Photos That Never Were

[ LiB ]

Photos That Never Were

You've already seen some examples in earlier chapters of how layers , masks, opacity, and blend modes can help you blend together (or composite) separate images into one. And you've seen how the Warp Brush can be used to modify a photo. In this section, we'll look at a couple extended examples of compositing and warping.

Compositing Photos

For this example, we'll take the photos shown in Figure 10.25, placing the woman in the forest.

Figure 10.25. The components of the composite.

graphic/10fig25.gif


Here are the steps:

  1. Use your favorite method of isolating a figure to select the woman. The Freehand Selection tool in Point to Point mode is one possibility here. Don't hesitate, too, to use S elections > E dit Selection to refine your selection. Feather the selection a bit, as shown in Figure 10.26.

    Figure 10.26. Feathered selection around figure.

    graphic/10fig26.gif


  2. Copy the selection by pressing Ctrl+C, and then paste it as a new layer into the forest image with E dit > P aste > Paste As New L ayer (or press Ctrl+L).

  3. The woman needs to be resized and repositioned. With the new layer the active layer, choose the Deform tool. Drag inside the bounding box to reposition the woman. With the right mouse button depressed, drag one of the corner handles to resize the figure while maintaining its original aspect ratio. Adjust the positioning if you need to. The result should look something like what's shown in Figure 10.27.

    Figure 10.27. Resizing and repositioning the figure.

    graphic/10fig27.gif


  4. Now to adjust the lighting on the woman. Using the Freehand Selection tool set to Freehand, define a rough selection around the woman's feet and left arm and the lower part of her dress, as shown in Figure 10.28. Feather the selection a bit, and then promote the selection to a layer with S elections > P romote Selection to Layer and deselect with Ctrl+D.

    Figure 10.28. Selecting the lower part of the figure.

    graphic/10fig28.gif


  5. Choose A djust > B rightness and Contrast > Cur v es. To create a shadow, define a curve like the one shown in Figure 10.29.

    Figure 10.29. Creating a shadow.

    graphic/10fig29.gif


  6. Now to lighten the upper part of the woman. Choose the Selection tool and set the to Ellipse. Select around the upper part of the woman. Feather the selection a bit. The result should look something like what you see in Figure 10.30.

    Figure 10.30. Selecting the upper part of the figure.

    graphic/10fig30.gif


  7. Make the original woman layer the active layer, and then promote the selection to a layer and deselect. Set the Blend Mode of the new layer to Dodge and set the Opacity to 10. Deselect. The image as it looks now, along with the layer structure so far, is shown in Figure 10.31.

    Figure 10.31. The image and its structure so far.

    graphic/10fig31.gif


  8. As a final touch, let's make the woman look like she's actually standing on the forest floor. Make the uppermost layer the active layer, and then click the New Raster Layer button in the Layer palette. Choose the Clone Brush, selecting Aligned mode and Sample merged in the Tool Options palette. Click the rocky area close to the woman's feet, and then paint over her feet so that some parts are hidden behind rock. The final result should look like what you see in Figure 10.32.

    Figure 10.32. The woman's feet planted firmly on the ground.

    graphic/10fig32.gif


Digital Face-Lift

In this section, we'll use the Warp Brush and Clone Brush to return a middle-aged woman to her youth, beginning with a photo like the one in Figure 10.33. (You can use any similar photo to work through this example.)

Figure 10.33. The original photo.

graphic/10fig33.gif


All right, now for the fountain of youth.

  1. Begin by choosing the Warp Brush. Click the Push button in the Tool Options palette, and set the brush size rather large. Then use the large brush to lift the woman's sagging cheeks, as shown in Figure 10.34.

    Figure 10.34. Raising the cheeks.

    graphic/10fig34.gif


  2. Again using a large brush, push the droopy jowls up, as in Figure 10.35.

    Figure 10.35. Eliminating the jowls.

    graphic/10fig35.gif


  3. Reduce the brush size, and then gently pull up the corners of the mouth just a little, as in Figure 10.36.

    Figure 10.36. Lifting the corners of the mouth.

    graphic/10fig36.gif


  4. Now for a step many folks forget about: fixing the neck. Go back to a large brush, and then push the neck in a little, as in Figure 10.37.

    Figure 10.37. Slimming the neck.

    graphic/10fig37.gif


  5. Switch to the Clone Brush, to clone away the wrinkles . Set the Opacity of the brush quite lowabout 30 or less is fine. Right-click in an area close to the wrinkle, and then click on the wrinkle itself. Click multiple times, resampling as you need to, to gradually soften the wrinkle. Do the same with other wrinkles. And as Figure 10.38 shows, you should remember the neck as well as the face.

    Figure 10.38. Smoothing the wrinkles.

    graphic/10fig38.gif


  6. As you're working, change the brush size as needed, and dab rather than drag. Keep in mind that the idea here isn't to totally eliminate every line and crease . Even young people have a few lines, and you want to be sure that your edited image looks like a real person, not like a circus clown or a store mannequin . Figure 10.39 shows a side-by-side comparison of the original photo and the completed face-lifted version.

    Figure 10.39. Before (left) and after (right).

    graphic/10fig39.gif


NOTE

graphic/p1.gif TIP

You can use something like this method in reverse to age a young person, too. Use the Warp Brush to create sags instead of eliminating them, and clone some wrinkles from one photo onto your target photo.

Creating a Panorama

There are software applications such as Jasc's Paint Shop Photo Album that have a built-in facility for creating a panorama from a series of photos. But you can also create a panorama from scratch with Paint Shop Pro without too much extra effort.

You need to start out with two or more photos that you've taken. First take a photo at one end of the scene, then pivot to take the next shot, then pivot to take the next shot, and so on. The photos should be shot so that there's about a 50 percent overlap between adjacent shots. For this example, I'll use the three shots of a desert scene shown in Figure 10.40. (See the color plate section for color versions of these photos.)

Figure 10.40. Beginning with three separate photos.

graphic/10fig40.gif


Here's how to put the photos together to create a seamless panorama:

  1. Open a new image canvas that's large enough to hold all three photos side by side. It's a good idea to have some extra vertical space, because the photos probably won't line up exactly.

  2. Copy the first photo and paste it as a new layer in your new image canvas. Position it as needed. See Figure 10.41, where the leftmost desert photo is pasted in as a layer over a transparent image canvas.

    Figure 10.41. Pasting in the first photo.

    graphic/10fig41.gif


  3. Copy the next photo and paste it as a new layer. Position it as needed. If you need to line the layer up with the previous layer, use I mage > R otate > F ree Rotate or the Straighten tool to do so. The result should look something like what you see in Figure 10.42.

    Figure 10.42. Positioning the second photo.

    graphic/10fig42.gif


  4. Repeat step 3 with the third photo. You'll then have something like what you see in Figure 10.43.

    Figure 10.43. Positioning the third photo.

    graphic/10fig43.gif


    NOTE

    graphic/p1.gif TIP

    To help position the pasted-in layer correctly, temporarily reduce the layer's Opacity so you can see the layer below. When you're finished positioning the layer, reset the layer's Opacity to 100.

  5. Use the Eraser with a soft brush setting to make the seams between the three image layers less sharp. You can also use the Clone Brush to edit the seams and to add content where the background of the image canvas shows through along the edges of the image.

  6. If necessary, adjust the color, brightness, and contrast of the layers so that they match one another. Then crop your panorama image so that none of the canvas background is left. The final result should look something like what's shown in Figure 10.44. (See the color plate section for a color version.)

    Figure 10.44. The completed panorama.

    graphic/10fig44.gif


[ LiB ]


Paint Shop Pro 8 Power
Paint Shop Pro 8 Power!
ISBN: B001QCXEI6
EAN: N/A
Year: 2006
Pages: 125
Authors: Lori J. Davis

flylib.com © 2008-2017.
If you may any questions please contact us: flylib@qtcs.net