Chapter 11: Using Filters

Overview

In This Chapter

• Using the new Filter Gallery

• Sharpening an image

• Using the Unsharp Mask filter

• Blurring a background to add selective focus

• Creating a watercolor

• Embossing an image

• Giving an image the appearance of motion

• Using the new Lens Blur filter

• Using layer masks for interesting filter effects

• Adding a Photo Filter adjustment layer

• Fading filter effects

• All the filters illustrated

If you’re a photographer, or if you’ve taken a photography course or two, you know how photographic filters work. Filters refine or refract light to modify the image as it comes into the camera. A daylight filter strains some of the blue out of the image; a polarization lens eliminates reflected light; a fish-eye lens refracts peripheral imagery into the photo.

So what do these photographic filters have to do with Photoshop? Glad you asked. Among the many tools and features that Photoshop has to offer, filters are (in my mind) possibly the coolest of all. Photoshop’s filters can quickly add subtle effects or amazing distortions. For instance, you can apply artistic effects that make an image look like it’s been painted with oils or created with mosaic tiles. You can use the Blur or Sharpen filters to subtly retouch an image. Apply distortion filters to make an image look like it’s been engraved or embossed. And you can combine any number of filter effects using selections, layers, and layer masks.

Filters open up a whole new range of opportunities that no other Photoshop function quite matches. Filters can make poor images look better and good images look fantastic. And you can use them to introduce special effects, such as camera movement and relief textures. You have nearly 100 filters to play with in Photoshop. This chapter can’t cover all of them in detail. Color Plate 11-1 shows you several filters in color.