become an instant Photoshop wiz!

Now, with your own set of Photoshop Tip Cards, you can plow through a pile of pre-printing processes in no time too!

Finally!

There is a simple, low-tech way to get help for the popular Adobe Photoshop editor.

STOP!
Wasting hours with distracting searches on the internet, flipping between screens looking for help as you're trying to work!

DROP!
The time wasting trial and error attempts to remember how to do all the complicated adjustments!

ROLL!
Your creative powers into making eye-catching digital images FAST!

Your house will be on FIRE!
With productivity and imagination.

52 easy to use index cards show in simple terms exactly how to do all the most popular Photoshop edits, tricks and "secret" shortcuts. And thanks to input from our members, printing costs have been substantially reduced. You're going to love (and be amazed at) the price!

Start playing with a full deck!
Get more details or order yours today at:

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Christie said it best...
"I love, love, love your tip cards!"
PhotographybyChristie.net

Yes...they were designed by me for YOU!
Made right here in Buffalo, NY USA!

"Like a Photoshop seminar in every box"
(Only I saved you the high-priced fees and took all the notes for you!)

7 Profitable Photoshop Plans

2009-06-18T23:05:00.004-04:00

Today I'm going to offer something a bit different.

Every once in a while you have to stop and think, "What's the point?"

Having all these great Photoshop tips at hand is a wonderful thing. But many of us are looking for ways to earn more money in photography. Luckily, the two go hand-in-hand.

You can use everything you learn in Photoshop to begin earning more money from your photography.

Here are 7 tips to get you thinking:

1. Add creative borders to your prints.
There is a reason people put thier most important photos into frames with mattes. It's because they look better! And naturally things that look better can sell for more. Fortunately, adding creative frames in Photoshop is not difficult (I've shown that in a previous post) and best of all it costs us nothing but a few moments of our time.

2. Adjust your exposures, sharpness and contrast
This is a bit basic, most of my readers will already be using Photoshop for post-production touch-ups on their photos. But for newbies, I can't think of one professional photographer, no matter how expensive his camera or how great his skill, that isn't using Photoshop or a similar editing software to create just a little bit better photo to sell his/her client.

3. Add Special Effects
How about adding a little vignette (soft border effect) to your photos? Maybe a little background blurr to make your subject stand out? Some shading? Text perhaps? A little color alteration or maybe add a few morew clouds in the sky? Maybe straighten the horizon. Maybe you want everything to be in black and white except some special feature? These can all help you collect more bucks for your pics with no expense but your time.

4. Cut and Paste your subjects into cute scenes
One of the most powerful features of Photoshop is that you can cut subjects from one scene and seemlessly paste them into another. Scott's NewPhotoBiz 1.0 is an amazing program for doing just that. Putting babies onto flowers, hugging fishbowls, and into washtubs can even allow you to make a great full time income from your photography. With all the different scenes and backgrounds available now, you charge for three or more scenes all from one photo! That's 3x the money!

5. Give your subjects "Extreme Makeovers"
With tools like the healing brush, gaussian blur and sharpness controls you can make skin tones flawless. No more pimples, moles, or scars! Tools like Liquify can turn frowns to smiles or make those big noses smaller. Even suck in those big guts making your subjects instantly look 10lbs. thinner. When you make your client look better than they ever imagined, you my friend are a true professional and will be rewarded accordingly.

6. Design your own business cards and flyers
I had struggled for years with other programs to create business cards and flyers. Boy was I surprised when someone flipped the switch in my brain by telling me that I could use Photoshop to to combine words and pictures (duh!). But until Scott from NewPhotoBiz 1.0 told me I never made the connection to creating business materials. With templates available from Vista Print and others, you can design your own custom materials and save a bundle.

7. Create unique custom greeting / holiday cards
Your profits don't have to end with the photo session. Once your client gets his 5x7's, 8x10's and 16x20's you should be coming back to him often throughout the year with more things to sell him from your original works. Turn those photos into greeting cards like the one shown in todays photo. Thanksgiving and the Christmas holidays should your cue to get a custom card order out to your clients. Offer them postcards, keychains, coasters, tee shirts, golf balls, mugs, water bottles, blankets. None of this stuff has to be pre-ordered by you. There is no expense to you except to make the offer and there are many promotional site that make this easy. Cafepress
is just one site to look at for possibilities. Or start your own store!

Photoshop can be a powerful force that drives more profits into your business. For more ideas on getting the most from Photoshop and photography be sure to check out the other resources at the right on this page, in particular NewPhotoBiz 1.0.

Skin Softening with High Pass Filter

2009-06-09T22:25:00.009-04:00

Wait a minute!

Didn't we recently do a post
using the
HIGH PASS FILTER
to SHARPEN?

Ah! Do the wonders of
Photoshop ever cease
to amaze?

Yes folks, for my next trick I will now attempt to show you how to soften skin using that high pass filter in another useful way.

Drum roll please...

First off, I had to delay this post for several days because I just couldn't seem to locate a photo that seemed appropriate. Kids and pets are my specialty and neither of them have much use for a skin softening, so I had no stock photos to share and demonstrate. In desperation, I dug deep to find the most appropriate thing I could, "The Princess and the Toad."

Those of you shooting adult portraits and especially teens, will be very happy to have this technique in your toolbox (or better yet in your tip card pack where you can find it!).

So here goes:

1. First up, use Ctrl-J to duplicate your background layer.
2. Change the BLEND mode to OVERLAY
3. FILTER - OTHER -HIGH PASS
You can play with the pixel size here. I found starting at 9.5 is good
4. Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-I to invert the layer
Next, dial down the opacity until the skin looks pretty good. Concentrate on the skin texture only, don't worry about fuzzy features like the lips, eyes, hair etc. Will bring 'em back next!
5. Add a LAYER MASK, and paint with BLACK over the detail areas like the eyes, lips, hair, etc. (removing the filter, like an eraser) and watch them return to their original sharpness. You can vary the brush size, type and opacity to fine tune.

So there you have it. The act is complete. All I ask is that you hold your applause and just throw money!

But seriously, if you like what you see here and want more, please sign up for our FREE TIP CARDS if you haven't already, or do click here to request additional packs (of 10 cards ea.) to get the full benefit if you are already a member. We're well on our way to the goal of 52 cards in the full deck now! I'll have a special bonus for anyone holding more than the original10 cards when I get the full deck completed. (You won't want to be caught by surprise holding a short hand!)

Photos to Sketch Drawing

2009-06-02T01:02:00.005-04:00

After posting the previous lesson on converting color photos to pencil line art, many of you wrote asking for something better suited to portraits.

Your wish is my command!

Here is the simplest method I have ever found:

Duplicate your image using keyboard shortcut Ctrl-J
or you could also use Layer - New - Layer via copy

Next, desaturate (turn to B/W) the new Layer 1 using
Image - Adjustments - Desaturate

Duplicate Layer 1

On the new Layer 2 go to:
Image - Adjustments - Invert
now your photo should look like a negative

Now change the Blend Mode to Color Dodge
Whoops! Your photo just went all white...
well, that's all right.

We're going to now use the magic to give new life
to your photo...it will now be re-born in sketch form.

Ready?

Apply Filter - Blur - Gaussian Blur

BINGO! The magic sketch appears.
Now wasn't that simple and fun?

For best results, move your slider full left then bring back up until you get the best effect. You can also experiment using motion blur or radial blur in place of gaussian.

Finish up, if need be, by getting rid of any stray looking areas. To get the job done use the eraser tool, paint over with a white brush, or use a layer mask technique, whichever you prefer.

Remember, there's nothing like having all these tips right at your fingertips.

Why interrupt your workflow trying to find some technique you saw once before?

Sign up today (at the top right) to join our Photoshop Tip Card group. You'll get a free set of cards to keep by your computer. Then, within seconds you can be putting great tips like these to use...without having to waste hours searching online!

Sometimes, low-tech is better.
Sign up for your FREE Photoshop Tip Cards today!

Photos to Pencil Line Art

2009-05-30T00:32:00.009-04:00

Here's an interesting and quick way to turn your photographs into pencil drawings.

Mind you, it works best with images that do not have a lot of texture to them. Textured areas tend to become just messy gray zones rather than lines.

To begin, DUPLICATE your image using Ctrl-J

Next, set the foreground color to black then choose,
FILTER - OTHER - HIGH PASS
and select a very small radius. The best radius will depend on each individual image, but generally it will be under 2. The photo above was done at 1.8.

Next, be sure your background color is set to white and go to:
FILTER - SKETCH - NOTE PAPER
and try setting your sliders to:
IMAGE BALANCE : 25
GRAININESS: 0
RELIEF: 0

Then, go to IMAGE - ADJUST - THRESHOLD and move the slider left to make the lines more defined, more black.

As a final step, use either the pencil tool or the brush, with the color set to white, to remove (cover over) any stray black dots that distract from the image.

It's a quick and easy way to turn your images into interesting line art works.

Memorial Day...Polaroid Moments

2009-05-22T23:50:00.006-04:00

Happy Memorial Day!

As we remember to honor all the brave men and women who sacrifice much, if not everything, for their country - let us also be reminded to appreciate
all the freedoms we enjoy thanks to their dedicated service.

In order not to take anything away from the importance of honoring these heroes of the United States of America, let me just offer you a simple Photoshop, Polaroid style template into which you can place your favorite photos and possibly a caption which has meaning for you.

http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/freedownloads/ht/polaroidframe.htm

Have a great holiday weekend everyone!
Be sure you use your extra time to Photoshop something!

Clone as Copy & Paste Tool

2009-05-22T00:43:00.004-04:00

"Blink!"

That should get about as good a result as "smile!"

Of course I'm being sarcastic. Shouting either of these
words at a portrait session will likely yield those strange,
contorted faces that always sell so well.

But what CAN we do when the proofs come back and
we see that perfect pose, where everything is just right,
except for the closed eyes? What can we do when we get
the blink in an otherwise good shot?

We might try to cut and paste an eye from a similar shot.
We might try to overlay an entire face from a similar shot
and try to twist and erase until we got an acceptable eye overlay.

Or...we might try to use an often overlooked method of copying...
the CLONE tool.

Did you know that you could open a photo, select the CLONE tool,
(doesn't matter what size here) then use ALT-Left Mouse Click
on any portion of your to photo to copy the entire photo?

Sure you can. And it makes for a really easy Copy & Paste method.
We clone (copy) from one photo and then "paint"(paste) it into another.

Here's what you do:

Open your two photos in Photoshop.
We'll use eyes as an example here.

On the photo with the good eyes (or whatever) chose the CLONE tool
then ALT-left mouse click on any portion of that photo.

Next, bring your second photo up to the front (active) position.
As always, DUPLICATE the layer to protect your original.
Then, on add a blank LAYER
Now with the blank layer active, hold down the left mouse button
and begin to "Paint" your cloned layer onto this blank layer.

"Paint" on as much or as little as you need. Don't worry though,
if you paint on too much you can just use the eraser tool to get rid
of anything you don't want.

Because we put the clone on it's own layer, we can manipulate it in many
ways without effecting our photo below. We can use free transform to vary
the size and position. We can vary the opacity if that is appropriate.

We can add a non-destructive Dodge & Burn layer to adjust the layers
for perfect blending.

Using CLONE as a copy and paste tool can be used to create many
different creative effects.

Try it...I think you'll like it!

"Pops!" With Gaussian Blur?

2009-05-19T23:00:00.000-04:00

Sometimes, amazing results can come from unexpected places.

In fact, going to blur might be considered exactly what we don't want to use when we want to bring out the "POP" factor in our photos. We most often associate the blur with softening, not "popping".

But there's a hidden a secret in this method!

If you cannot already tell, in this tiger photo, the one on the left has been "popped!" while the one on the right is the original. You may click on the image to enlarge for greater detail - as is the case with all the photos seen in this blog.

Here is the simple technique revealed...

1. Open your photo and duplicate Ctrl-J (as always to preserve your original)

2. Go to FILTER - BLUR - GAUSSIAN BLUR and adjust the pixel radius so that you can still clearly see the shapes in your photo but still everything is sufficiently blurred. (in this popped photo the pixel radius was set to 15.8)

3. Here's the secret...change the blend mode on the layers pallet from NORMAL to OVERLAY!

Now is that simple or what! Try it out on your child and pet portraits, landscapes, everything!

Experiment! Instead of changing to OVERLAY, change to VIVID or HARD light. Vary the opacity.

ADVANCED: Want even greater control (as was used in this photo)? Then create a layer mask of the Gaussian blur and use the eraser to selectively apply the blur affect. In the case of the tiger, the darker regions of his face lost definition. Using the blur as a filter mask let me un-blur most of the face to preserve to detail but still create POP!

Gaussian blur to pop! It's in the cards for you.

Universal Contrast Correction

2009-05-18T22:52:00.000-04:00

This is one of my favorite, high-speed fixes that has never failed to give me a better looking photograph. Never.

That is why I call it the universal correction. Try it on any photograph you have and see if you agree with me.

It is Part 1 of my 2 favorite quick-fix processes. The other was written about earlier in Better Sharpening w/ High Pass Filter. These two, easy to use processes, are my secret weapon for improving a whole bunch of photos fast, prior to adding any special effects.

So without further ado, here are the steps to Universal Contrast Correction:

1. Open your image and duplicate the background

2. Go to: IMAGE-ADJUSTMENTS-AUTO LEVELS
(this should instantly make your photo look quite a bit better, because it's basically what you would do yourself if you went in to fiddle around with levels and curves adjustments separately)

3. Use keyboard shortcut Ctrl-J to duplicate the newly adjusted layer

4. Go to IMAGE-ADJUSTMENTS- EQUALIZE
Whoops! Now your good photo looks like a bad HDR. But not to worry, we'll fix it back to good again in step 5.

5. Change the BLEND MODE on this layer to Soft Light and drop the OPACITY down to between 30% and 50% based on your own judgment of what looks best for that particular photograph.

6. Finally, go to LAYER-MERGE VISIBLE to complete the process.

Viola! You're done.

Now you've got a secret weapon that will mindlessly improve all your photos in under 60 seconds.

Universal Contrast Correction

Remember, if you need help getting customers for your photography business, if you want simple, proven ideas for marketing your photography services to earn cash...be sure to check out the latest book I co-authored with pro-photographer and marketing genius Dan Eitriem.

Volume 1 was a smash hit. Now, with Volume 2 and 17 more ways to be successful, the only way you can fail is if you're not serious about making photography a real, cash making business.

Click here to have a look-see (but be warned...once seen, you might not be sleeping tonight!)

Sunday Shortcuts...The Finale

2009-05-17T23:12:00.000-04:00

This weekend I was reminded of the seamless beauty of the circle of life. New lives begin, old ones die. With each loss opportunity awaits for life anew.

This is what happens when your favorite location for a photo-hike happens to be in a 260 acre cemetery!

But this is no ordinary cemetery. It is Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo, NY.

Forest Lawn Cemetary. Buffalo History Preserved

Eternal resting place to a U.S. President, a rock star, countless millionaires, artists, world explorers, and pioneers of industry.

But it's not so much the who's but the what's that make this place special.
The what's include: a picturesque lake, rivers and bridges, over 200 species of birds, flowering trees, hills. Art carvings, stained glass, and bronze statuary well suited to honor these residents who have earned their place in history.

At this point you may be wondering,
"Bob, this is all very fascinating, but where are the Sunday Shortcuts?"

Which brings me exactly to my point.

As I pondered life's mysteries while watching and photographing this lovely goose with her new chick, a new life was hatched for Sunday Shortcuts as well.

Rather than dole them out piecemeal fashion, I can offer you printouts of ALL the keyboard shortcuts for your exact version of Photoshop. As an example, I have in my hand ALL the shortcuts for Photoshop 7...and it is a full two pages of 6 pt type!

Best of all...you can get your very own copy of ALL the keyboard shortcuts for your Photoshop version FREE with Pack 2 of the Photoshop Tip Cards.

But only through this special link:
http://tinyurl.com/cardsandbonus

Once I'm notified of your request, I'll send you a personal email to determine what version of Photoshop you are using. Then, I'll pull that Keyboard shortcut printout to send along with your Photoshop Tip Cards Pack 2.

So as we close the book on Sunday Shortcuts, as it fades from life, new life is given to the Shortcuts Printout.

I think you'll find it quite valuable. But since Photoshop House of Cards is about what's helpful for you, click on the comment section below and let me know what YOU would like to have.
And certainly...you can have both!

I'll never know unless you tell me! So be sure to leave a comment below.

But so you don't leave without at least one keyboard shortcut today:

When you turn ON the Caps lock, you enable precise cursor movement. That lets you have a finer control when using the MOVE tool. But here's a companion tip. If you forget to turn OFF Caps lock, your brushes will not be normal. They'll still work, but you won't be able to see the coverage area prior to the action...and you'll be scratching your head as to why.

Here's what you need to do:

1. Sign up today to receive your FREE Photoshop Tip Cards Pack 1 if you are not already a member.

2. Click on the link above to get Photoshop Tip Cards Pack 2 and the bonus Shortcuts Printout.

3. Enter your favorite Photoshop'd photo into the contest that ends this week

4. Leave a comment below

Read the previous posting if you are hesitating to do Steps 1, 2, 3 or 4

Have a great week!

Coming MONDAY: Fast and Furious Contrast Correction- A Universal Fix

If Today Was Your Last Day...

2009-05-15T23:28:00.000-04:00

As I cruised down the road today, in my early morning commute, a song came on the radio which colored my thinking for the day. It colors my thoughts now, even as I write this blog entry.

The song is by a group named, "Nickelback"
and is titled, "If today was your last day"

You might find it here at this link on Youtube, but no guarantees because the record label seems to be chasing it down for removal. But you could always "Google" the lyrics.

Click here or copy and paste the link below to hear the song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StbWZz4pF88&feature=related

As the title implies, it's about taking stock of what you are doing in your life now and what you would be doing if you knew the end was near...like TODAY!

How often do we just wake up into our daily ruts and go mindlessly along the tracks we create in our lives? As if, like the innocent children seen here in today's photo, we imagine life will just automatically be better tomorrow.

But will there be a tomorrow? If so, how many more?

I hope one of the reasons you are here, reading this now, is because you want to become better. Better at producing high quality photos. Better at Photoshop skills. Better at workflow speed. Which will hopefully lead you to better compliments, better customers and better cashflow.

But often times we get caught up in the learning mode (to which I plead exceedingly guilty!) and forget that what we need to do, is DO!

Most importantly, if we are not where we want to be, what SHOULD we be DOING that will bring us closer to our goals?

So today's Photoshop tip is to be sure you DO, not just read through!

Try each tip. Experiment with the sliders, the dials, the deep, deep menu options.

Click on the links at the right of this page if you haven't already. Click on them again and DO something if you just were looking last time. Each posted link is a resource I have personally used to increase my photography skills and increase my income. Each has been tested, proven and receives my highest recommendation as something I feel will be helpful to you too.

When you have done that, get those photos out of your computer and out into the world!

Enter contests, (my contest ends next week so submit your photos!) show your portfolio to prospects, submit your photos to forums for review, or at the very least, get them printed, matted, framed and up on your walls!

Promise yourself you WILL do SOMETHING different today!

Because, God forbid, what IF today was your last day?

Today, I rearranged my schedule and instead spent the day with my Dad, out in the sun helping him rebuild his porch steps. Priceless.

Better Sharpening with High Pass Filter

2009-05-14T23:47:00.000-04:00

What's Everybody Looking For?

A better way to sharpen up those images, that's what!

While just about everyone is familiar with using the UNSHARP MASK to sharpen up their photos, there is another less well known and often more effective method.

It is the HIGH PASS FILTER

There are two main reasons why HIGH PASS can be better.

1. UNSHARP mask operates on all of the pixels in your photo. It works by making changes to those pixels...therefore it can be categorized as a destructive process, much like the dodge and burn tool.

2. UNSHARP mask takes the broad approach to sharpening, sharpening everything. Unlike HIGH PASS which limits its process to the edges where the most obvious benefits can be seen from sharpening.

Try this HIGH PASS FILTER method the next time you need a little sharpening done:

Step 1: Open you image and duplicate the background (Ctrl-J)
Step 2: Add a (blank) layer to the top of your stack
Step 3: Ctrl-Alt-Shift-E, this fills your top layer with a flattened version of your background
Step 4: Set Blend Mode on this layer to OVERLAY
Step 5: FILTER- OTHER- HIGH PASS
You'll get a pop-up box with a slider (for Radius) which will have a preview of your image. Slide that slider left until you can only see gray values (no colors) in your preview.
The "sweet spot" will be around the point where you just make the colors go away to see only an outtline of your image and gray. (Usually this radius is way under 10, more likely between 1.5 and 3.5)

That's it! You're done!

To check your results, toggle on/off the high pass layer. You can also bring the opacity slider for this level down to zero and back up to check. Even set the opacity for your own taste.

And there you have it! An alternative, non-destructive option for sharpening up those photos.

Here's a bonus! You can also spot tune your sharpening for more or less effect in certain places by using a 50% gray brush to increase/decrease the effect in particular areas as you desire.

Go ahead and monkey around with it now so you don't forget!

And so you'll have this tip on hand next time you need it, be sure to get signed up for my Photoshop Tips Card Group...its FREE! Plus, new members will receive a very helpful set of Photoshop Tip Cards free when they sign up. These helpful index cards include all the tips you need to crank out great photos every time. Best of all they sit right beside your computer so you don't have to waste time searching online for the tips you need.

Also, be sure to enter the MEMBERS ONLY PHOTO CONTEST going on now.
You'll get full details in your email when you sign up.

Shortcut Sundays...for Lazy Cats

2009-05-10T22:45:00.001-04:00

"Look me in the eye(s) and tell me you don't want to get things done faster!"

I'm quite certain the cat's motto is, "Why do any more than you have to."

It is in that spirit that we continue on with another edition of Shortcut Sundays. Because why should we do more than we have to in Photoshop?

1. Quickly zoom to 100%: If you double-click on the zoom tool (looks like a magnifying glass, just above rt. to the color palettes) the magnification will go to 100%

2. Precise Cursor: When you engage the "Caps Lock" key the cursor switches to precise movement.

3. Background Color: by default, Photoshop brings up a grey background upon which to do our work.

Sometimes, because of the edge color on our photos, the default grey is not the optimum color to be working on. Or, maybe we just want to be seeing OUR favorite color in the background as we work. Well, making your default background any color you wish to is easy as 1-2-3:

1. Choose a color from the color palettes, have it in the foreground position.
2. Activate the Paint Bucket.
3. SHIFT-CLICK anywhere outside of your workspace (not on your photo working area) and the background color will switch to whatever color you have chosen.

4. Quick-Change Brush Tool Opacity: To quickly set the opacity of your brushes, you can use the keyboard numbers (just above the letters, not off to the far-right on your keypad) (to increase by 10% increments). For example, once you have activated the brush tool,
PRESS the number 1 key to set brush opacity to 10%.
PRESS the number 2 key to set brush opacity to 20%
PRESS the number 3 key to set brush opacity to 30% ...
and so on , all the way up to pressing 0 to get 100%.

Well there you go! Another Shortcut Sunday Photoshop Session has ended. Go and piece to create another phabulous Photoshop phenomenon!

I'll be announcing a photo contest later this week, open to members of my Photoshop Tip Card Group only. Be sure to sign up today to join our group if you're not already a member. Then you'll be on the list to receive all the details too, and be eligible for valuable prizes. Current members can just sit tight...details will be coming to you soon.

Getting Customers, Keeping Them Happy

2009-05-08T21:35:00.000-04:00

Today's Photoshop tip is a bit different, but equally valuable. I know it's valuable because it answers two of the most common questions photographers ask:

1. How can I get more customers, and...
2. Where can I find a reasonably priced lab that won't screw-up my prints.

After all, the motivation most of us have for bettering our Photoshop skills is $$!

When we're better we can charge more.
When we're better we can get more customers.
When we're charging more AND getting more customers, we're making more money!
And if we can find a good processing lab that saves us money and hassle...

Now we've got a GREAT BUSINESS!
And that's the connection today's tip has to Photoshop.

Actually it's two tips today. The two great resources you've been asking for:

First: How can you get more customers?

Veteran photographer and marketing expert Dan Eitriem has just released Volume 2 of his enormously successful book, "How to Pay the Rent With Your Camera...This Month!"

Volume 1 was packed with great tips on how to get more customers into your business at very little cost. But Dan's a great marketer and he knew there were even more ways photographers could get customers. So, once again, Dan approached photographer's, asking them to reveal their best customer getting tips. And sure enough, he got tips to fill an entire book... Volume 2 was born!

I've been a big fan of Dan's marketing genious for quite a while now. Bought just about all of his stuff and loved it...because it works! Dozens of proven ways to get customers, with little or no cost marketing methods...methods that "real people" can actually do. Even me!

Volume 1 was great, I bought it, I loved it. Volume 2 is just as good if not better.

And if you like my tips here, you might just enjoy (and profit from) the one tip of mine Dan thought was so good he even included it when putting together Volume 2 of "How to Pay the Rent With Your Camera...This Month!"

You'll find that tip on Page 32 of his book, and not anywhere else but in Dan's book. So yes, if you buy his book I'll get a small percentage from Clickbank, but you'll get so much more when you put even one of his 17+ methods to work!

So tip one is: Want more customers? Get Dan's book.

Second: Where Can I Get Great Prints at Great Prices?

You could spend hours and hours, using all your Photoshop skills to create the finest photos, but if your monitor calibration is off your prints are going to come back looking awful. Or if the kid down at the photo lab is just dumping your photo files in to print, you could get back garbage.

- Wouldn't it be nice to know that each and every one of your photo files was being looked at on a carefully calibrated monitor prior to printing?
- Wouldn't it be nice to know that if the color or exposure was a bit off trained technicians would adjust it prior to printing?
- And if you could get fast turn-around, fast deliver, and freindly folks to deal with would you be tempted to learn who's doing this?
- And if I told you their prices were better, in many cases, than anything you could get locally would you just about kill me if I wouldn't tell you who they were?

Not to worry! I'm here to help.
And if it makes you feel any better, I get nothing for telling you about them. We are not affiliated in any way - except that they do my prints and I am happy to pay them.

You can get more details about them from their website: http://meridianpro.com

Tip Two is: Great prints, great prices at http://meridianpro.com

Photoshop is a great tool for improving our end results. But if we can't get a good print, at a good price, and someone to sell it too...what's the point?

TEXT...Triple Tip Thursday

2009-05-07T22:31:00.000-04:00

Get excited today because I've got 3 great tips for you!

The first two will greatly enhance your text work and the last tip will greatly enhance your bank account!

First Text Tip: Changing the font size of text can often be a hassle. Moving the mouse around, clicking, and/or manually typing in font sizes until you get just the right size. Who needs that?

Here's a keyboard shortcut...press 3 keys together, Ctrl-Shift-> to increase the font size at 2pt steps. Press Ctrl-Shift-< to decrease the font size at 2pt steps. If you want to move at larger increments, add the Alt key to move at 10pt increments. So that would be 4 keys together: Ctrl-Shift-Alt-> to get 10pt larger with each hit.

Second Text Tip: If you want to get creative with the shape of your text layer, for example like the perspective view in today's photo, you must first change the text layer into a shape layer. This is done only after you have perfected your text for font size and spelling because once you convert the text layer to a shape layer you can no longer change the individual text characters.

Here's how to change a text layer into a shape layer: With your type layer active, go to LAYER-TYPE-CONVERT TO SHAPE. Once you have done that you can go to EDIT-FREE TRANSFORM and now you will see the changeable box form around your text. Now just drag it around to the shape and size you desire and click ENTER to lock in the change. Remember that to asymetrically change sizes, hold the Ctrl key while dragging in/out your corners to create a perspective view like the one shown today.

Third Tip: As my subscribers and regular readers know I'm a huge fan of Scott's NewPhotoBiz 1.0 One of the great surprises in his material is that photographs of feet sell...big time! Can you imagine taking a picture of children's feet and then selling it for over $200. Scott shows you step by simple step how to do it... over and over again! Parents love showing off this unique style to all their friends! If you haven't already checked out his program, do it now.

Click the colored NewPhotoBiz 1.0 link above or over in the right margin and discover even more secrets to making big bucks with your camera and these Photoshop tips!

Shadows that Trail Along...w/Ctrl-E

2009-05-06T23:59:00.000-04:00

Here's a small but important tip for anyone who is creating shadows of the kind I've shown how to make on previous postings. (As opposed to the ones we hate to get when taking photographs in the first place!)

The problem I see happening is when you want to reposition your subject AFTER having made the shadow.

Since we have been creating shadows by duplicating our subject layer, blackening it, reducing opacity, move tool to offset, etc., etc., the problem comes when we move our original subject - the realistic shadow we created does not follow along (because it is on a separate layer).

Fortunately, the solution is simple! Ctrl-E

Ctrl-E (keyboard shortcut for LAYER-MERGE DOWN) will combine your shadow layer and your subject layer into ONE layer. Simply select the layer which is on top (orig.subject) and then do a Ctrl-E to merge it down together with your shadow effect.

Now being one layer, when you want to move your subject, the shadow will trail along.

Not just for shadows, whenever you have two or more items you want to be able to manipulate as one group, use Ctrl-E to merge your two (or more) layers together. (Since it will only combine one layer with the one directly below it, combining more than 2 layer will require more than 2 Ctrl-E operations)

In today's photo, once I combined the matchbox with the shadow, I could duplicate it over and over and position each one wherever I want on the photo.

Faster Cut-Outs

2009-05-05T23:30:00.000-04:00

One of the great features of Photoshop is that you can cut out parts of one photo and paste them into another.

(And you can make a lot of money doing it! I'll tell you how at the end of this post)

Or you can just cut your subject out to get rid of the background entirely, as was done in today's photo.

So we agree, cutting is good and useful.

But we might not always agree on the best way because there are so many options. Some harder than others.

1. We could use the eraser tool to slowly and carefully erase all around our subject, hoping we don't accidentally erase something we didn't want to. Not recommended for large areas.

2. We could use the lasso tool to select the edges of our subject by carefully guiding our mouse along the edges. A relatively imperfect task, made a bit easier when the magnetic lasso tool is employed.

3. We could use the magic wand to select our subject. But the magic wand selects based on similar color/tonality. But by holding the SHIFT key and left mouse clicking we could eventually select all the colors/tonalities within of our subject.

4. We could use the magic wand tool on our background. In the case of the photo shown here we would left mouse click in the black area around our subject. Because it is a uniform, solid color it will automatically avoid all of my subject. Then go to SELECT -INVERSE. Now instead of the background being selected, my image is. Now I can lift my lady out of the black by choosing LAYER-NEW LAYER-VIA COPY (or CUT if you prefer)

When your background is more uniform than your subject, selecting the background and then inverting your selection can be a faster, if less obvious, solution many times.

To be efficient, we ideally look for the fastest way. #4 is clearly the easiest and fastest way with this photo here.

It's easy to get confused, have tunnel vision when approaching a task. Doing things the usual way, the way we are comfortable isn't always the best way. A little time spent thinking about all the possibilities before diving in can often be time well spent.

Having your Photoshop Tip cards on your desk to flip through can give many time saving ideas.

Now if you want to make lots of money just cutting babies and pets out of photos and putting them into the cutest scenes, look in the right margin, or click here for Scott's, NewPhotoBiz 1.0

It's a great way to earn extra income, or even full time income using your camera. Best of all, it's recession proof! People love their pets in good economies and bad. And last I heard, they're still making babies all over the place!

5 Photoshop Tips for Cinco de Mayo

2009-05-04T22:48:00.000-04:00

Happy Cinco de Mayo!

There are several techniques going on in this Photoshop tip for today. In honor of this special day I have included 5 techniques.

Can you guess how many have already been discussed in previous posts?

If you guessed 2 you would be correct.

#1 The green base was constructed using the same method as in "Fool-proof Frames and Mats" except that here I did not delete the center where the photo would usually go. I left the entire layer intact with the border edge giving it a little 3-D effect. The green base is one layer.

#2 The shadow under the curved photo was from the same technique show previously in "Simple Shadows" where we duplicate our subject to another layer and then blacken it and reduce the opacity to around 50%. In this photo, a little Gaussian Blur was added to the shadow to help feather the edges a touch. The shadow was then flipped vertically (Edit -Transform - Flip Vertically) and moved into a realistic position under the subject.

#3 The third element is adding a white border to the subject picture. To do this just take any photo and...

-Duplicate your layer as always,
-Press the letter "D" shortcut to set your color palette to black foreground/white background
-Go to IMAGE - CANVAS SIZE - (once here change your measuring scale from inches to pixels for both the height and width
-add 50 to 100 pixels equallyto whatever height and width values are shown (your preference on how much border you like to have)
-click OK and you're done. A nice white border around your pic!
(If it turns out your border is black, it's OK! Just grab a bucket of white paint and dump it on the border to change the color...it's easy to forget to change the color palette first)

#4 Bending things. An easy way to bend things is to go to FILTER - DISTORT - SHEAR
The downside is that it will only bend from left to right, not up and down. In that regard you may have been fooled by the Mother Goose photo shown here. Since SHEAR will only bend from left to right, in this case it was necessary to first ROTATE the canvas 90' clockwise before using the FILTER-DISTORT-SHEAR feature, and then rotate it back after completing the bend.
( The shear function is like curves in that it has a line you can bend and mold to all sorts of shapes which will then create the form for your image)

#5 Creative Composition. Remember that the awesome power of Photoshop lies in the layers. Create, compose, stack, blend, mix and match! Bring several techniques together.

One of the easiest ways to create quick compositions is by having Photoshop Tip Cards on your desk beside you. There are so many tips, techniques and cool things you can do...but only if you can remember them! If you have to go surfing the net to find tutorials every time, you're not going to be very productive.

Photoshop Tip Cards solve the problem! Index cards that sit quietly beside you, ready to help when you need inspiration, or just a subtle reminder when you can't seem to remember the crucial steps.

Get a FREE set today! Sign up to join our tip group!

And, if you'd like more detailed instructions on how to create bended, shadowed photos, just drop me an email request (subject line: Bending) to robert@totalfitnessphotography.com

Shortcuts Answer Your Prayers for More Time

2009-05-03T13:23:00.000-04:00

Welcome to another edition of Shortcut Sundays!

Today brings many more Photoshop keyboard shortcuts, shortcuts which can be the answer to your prayers for more time.

Each keyboard shortcut can often save 2, 3, or 4 clicks of the mouse, plus your time reading pop-up dialog boxes which may appear at each step.

While one shortcut may not seem like that much of a time-saver, over the course of an entire photo project they can really add up.

Maybe all of them won't be useful for you, but the repeated use of the ones most commonly used in your work will make your life easier...help you get back some of your precious time.

That being said, here are today's Shortcut Sunday tips:

X switches your foreground and background color palettes
B brings up the brush tool
T brings up the text tool
J brings up the healing tool
W brings up the wand tool

Ctrl -Tab when you're working from several photos at once, your desktop can get pretty messy. Using this shortcut lets you quickly switch between layers

Ctrl -Shift-N adds a new layer to your work and includes the dialog pop-up box

Ctrl - Shift - Alt -N adds a new layer to your work instantly, without the dialog pop-up appearing

That's it for today's Shortcut Sunday tips. Be sure to try them out immediately while fresh in your mind. Even if you don't think you'll use them, by trying them just once or twice you may find that you'll remember them at just the right time in the future when you need them.

And for the ultimate Photoshop memory tool...be sure to sign-up for the FREE Photoshop Tip cards. Then, when you're stumped and wasting time because you want to do something but can't remember how, you can simply leaf through the tip cards setting beside your computer to find the answer.

No Google searching! No flipping from site to site! No interrupting your workflow!

If you really want to get through your Photoshop edits in the fastest possible way, and learn new tip and tricks to add pizazz to your photos...get your self a FREE pack of Photoshop Tip Cards today. Sign-up today!

And for even more great resources to help build your photography skills and profits -be sure to check out the other links located along the right side of this page. Personally used by me and tested for value, you'll find excellent opportunities for growth in the resource links provided.

100 Percent Clear

2009-05-01T23:18:00.000-04:00

Be like the tall building... reach for the sky!

Short post today (tonight). Got to rise early for my daughter's First Communion service tomorrow. And there's still miles to go before I sleep! So here we go...

Ever found yourself scratching your head as to why your photo will look nice and sharp at one percentage, say 25%, and then when you zoom up to 75% or 95% to do some detail work it gets all fuzzy, all pixelly, all jagged?

It's a Photoshop thing.

Photoshop uses its full pixel power at 100%, 50%, 25% and 12.5 %. At these percentages you will see what you'll get.

Intermediate percentages, those which fall between any of the numbers shown above, like 33.3% will not include all the pixels. That is why your image may appear a little fuzzy at that size, but then it looks good when you move to 50%.

Photoshop stores in cache the full pixel preview at the 100, 50, 25 and 12.5 percent ratios. By not showing/storing for every ratio, memory is conserved and speed is optimized.

So if your adjusting for clarity or sharpness, be sure your ratio is set to one of the 4 full-pixel points...100%, 50%, 25% or 12.5 %.

There you go. Another Photoshop mystery solved.

Remember to pop on back for "Shortcut Sunday" where I'll share more secret keyboard shortcuts to speed your work along.

And, be sure to sign-up (in the top right corner) for the Photoshop Tip Cards group.

In addition to receiving a FREE set of cards, next week I'll be announcing a new book that I've co-authored with another photographer who just happens to be a brilliant marketer. If you're looking to boost your income along with your Photoshop skills, you won't want to miss it!
Sign-up now so you'll be the first to know!

by Robert Schwarztrauber

Photoshop Crop...Cutting for Clarity

2009-04-30T22:53:00.000-04:00

The final entry in this series on my Photoshop workflow process is CROP.

If you've been following, you remember that I'm working backward from CURVES where it all started (or ends). I know it's a bit confusing so let me restate the workflow.

#1 Crop...#2 Levels...#3 Curves That's the process 99% of my photos go through before I do anything else in Photoshop. And today I'll discuss CROP and it's importance.

Above you'll see the before (left) and after (right) of my goose friend here.

One key element that makes for a good photographs is a clearly defined subject. One element in your photo that the eye is instantly drawn to. One clear focal point telling your eye exactly what to look at. Photos that have too many objects, arranged in random order, distract and confuse the eye which then tells the brain, "I don't like it."

So the function of cropping is two fold.

One is to cut out the distractions or excess items that draw the eye away from the main subject and two, to place the supporting object and main subject into a position on the photo that has been proven to please the eye.

Cutting out distractions using the CROP tool is really just zooming in. We attempt to create the smallest size picture that still shows the main subject of our photo (which we hopefully chose when we originally took the picture) and the least amount of supporting items that still tell the story. A good photo never leaves the viewing thinking, "What's that supposed to be a photo of?"

In the example of the goose above, you can see that I cropped (zoomed in) on her head and neck.

That's because the original scene had too much wasted space, too much that wasn't my subject- which of course, was the goose.

The second consideration when using the crop tool is placement, where is your subject located on the page. Imagine your photo is divided by three equally spaced lines, both horizontally and vertically. Ideally, you will want your subject to lie where a horizontal and vertical line intersect. (Red dots)
Dead center is usually not best. But rules are made to be broken, sometimes. On the diagram you can see why it's called the Rule of Thirds. Three lines up, three across. Put your subjects there.

And the last element of good composition ( and function of the CROP) tool is to get some diagonals working. That is aligning some elements of your photo to form a diagonal line which helps to draw the viewers eye into the scene, hopefully concluding at your subject.

Be careful when positioning faces. The viewers eye naturally seeks out other eyes, even if that's not where you want the viewer to look.

Going back to my crop example above, you can see that the beak (a bright orange, eye drawing color is on the lower left thirds line, and the other main feature is the goose's neck detail, also located on a thirds line (right/lower). The eye lies in between. You can see the diagonal line created by the gooses neck. And also a diagonal from (lower-left /up) created by the beak and eye combination.

So to recap, I used CROP to zoom in and feature the main subject. I used CROP to position the subject in the photo along the rule of thirds. Both considered Composition actions.

Also, consider what size you wish your final photo to be before you crop. You can define the size in the toolbar once you select the crop tool - standard sizes like 4x6, 5x7, 8x10, 10x14, 16x20.
Set your size before you crop, click and draw your crop lines on the photo. Photoshop will work from the dimensions you chose. If you change you mind, right click inside your box and left mouse click CANCEL to start over. Or left click CROP to keep. You can use the ENTER key to crop as well.
You can also click (CLEAR) on the toolbar and freeform any size rectangle you wish for cropping.

That concludes my series on workflow. I hope it was helpful.

Remember, CROP - LEVELS - CURVES. A great way to start your Photoshop day!

Also, if you've ever had a dream, pop over to:
totalfitnessphotography.com for what might just be the most inspirational story in our lifetime.
"I Have a Dream!"

LEVELS: Secret to Pin-point Accuracy

2009-04-29T22:53:00.000-04:00

In the previous post on CURVES I made mention of my Photoshop workflow process. Many of you wrote asking me to describe my workflow so I thought I would do that today.

Since I described the third step in my process, CURVES, a bit already, today I'll work backward and describe a little tip on my second sequence in processing, LEVELS.

First, to give you the playbook, I always begin optimizing my photographs in Photoshop this 3 step way:

Ctrl-J to duplicate the background so I'm not working on my original. It's automatic to me, a must do, so I'm not even giving it a step number.

1. CROP: Here I compose the photo. Getting the subject where I want it and getting any clutter or distractions out of the picture. More on CROP tomorrow.

2. LEVELS: I use the histogram in LAYER - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - LEVELS.
Today I'll give you a neat trick that lets you optimize your levels adjustment to retain all the pixels.

3. CURVES: After cropping to size and compose, after using LEVELS to set the proper exposure I next move to CURVES to give a little more sharpness and contrast to the photo. On rare occasions I will vary from this, but mostly my curves adjustment will look like this:

Using these three steps lets me very quickly improve the visual and technical qualities of 80% of my work. The other 20% will need some blemish repair, maybe a little more hue, maybe a little more sharpness, maybe a little Gaussian blur on the background to highlight my subject.

I don't include specialty stuff here, like subject transplants, or creative works like the statue in the previous 2 posts. And of course fun stuff like Scott's NewPhotoBiz 1.0 . But those project all still start out with my 3 step process. Crop, Levels, Curves.

OK, OK! Today's tip on LEVELS.

Often times when you open the levels window, you will see that histogram does not run complete from left to right (aka, dark to light). Maybe it doesn't reach to the dark side, which means you need to move the left slider arrow towards the middle to darken your photo. Maybe the histogram doesn't reach to the right side which means you need to drag the slider arrow toward the middle to lighten your photo.

But if you move it too far, you begin to let pixels drop off. You inadvertantly loose the lightest or darkest values. Sometimes, that's ok. But what if you want to keep everything?

Here's the tip!

Hold the (Alt) key down while you move the sliders.
Watch your photo now as you move the sliders.

If you are moving the right (lightest) slider arrow your photo will start out as black. As you move it left, towards the middle of the histogram to lighten your photo, you will begin to see a light appear from your subject. As soon as you see the first light, stop. That is the lightest pixel.

If you are moving the left (darkest) slider arrow your photo will start out white. As you move the arrow right, towards the middle of the histogram to darken your photo, you will begin to see colors appear. Stop. At that point you are revealing the darkest values in your photo.

There you have it. Now you know exactly where the lightest and darkest values lie on your photo. That's not to say it's bad to go past that point. It's OK to knock a few pixels off if it makes for a better photo in the end. But at least you won't inadvertently be losing them because you GUESSED where you should put the slider. now you can KNOW!

Be sure to sign up for my Tip Cards at the upper right of your screen. In addition to getting a FREE set of Photoshop Tip Cards for handy desktop reference, next week I'll be letting my Photoshop Tip Card Members in on a new book I co-authored with another very well known photographer and marketing expert.

In the book you'll discover great new ways to boost your photography income
(or even get yourself started in this great business with very little expense!)

Go ahead now...SIGN UP...it's free!

And tune in tomorrow for more CROP!

This is Robert Schwarztrauber, signing off to go Photoshop something.

Sexy Curves Turn Granite to Gold

2009-04-28T23:07:00.000-04:00

Normally you would never see a photo this bad on my site. After all, isn't that what separates the amateurs from the pros...the pros only show the good photos?

But I thought it was educational in many ways. Lots of tips I could glean from one photo disaster.

If, upon seeing today's photo you thought, "That looks familiar?" You would be correct... it's the same photo I showed on the last post as teaser for today. (Look back to "Simple Starburst Effect" as we go along to compare)

So here's the tips that come to mind:

1. We don't always get to choose our backdrop. Sometimes we must shoot a beautiful subject surrounded by junk. So we must learn to deal with it! (aka cut out the subject with Photoshop and drop it into another background, whether that be plain white, textured colors, fresh scenes, or as in this case, plain black.

2. Sometimes our lives need more pizazz!
A little excitement! A little glitz!
In many cases where our subject contains only a little color (as in this granite statue) it looks better to switch to black and white letting the shadows and lights add dimension. But sometimes it would be great to really jazz it up.

Wouldn't it be great if you could have the "Midas Touch" where everything you Photoshop'd turned to gold?

O.K.. Here it comes! The part where I show you how sexy CURVES can be while at the same time giving you the "Midas Touch."

A digression. Isn't it ironic how Photoshop allows us the ultimate freedom to be creative, and yet we want someone to show us how? Hmmm? ( I still search the internet daily to find new techniques, new discoveries...someone to show me how to use the tools to be more "creative")

Well because I love to push the boundaries and because I "hate rules", I had an opportunity to discover something cool in Photoshop curves that I wanted to share with you today.

Normally, as part two of my standard workflow, just after the levels adjustment, I go to
LAYER - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - CURVES.
Here I find the diagonal line that flows from dark at the lower left corner to light at the upper right corner. I do a couple of minute tweaks to the line (usually creating a very slight S curve) which improves the contrast in my photos. That's it.

But on one particular occassion I knew I had a great subject (this statue) but I couldn't get it to "POP". It was just too average. So I started tugging on the curve's line.

You can create many points to pull that line up and down. You can control where dark begins and light ends. You can even (take a deep breath or look away as I break the "rules" now)
TOUCH THE BOTTOM! TOUCH THE TOP! ...the walls of the box which are normally out of bounds (because they max-out the software and allow uncontroled events to occur... like wicked color changes!).

And therein lies the secret. You can create metallic-like colors and bold expressions when you step off the path and really get creative with CURVES. Because each photo contains pixels of every shade and hue, I cannot tell you exactly what setting will do what. But what I can tell you for certain is that you can really add some spice to your works when you start banging that line around in CURVES. Experiment, Try it today!

3. An important note on experimentation. Tip number three is to ALWAYS start your Photoshop workflow by DUPLICATING your original layer. Just start by pressing the shortcut Ctrl-J. Once that is done you never have to worry about experimenting. You can play to your hearts desire without ever effecting your original. You can always go home. And your original is safe.

(sorry for those of you who thought today might be about shooting sexy photos of expecting moms, although she was the subject in the photo, today was just about Photoshop curves.)

That being said...CURVES are sexy!
So go break some (Curves) rules today!

Simple Starburst Effect

2009-04-27T23:11:00.001-04:00

As I promised yesterday, today I will explain how to create a simple starburst effect on your photos, like the subtle one shown on yesterdays Sunrise photo.

This technique works best if there are many points of light (highlights, pinpoints of bright white in contrast with a darker surrounding). It is those points that will ultimately create the effect.

The simplest way to do it, is by using the FILTER mode.

But first we must prepare out workspace by duplicating our original two times.

Step 1 : DUPLICATE your background twice (I like to use keyboard shortcut, Ctrl-J

Before we begin to create the effect we must now have 3 identical layers showing on layers palette.

With the top layer selected,

Step 2 : Filter - Blur - Motion Blur
on the pop-up box we need to set the angle to (45)
and max-out the distance to 999

Turn off that top later and select the Middle Layer next.

Step 3 : Filter - Blur - Motion Blur
on the pop-up box we need to set the angle to (-45)
and max-out the distance to 999

Step 4 : Go back up to the top layer and turn it on, then change the Blend Mode to Screen

Step 5 : Go up to the menu and choose LAYER - MERGE DOWN (shortcut Ctrl-E)

Now you should see the starburst effect (criss cross)

Step 6 : On the newly merged layer (top one because at this point you should just have two layers showing on your layers palette) change that Blend Mode to Screen

You should now be seeing a pretty good image formed showing the starburst effect, but it is probably too light because we have been changing blend modes to screen (remember screen mode is a lightener)

To get the exposure looking right,

Step 7 : go to IMAGE - ADJUSTMENTS - LEVELS and lets move that left hand slider over towards the right a bit to darken up our photo.

Wow! That's it. Seven simple steps to starburst stardom!

With that 7 step system now in your toolbelt you'll be creating cool photos like the sunrise shown on Sunday's Shortcuts in no time! Or something even better I suspect!

One note though. If you find that the starburst are over-powering your subject, take the ERASER (set at 10-20%) on your top layer and lightly erase the effect from over your subject
(or you could use a layer mask as well if the eraser tool scares you.)

I was reminded of this from a post on Scott's NewPhotoBiz forum, (one of the members posted the www.gavtrain.com link) If you haven't checked out NewPhotoBiz 1.0 yet, check over in the right margin where you'll find a link to Scott's site. Really, every photographer who wants to create great images and make money doing it the easy way should be a member of Scott's group
( I know I jumped at the chance when I found out!)

And remember to sign up for your free tip cards here too, top right.

Tune in tomorrow to see why CURVES are so sexy and what that has to do with the "Midas Touch"

Photoshop Shortcut Sundays Begin!

2009-04-26T21:05:00.000-04:00

Welcome to Shortcut Sundays!

Each Sunday I'll be posting some of my favorite keyboard shortcuts. Some of them you may know, some you may not, and some of you may not even be aware that there are keyboard shortcuts. ( I know I played with Photoshop for 8 months before I first learned!)

So, to keep it short...here goes:

Ctrl + press the control key (Ctrl) and the (+) plus/equals keys to zoom in on your photo
Crtl - press the control key (Ctrl) and the (-) minus/underline keys together to zoom out

Hold Spacebar when zoomed in to turn your curser into a hand tool. Then just click and hold the left mouse key to move your selection around to see all the parts.

Ctrl T press control (Ctrl) and the letter (T) to bring up Free Transform to resize your images

Crtl J my favorite! Pressing (Ctrl) and letter (J) will duplicate the layer you are on currently

Crtl I pressing (Ctrl) and letter (I) will Invert, or change your foreground and background color palettes. Great when you are working on a layer mask to change quickly from white to black.

D one key shortcuts...doesn't get any shorter than that! Pressing letter (D) quicly changes your color palette back to the default, black and white

Q pressing letter (Q) brings up the Quickmask feature. then use your brush tool to paint over the area you wish to mask/select. Pressing (Q) again will SELECT the area (dancing ants) and then you can copy it into another layer. Works great as a selection tool for taking subjects out of one scene and putting them into another. Great for the folks in Scott's NewPhotoBiz group.

Well, there you have it. Eight great ways to save yourself precious time when working in Photoshop.

You'll find these shortcuts and more included in my Photoshop Tip Cards. If you haven't already, be sure to sign up at the top right of your screen to join our group. You'll receive your first pack
of Photoshop Tip Cards in the mail FREE just for signing up. Plus you'll get insider tips on many more photography and Photoshop related resources! Go ahead and sign up today...it's free!

Be sure to check back tomorrow when I'll tell you a quick way to get those cool sunrays you see streaming across the Sunrise photo featured today.

2 Popular Blend Modes

2009-04-24T22:30:00.000-04:00

Here's a little behind the scenes look at 2 popular blend modes and how they work.

But before I begin, I received so many nice comments on the previous stained glass photo in "Dead Colors Come Alive" I thought I would post another of my favorites here today. Again, this rare bit of secular stained glass was found in Forest Lawn Cemetery. It is on the list of national historic places - President McKinley was buried here. Aside from being the eternal resting place of many famous Americans of the 1800's, it also houses some of the most beautiful outdoor artworks in the city. I hope you'll enjoy today's selected photo! A sunrise full of hope.

And as an additional note for those who might be straining to look for some connection between the tips being offered in this blog and the photos beside each piece, there is none. Except to say that all of the photos have been put through a Photoshop enhancement of one kind or another...and probably many.

That said, let's talk about two popular blend modes, how they work, and what they can do to make your photos more appealing.

First up is MULTIPLY.

You will find that Photoshop's default blend mode is NORMAL. If you change the blend mode to MULTIPLY, Photoshop will take out the light (white) pixels and multiply the dark ones. If you have a photo that is dominated by too much lightness, maybe outdoors on a sunny day, or a bit too heavy on the flash, a quick way to darken it up is to change the blend mode to MULTIPLY. Be sure to use the opacity slider to fine tune it because in most cases just switching blend modes here will make your photo too dark. Decrease the opacity for a better effect.

Next up is SCREEN.

The SCREEN mode is basically the opposite if MULTIPLY. In screen mode Photoshop takes out the dark pixels. When you change from NORMAL to SCREEN you will see your photo appear washed out, too light. Again, adjust the opacity to gain a more favorable effect. If you find your prints always come out too dark, despite looking great on your monitor, SCREEN is a great way to lighten your photos after you have made all other adjustments in Photoshop and are ready to print. (click for more details on using screen to correct dark prints)

These two blend modes can be great time savers when you know how they work. And now you do! So whenever you want nice control over your lights and darks get out your own Photoshop and experiment with blend modes...and their opacity slider.

Be sure to check back on Sunday. This week I'll begin "SHORTCUT SUNDAYS".

Each Sunday will now be dedicated to showing you the hidden keyboard shortcuts in Photoshop. Great tips to shorten your time on the computer so you can spend more time behind the camera.

Quick White Balance Using Levels

2009-04-23T23:40:00.001-04:00

Here's a quick way to adjust the white balance on your photos, in Photoshop using the LEVELS adjustment.

Open your photo in Photoshop, hit Ctrl-J to duplicate as always so we are not working on or changing our original.

Then go to: LAYER - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - LEVELS and hit OK at the pop-up window

Left mouse click on the center eye-dropper to activate.

Next take that over to your photo and left-mouse click on a neutral colored location (anything metal usually works very well, if not available, look for something of a neutral gray or beige tone)

You will see your photo change, hopefully for the better! If it looks good, click OK in the levels box and move on.

If it looks awful, click around a bit more, experiment as you try to achieve a better look.

Need more options?

The far left eye-dropper will set your black point. Use this to acheive really black blacks. The far right eye-dropper will set your white point. It's like bleach for photographs, it gives you whiter whites.

And if you're the type that never tires of tinkering, fine tune your results using the Black/White Output Level slider bar below the histogram, or adjust any of the three arrows directly under the histogram to adjust your white, mid-range, or black values.

LEVELS - more than just a tool to lighten or darken your photos!

Dead Colors Come Alive!

2009-04-22T19:42:00.000-04:00

To begin, let me say that I just love photographing stained glass windows.

The vibrant colors created as the light plays through some phenomenal artist's work inspires me. I am humbled that I can only capture his talent, not produce it.

There are a great many 19th century churches in Buffalo, NY - housing some of the finest stained glass creations anywhere in the world, One by the original creator of the chemically treated glass coloring process himself, Louis Comfort Tiffany.

You may have heard of Tiffany glass? Imagine how expensive an entire church wall of Tiffany Glass would be. Unimaginable. Priceless.

But in reality, the stained glass windows in churches, while beautiful to behold, are not as well suited to decorate the more traditional walls in my own home. This leads me to the illusive hunt for more secular stained glass. Something that can be used to brighten any room in the house.

This is one of my favorite's here. I discovered ths bright and cheerful garden scene in a most unlikely place... a cemetery.

And that leads me to today's Photoshop tip.
Getting maximum impact "PoP" from the colors in your photographs.

Often times, folks use lightness or brightness to try to make the colors more vivid. But that only tends to wash out the whole image. While the colors may seem brighter, they lack the 'pop'.

It can be confusing, what with options like COLOR BALANCE, BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST, HUE/SATURATION and SELECTIVE COLOR. While these options are all useful in their appropriate places, only one is best suited to improving the overall color pop across the entire photograph.

For adding overall color 'pop'...think SATURATION. You're going to saturate your photo with color pixels until they can just barely hold any more without bursting.

To do this go to LAYER - NEW ADJUSTMENT LAYER - HUE/SATURATION
Using only the center SATURATION slider you will find that moving the slider all the way to the left turns your photo to black and white (remember this as an easy way to create a b/w image ...and also a great way to create those images of the b/w bride who is holding the brightly colored red bouquet. You need to add a layer mask for that. I'll cover it another time, or if you can't wait it can be found in the Photoshop Tip Cards)

So, moving the SATURATION slider left reduces the color intensity. Conversely, moving the slider right increases the saturation, ie. adds more color 'pop'. It doesn't take much either. Up to +10 usually is sufficient to add pop without noticeably changing your colors. Get beyond +10 and you may start changing your colors in ways that are unattractive.

When you think bolder color, think SATURATION.

And if you need to add just a bit more 'POP', don't go for the lightness or brightness sliders, try increasing the CONTRAST instead.

Side note. If you consistantly find yourself having to increase the saturation because you are not pleased with the output from your digital camera, you may need to consult your owners manual.
Most cameras (including my favorite Nikon) have adjustment for image color and saturation in the custom settings mode. I leave the color mode at its default setting, but crank the saturation to its highest level.

Photoshop saturation...soaking the pixels with vibrant color.

Notes on History

2009-04-21T22:35:00.000-04:00

At some point in our lives, we all wish we could go back in time and do things just a bit differently.

We'd like a do-over.

Well, as photographers we know we can stop time with our cameras, right? So, is it really a stretch to think we can use our great software, Photoshop, to actually go back in time?

In reality, the creators of Photoshop, in their infinite wisdom (how they actually created such a thing in the first place boggles my mind!) realized that occasionally, we might make a mistake, an errant keystroke perhaps. When this occurred we might be frustrated if we couldn't go back and "undo".

And so they gave us the power to go back in time. The almighty "UNDO". In fact, they not only gave us one UNDO, but through use of a built-in memory system called HISTORY, they let us have several whacks at UNDOing"

Alas, though they were generous to a (de) fault, sometimes we find that we just can't go back far enough, right?

But perhaps you have been imprisoned by your own thoughts?

You CAN change "HISTORY"!

You can change it from it's default of "20" to a much more reasonable number for us mortals, like between 50 and 100. (However, don't get carried away with your new-found power. If you get crazy and decide to set the history to 999, you'll pay the ultimate price. Photoshop will eat your every last gigabyte of memory trying to keep track of what you are doing. Ultimately, your system will slow to a snails pace. Just remember, the higher default you set, the more memory is consumed.)

So here's the simple HISTORY tip that will save you many hours of frustration and deleted layers:

Go to EDIT - PREFERENCES -PERFORMANCE
("PERFORMANCE" might be "GENERAL" on versions 7 and earlier)
Look for HISTORY STATES. Change the number from 20 to anywhere, say 50 -100, and click, "OK".

You're done!

It's a really simple tip but one that's often overlooked.
Doing this can really make your time with Photoshop a much more pleasureable experience.

Simple Shadows

2009-04-20T22:53:00.001-04:00

Shadows offer a great way to add depth and dimension to otherwise flat objects. They can also help subjects stand out from similarly colored and textured backgrounds.

Creating simple, subtle shadows is easy.

First, to preserve the integrity of your original, it's always good to work from a duplicate. So to begin, press Ctrl-J to duplicate your original.

Now your layers palette is showing two layers. Your original and the duplicate.

Next, using the magic want tool, SELECT the subject you want to add a shadow to. (You'll know it's selected when the "ants" are dancing all around your object.

Once selected, go to LAYER-NEW-LAYER VIA COPY. At this point you will have three layers on your palette. The top layer should be just your subject on a checkboard background.

Now use Ctrl-J again to duplicate your cut-out. Now you have 4 layers. SELECT your object again on this top layer and paint it completely black with either the bucket or paint brush.

Next, in the layers palette, left mouse click on your blackened subject layer, hold and drag that level down one level. Now you don't see the blackened layer anymore. Next comes the magic!

With the blackened layer selected in the palette, use the arrow move tool to drag your shadow out from behind what is now your top subject. You should start to see the black appear as soon as you begin moving with the move tool (arrow). Place your shadow just a little offset, in a place where you would expect the shadow to be (opposite the lightest side of your subject.)

To make it appear real now, on the layers palette, adjust (reduce) the OPACITY of your blackened image to around 20-35%. It will now appear grey...like a shadow!

Ta-da! You did it.

The secrets here are you need at least three layers to make it happen. Your background on the bottom(1), your shadow in the middle(2), and your cut-out subject on top(3). The other secret is to reduce the opacity of your shadow to make it look real. And always watch/ examine your photo for how you would expect the light to create a shadow.

Once you've created the basic shadow, you can get fancy by using EDIT-FREE TRANSFORM to lengthen or distort your shadow layer. Remember that to create perspective (non-90 degree angles with the free-transform, hold down the (Ctrl) while dragging the corners. That will create a skew which can be used to make a really long shadow which reaches on to the horizon line.

Works great on text layers too. Can really make your words stand out. Something often needed when trying to write on multi-colored backgrounds. In that case, you can change your shadow to any color you chose to contrast with the surroundings.

BONUS! Use this three layer technique when you want to have kids or pets "peaking" out from behind things. Simply replace the blackened shadow layer with your child or pet subject. This "sandwich" method is the easiest way to insert subjects realistically into scenes. Because your subject is in-between you can move them around to the best position without trying to "cut" your subject in. Leave your subject whole, resize as needed to fit into the scene. Then, when you like its position, erase any parts of your subject that stick out where they don't belong.

Experiment...have fun. Go Photoshop something!

Pop Eyes

2009-04-17T00:47:00.000-04:00

Here's a quick and easy 3-step technique that can really give life to the eyes.

1. Use Ctrl-J to duplicate your background layer, you can rename it "pop eyes" or whatever you like.

2. Use the DODGE tool (looks like a ball with a pin stuck in it) set to a small enough size to lighten the iris, between the pupil and outer edge of the iris. Setting should be MIDTONES, with the exposure less than 20% so as not to over do it.

3. Use the BURN tool (opposite of dodge) set to a small enough size to just darken the outer edge of the iris and also the pupil. Settings should be SHADOW and exposure less than 15%.

You can also use the BURN tool to darken the eyelashes and around the edge of the lids for a bit more "pop".

Essentially, we're just using the dodge and burn tools to "paint" a little lightness and darkness contrast to key areas around the eyes. Keep in mind that when using the dodge and burn tools here, the strokes cannot be reversed...unlike the non-destructive dodge and burn method shown in an earlier post

It's great to have these tips right beside your computer so you don't have to search for them when you need them. You'll receive a FREE pack of TIP CARDS and email updates on cool Photoshop stuff when you join our TIP CARD GROUP. Sign up today, up at the top right.

Digital Wake Up Call

2009-04-12T00:22:00.000-04:00

On Thursday night I attended one of the most intense seminars on photography. This guy hit the ground running and didn't stop until nearly 5 hours later. Yes, it started at 6pm and didn't end until nearly 11pm. My head actually hurt from straining to take in all the info. This guy knew so much about digital photography, cameras, lighting and the software that makes everything pop...he could have gone on all night, probably all week without notes.

I'm talking about internationally known, professional photographer David A. Ziser and his "Digital WakeUp Call Tour 2009...A New Dawn." Mr. Ziser is a professional wedding and portrait photographer from Cincinnati, Ohio.

Here's a brief rundown on what was included in his phenomenal seminar (taken right from the cover of his full-color, high-gloss seminar wookbook:

- 32 Ways to use your on and off camera flashes for creative and dramatic effects
-10 of the best lens choices and camera settings for creating striking images on every job.
-7 ways to use DSLR video capabilities to transform your product offerings.
-10 "Magic Bullet" techniques to make your digital workflow nearly effortless, highly efficient, and fun with today's top software from Adobe Lightroom 2, Photoshop, NIK, and more.
-20 new product and solid business building ideas targeted to today's customers to add substantially to your bottom line.

You'll absolutely come away from his seminar brimming with ideas that you'll want to try right now. Saddly, after cramming your head full of information, you're too tired and it's too late in the evening to do another thing tonight. But there's always tomorrow!

David puts lighting and camera technical babble into quick, easy to understand lessons that anyone can follow. He's got a PowerPoint presentation up on the screen where he shows you exactly how he got the great shots, step by step. That's what we all like to see, right!

Before I get too long here, let me just say it's a great program and if you get the chance, go see him. (It's less that $60 for a whole night of great professional instruction!) Plus he's handing out $1000's of real value door prizes each night. PLUS, you get a DVD full of additional tips!

If you want great tips on lighting, on camera settings, on shooting weddings, on PHOTOSHOP, LIGHTROOM 2 and more...check out his webpage at: http://www.digitalwakeupcall.com.

PS: This is just a great tip for y'all, not an affiliate link. I get nothin' if you go there except the satisfaction of knowing I passed along some great tips. And that's what this blog is all about!
With about 60 tour dates and cities, he might just be coming near you!

Robert Schwarztrauber

A Better Way to Dodge & Burn

2009-04-07T23:42:00.000-04:00

Dodge and Burn, meaning to selectively lighten or darken certain parts of your image rather than to apply changes to the whole photo. Generally used to hide or highlight, or to give a more overall pleasing effect to a photograph.

You could lighten parts of the face which may have lost detail from shadow. Or, you might darken an area that was too light from reflection or flash.

Photoshop provides a dodge and burn tool on the left hand toolbar, just below the paint can. Looks like a ball with a pin sticking out.

However, when you use that tool on your layer, the result is irreversible. If you make a mistake you cannot go back and easily change what you did. As one prone to making mistakes, or at least changing my mind, that does not appeal to me.

A better way to selectively darken or lighten parts of your photo can be achieved by working from another layer. Call it a "dodge and burn layer" over our actual photo. It will act as a filter to control just how much light we'll actually see when the adjustments are made. It will not in any way change our original, only how we view it.

Now here's how we do it:

From your background layer, or it's duplication, on the layers palette, click to add a new layer while holding down the ALT key. You will get a dialog box pop up saying "Layer 1"

Now down below that we're going to change the MODE from normal to SOFT LIGHT. Then click (turn on) the option box that says, "Fill with Soft-Light neutral color (50% gray).

What you have done is create a layer (50% gray filter) over your original. We can alter that gray in two ways with the paintbrush. Wherever we paint on this layer with white, our original image appears lighter. Wherever we paint with black, our image appears darker.

So here's what we do. Select the PAINTBRUSH and set the OPACITY to 15%. (that will allow us to gently apply the effects. For more intensity, just keep brushing over the same area.)
If you want to lighten an area, select the color white for your paintbrush. If you wish to darken an area select black. Generally, choose a brush size slightly larger than the area you are working on and select a harness around 10. Then just "paint" over the area you wish to change. (it's ok...you're not actually "painting", you're merely changing the "grayness" of your filter layer to let more or less light show through)

Now here's where the magic comes in. Here's why this method is better. If you make a mistake you can just reverse the color and automatically undo what you did. Like say if you were using the white to lighten an area and it's now too light...just change the brush color to black and paint your area back. Or if you were using a black brush to darken and now it's too dark...just change the brush to white to get it right!

Cool stuff, eh?

Of course if you have any questions, or need additional help, feel free to email me anytime at: robert@totalfitnessphotography.com

If not, then get busy. We've got stuff to Photoshop!

Robert Schwarztrauber

Straighten Up or Else

2009-04-06T23:36:00.000-04:00

Most every photographer quickly learns that if you're going to have a good photo you better get one thing straight. The horizon.

Whether you're shooting the edge of the Earth or the outside of buildings or inside of rooms, our eyes
get very annoyed if things are not straight.

But what's a photographer to do?

We're only human. And sometimes a bit tipsy.

We'll, for us digital shooters equiped with Photoshop, it's no worries! We can automatically have the software correct our mistake.

Here's how to make sure all your images are dead on straight from now on...

Buried under the eyedropper tool you'll find something called MEASURE (just right mouse-click on the EYEDROPPER tool). Select the MEASURE tool.

Next, bring the curser to your photo. It will look like a + sign with a ruler tagging along.

On the left end, of the longest edge you know should be straight, LEFT mouse-click on that edge and drag a line over to the right end of that line. If your line was indeed off level, the line you drew should be a bit jagged, that's ok.

Next, go up to the toolbar and click, IMAGE - ROTATE CANVAS -ARBITRARY

You'll now see a dialog box showing how many degrees off-level your edge was.
Click OK and your image will automatically be rotated to level.

Wow! That was easy!

Addendum...If the photo still looks a little off to your eye, you can run the sequence again or else use FREE TRANSFORM to suit your eye. Also, once rotated you will likely need to do some cropping. But in my experience, 9 times out of 10 the image comes out right the first time, just as you see in this sunrise photo here.

Also, if you're just popping in, notice the matching border? Matching borders on your prints are so easy to make, and make such a bold difference in showing your work, you definitely should have a look below at how to make them. Here's the link:

http://photoshophouseofcards.blogspot.com/2009/03/fool-proof-frames-and-mats.html

The world loves a straight shooter - that's what I'm typin' bout.

Robert Schwarztrauber

Ring Around the Cut-outs

2009-04-05T00:42:00.000-04:00

Here's a common problem experienced when you are cutting a subject from its background or cutting and pasting your subject into a new scene.

Ring-a-round-the-cut-out.

When you use the magic wand or whatever your favorite separator tool, often the cut does not reside exactly along the edge. It's close give or take a few pixels. And that's why when you enlarge to view your cut-out image, or you place it in a background that contrasts with your edge you notice that it has an undesireable border - an unwanted ring around the edge of your subject.

Well here's a quick Photoshop fix for you.

While you have your cut-out subject selected,
on your toolbar go to:

LAYERS - MATTING - DEFRINGE

You will be shown an option for pixel size. That is to designate how
many pixels Photoshop will automatically remove from the edges
of your subject. I find 2 pixels is a good place to start. If it's not enough, go back and run the sequence again.

Pretty cool huh? I'll bet you never got that far down the menu
in Layers before! So many options and no one to sit beside us!

Remember, if you can't wait until the next blog post,
sign-up for a FREE sample deck of my Photoshop Tip Cards
on the form to your right (top right).

I'm here for ya!
Now lets go Photoshop something!

Robert Schwarztrauber

Prior Prep Prevents Dark Prints

2009-04-03T21:49:00.000-04:00

You spend hours sitting at the computer. You compose, you adjust, you tweak it in Photoshop until the photo is just perfect.

However, when it comes out of the printer or returns from the lab you find yourself holding this extremely dark print, possibly devoid of all the detail you worked so hard to obtain.

Ever happen to you?

Always happen to you?

I wrestled with this for a long time. Always trying to find a way to either correct my screen, or have the lab up the exposure or use another program to lighten after Photoshop.

But everything was hit or miss until I came across this really cool tip...that works!

And the best part is that it is so simple to use!

Here's what you do. Work your photograph in Photoshop just the way you usually do.

When you feel you've got it just perfect, use Layer-Flatten Image

Next, hit Ctrl-J to duplicate the image. Then, on the Layers pallet, change the blend mode from NORMAL to SCREEN. You should see your photo instantly become too light, washed-out.

Next, reduce the OPACITY to between 20% - 50%. Now your photo should look crisp and bright. You can toggle between your original and the new "screen" lightened version by turning the duplicated layer on and off to compare. You'll probably be surprised at how much this simple change has made your photo brighter.

Finally, use SAVE AS to save your adjusted photo as jpg for printing. I usually will add the letter J at the end of my file name to let me know later that this is the one to print. You could use P or whatever designation lets you know it is for printing (so you don't mix it with one for web use or for editing).

You'll still have to use a little judgment regarding how much you should reduce the opacity. If your original was pretty dark you'll be closer to 50%, but if it just needed a little lightening reduce it to around 30%. With a little practice you'll be making perfect prints in no time!

This will save you a bundle on either printer ink or wasted lab costs! And it's so simple to do!

Try this for no more dark prints!

Robert Schwarztrauber

Creating Waves of Cash from Photoshop Props

2009-03-29T12:39:00.000-04:00

Today I want to introduce you to Scott. Scott has created waves of cash at will using a simple system involving Photoshop Props he and his wife designed. The best thing for you and me is, he bought all the props, he photographed all the props, he designed the simple Photoshop Cut-out templates... and now we get to just pop any of our images into his templates to create stunningly cute photographs that parents are eager to drop big money on.

It could easily double you profits in a year I think. With minimal work on your part. Very minimal! He's making his program NewPhotoBiz Lite available once again ...after selling out the last 3 or 4 launches!

If you missed out before, or are being introduced to the this for the first time you won't want to miss this!

Scott has put together a series of FREE videos to show you the power of the NewPhotoBiz program.

As an additional bonus to you, when you sign up to receive the FREE Photoshop Tip Cards (over there on your top right), I'll send you the link to his series.

Even if you're not interested in boosting your business, you'll still get great FREE Photoshop tips from Scott. Go sign up now...you have everything to gain...nothing to lose!

Now let's go Photoshop something!
Robert Schwarztrauber

Fool-Proof Frames and Mats

2009-03-16T23:34:00.000-04:00

Thanks for checking back!

As promised, here's a quick and easy way to dress up your photos with fool-proof frames and mat borders.

Two things I love about this technique is that the color always matches, compliments or "goes with" your photo because you got the color using the eyedropper tool to select it right from the picture background. The other thing I like is it's fast...takes less than 2 minutes to do.

Here's a bonus feature...you can stack them and/or resize them for different effects! And, with a little more massaging, you can use the same technique to make objects appear to float off the page. (I'll show that one another time and put it on a card)

So if you're ready to begin, here goes...

1. Complete all the color and level adjustments on your photo and crop it to size. For our purpose here, I'll assume you are starting with a 4x6.

2. Go to IMAGE - CANVAS SIZE : add 1 inch to the width and height
(ie. change to 5x7) Note: In the anchor area, the default center box should be white with all the arrows pointing out

3. With the PAINT BUCKET tool selected, use the eyedropper to pick a color from your photo (background) that you wish to use for your frame. Suggestion: If you have the default white frame around your photo after enlarging the canvas size, you will want to chose darker colors from your background for the frame. Since it uses a gradient, lighter colors tend to lose effect.

4. ADD LAYER, then using the MARQUEE tool (rectangle) drag it to cover the 5x7 image.

5. Use the PAINT BUCKET to fill the area with color over your photo. Now all you see is solid color and the "dancing marquee ants"

6. SELECT - MODIFY - BORDER : set the border to the maximum 200 pixels (just a guide, you can vary the effect (width of frame) as you prefer).

7. SELECT - INVERSE : use the delete key on your keyboard to remove the colored area over your photo and viola! You have a beautiful framed print!

Use your favorite save technique to store your image.

Once you try this it's like potato chips...you can't have just one! You'll be dragging out all your old photos to dress them up as well. This "QUICK TIP" will now have you at the computer for hours! Sorry.

Until next time... Go Photoshop Something!

Robert Schwarztrauber, photographer

Sharing My Tips On Photoshop

2009-03-16T00:14:00.000-04:00

Many have asked how I get through so many Photoshop edits so quickly. To answer that I decided to share my secret with y'all here on this blog.

The answer: Cards.

I'm not an expert in Photoshop by any means. But when I learn a new "trick" I jot down the essential points in the process. Then, when I am looking to do a particular task later, I can remember (look up) what the heck I'm supposed to do.

There are just so many sites out there that offer free Photoshop tips (and I thank them profusely!) but it's time consuming to have to go back weeks or months later to research what you've already done...if only infrequently.

That's why I started jotting down notes. Notes everywhere.

And that worked great for a while, until I started losing my notes.

Normally I love all things computer. It's amazing the power at your fingertips. But sometimes I find the old ways are still the best. For organizing my Photoshop tips, index cards were the answer. And here's why:

Tip Cards sit on my desk, in a box so I can refer to them quickly without disrupting my workflow on the computer. (Flipping screens has me "flipping out" in no time.)
Once I've found a cool tip or shortcut, I never have to remember how to do it. I have a my Tip Card "remember" for me!
Saves countless hours "surfing the net" trying to look-up techniques I would have forgotten.
I can shuffle through my Tip Card deck any time I feel my output is getting boring. I'm quickly reminded of a technique I hadn't used in awhile.

So there it is folks, my secret is out. A great (always growing) set of Photoshop Tip Cards let me plow through a pile of pre-printing processes in no time. Say that fast if you can!

I'll be sharing the tips on those cards, like the ones used to make the photo included here, in subsequent posts on this blog. So I hope you'll return often.

If you're in a hurry though, and seek semi-instant gratification, I'll be making a mini-pack of those cards available FREE, right here on this blog. Just as soon as I figure out how to get a sign-up widget going. Until then...

Go Photoshop Something!
(or, if you got time on your hands, "Google" me to find other helpful blogs and photos.

Robert Schwarztrauber, Photographer