Section 9.3. Photoshop Features Especially Useful for Making Montages

9.3. Photoshop Features Especially Useful for Making Montages

Making montages can be much more complex than making collages because the bits and pieces of photos that make up the whole have to look as though they were all photographed in the same place and at the same time. That is, the angle of lighting of objects in the background photo has to match in the lighting of the imported objects. So does the color temperature, the perspective, and the angle of view of each imported object. To make matters worse, it is often impossibleor at least impracticalto find photos that are an exact match. This section will show you some Photoshop features that help you credibly fake the appearance of the matching photo. Especially notable among these features are the new Warp and Smart Object.

9.3.1. The Smart Object Advantage

Smart Object is a new feature in Photoshop CS2 that can go a long way toward minimizing the horrendous degree of destructive editing that traditionally occurs when combining photographs. The basic idea of the Smart Object is that one image can be used in multiple documents or places in the same document without ever really being there. The Smart Object is simply stored in its own file (which acquires a PSB extension) and mathematically referenced to as the needed changes in appearance happen when that image appears in another place. Moreover, there's no limit to the number of other places in which it can appear. You could, for instance, have a whole flock of birds flying across a sky in different sizes and rotational and transformational attitudes. Even after all this, nothing has really happened to the original image of the bird.

NOTE

Smart Object maintains this nondestructive editing capability as long as you don't change the bits in the image, which presently only can happen by converting the layer back into a bitmap or changing the original image's bitmap. Operations that can occur only on a rasterized or bitmapped image include most filter effects, painting on the image, and changing the adjustments in the image itself. However, when it comes to making adjustments or adding effects, you may be able to simply add a Blend Mode or adjustment layer to the Smart Object as a Clipping Layer, so that you don't have to affect the Smart Object itself.

I knowit sounds too good to be true. Figure 9-4 shows one portion of one Smart Object that has been combined into a sort of supernatural kaleidoscope. All of the pieces of this kaleidoscopic image are layers derived from the same Smart Object.

Figure 9-4. Warping the Smart Object into the desired shape.

9.3.1.1. Warping a smart object

Another new feature of CS2 that can have a positive impact on making composites (whether they be collage or montage) is a new Options Bar choice for Freeform Transformations that allows you to actually warp the shape of the image. Click the new Warp icon on the right side of the Options bar and you'll be switched to warp mode. You can see the Freeform Transform Options Bar in warp mode in Figure 9-4.

If you want the Smart Object to originate at the same size as its original image, just choose the original image and copy its contents to the clipboard. Then open the target image and paste (Cmd/Ctrl-V). Open the Layers palette, right-click on the pasted layer to show the in-context menu, and choose Group Into New Smart Object. Now, press Cmd/Ctrl-T to Transform the object and scale it to the size in which it will be used most often in the new image. The next two sections will show you how this image became a part of a completed montage.

9.3.2. Making a Montage with a Warped Smart Object

In Figure 9-5 I put together several versions of the image on the left, resulting in the kaleidoscope on the right.

Figure 9-5. On the right, a kaleidoscopic montage made from four Smart Objects, all derived from the photo at left.

This is how you make a kaleidoscope montage:

1. Open the original of the image or images that you want to use as Smart Objects. This can be a Camera Raw image that you've opened in Photoshop, as long as it wasn't saved as a Photoshop file since the collage will reference the RAW image. Your collage will remember the Camera Raw settings that were used in the Smart Object.

2. Open the background image for your montage and paste in the clipboard image.

3. Go to the Layers palette and right click on the new layer. From the resulting in-context menu, choose Group into New Smart layer.

4. While the new layer is still selected, press Cmd/Ctrl-T to go into Free Transform. Scale the image to the size you want it to be by pressing Shift and dragging a corner handle.

5. Once the image is the right size, and while it's still in Transform mode, click the Warp mode icon. You'll now see a grid around the layer's image with 12 control handles. If you drag on any of these, a curve control handle will appear. In this instance, I dragged the handles into the positions you see in Figure 9-6. You can drag the curve control handle to stretch the image in the direction you drag it. Also, if you drag inside any of the nine grid sections you can warp that portion of the image uniformly. In this example, I dragged the handles into the positions I wanted. When you like what you've done, press Return/Enter or click the Commit icon in the Options bar.

   Figure 9-6. Drag the handles to your desired shape.

6. Copy this layer three more times. Use Free Transform to rotate each layer 90 degrees and then drag the result so that the foot of the branches is in the dead center of the image.

7. To create a background the normal wayby knocking it outwould force you to rasterize each layer. Rasterization would then disqualify it as a Smart Object. So, to work around that place each layer in a Blend Mode that causes the background to be revealed. In this example, Multiply works quite well.

9.3.3. Knockout Knockouts

One thing you must almost always do when adding objects to a background photo is to seamlessly remove the object from its background. Making believable knockouts is mostly a matter of knowing which selection tools to use and which technique to use for a given subject type. Table 9-1 gives you the basic guidelines to follow.

NOTE

If the knockout is a combination of the above subject types, you will need to use software such as the Photoshop Extract filter, Ultimatte Advantage, onOne Mask Pro 3, or Fluid Mask from Vertustech.com

Table 9-1. Extraction Tool Guidelines

Subject type	Command or technique
Complex edges, e.g., flying hair, feathers, transparency	Extract filter or third-party knockout tool, such as Ultimatte AdvantEdge or onOne Mask Pro 3
Soft edges, transitional edges	Extract filter
Manufactured objects, fruit	Pen or Magnetic Pen tool
Large areas of solid color, such as skies and walls	SelectSelect Color
Wiggly edges	Magnetic Lasso

9.3.3.1. Manual knockouts and transitional edges

If the edges are smooth and geometric, you want your selection edges to be equally smooth and geometric. To select these edges, especially for a knockout, you should use the Pen tool as much as possible. You're probably already aware that the Pen tool draws geometric shapes called vector curves. These originated in drawing programs. Not only do they draw perfectly smooth edges, but these forms can be edited quickly and with a great deal of precision. They can also be stored with the file and in far less memory than the bitmapped edges formed with any of the selection tools, such as the Lasso. Figure 9-7 shows a selection drawn around a manufactured object and the resultant knockouts.

Figure 9-7. The selection on the left was made with the Pen tool. Note that this path can be easily and precisely reshaped by dragging either the control points or the curve handles. At right is the resultant knockout and montage.

Here are the steps taken to make this selection:

1. Choose the Freeform Pen tool from the Pen tools menu. In its Options bar, check the Magnetic box. Click the inverted arrow just to the right of the shape icons and choose the Freeform Pen options shown in Figure 9-8. Also, make sure the Add mode is checked.

   Figure 9-8. The fit resolution options for the Magnetic Pen tool.

2. Drag carefully along the edge of the shape you want to select. Absolute precision isn't necessary at this point and speed is essential. On the other hand, don't be blatantly sloppy. Be sure to close the path.

3. Zoom in to 100 percent and then use the Hand tool to follow the path. Choose the Select Path (white) arrow just above the Pen tool and click on the path so that you can see the control points. Use the white Direct Selection tool to select and drag a point you want to move. When you do, its control handles will appear, protruding on either side of its anchor points. Drag the anchor points to align the path with the edge you are selecting. Then use the control points to shape the curve (see Figure 9-9).

   Figure 9-9. A close up of the curve path showing anchor points and control handles.

4. You may need to edit some of the points. If you have too many points, you can remove the extras by choosing the Subtract Point Pen (it has a minus sign next to its icon) and clicking on the unwanted point. If you want to make a corner point from a curve point, choose the Convert Point tool and click the point. If you use the Convert Point tool to click and drag on a point, a new Control Handle will appear in the direction you are dragging.

5. Make sure the Paths palette is open and save the path (from the Paths palette menu, choose Save Path). When the dialog opens, enter a name for this path.

6. Convert the path to a selection and feather it slightly so that you'll have an edge that blends with the image you are going to composite it into. If it's a hard-edged object like the one in Figure 9-9, keep the feathering to a small number of pixels. Depending on the overall size of the item, 15 pixels should do.

7. Invert the selection (Cmd/Ctrl-Shift-I) and press Delete/Backspace. The image outside the selection is now transparent. Save your image. When you want to place it into an image, open your knockout image at the same time. Press Cmd/Ctrl-A to select all, then Cmd/Ctrl-C to copy it. Activate the target image's window and press Cmd/Ctrl-V to paste it into place. See the section "Matching a Knockout to Its Background" later in this chapter for instructions on sizing, lighting, and shadow casting.

NOTE

Sometimes you'll have an object that is transparent or semi-transparent inside its boundaries. You'll have the most control over the blending and shape of this transparency if you add a blank mask to your knockout layer after the knockout has been placed into the target image. Use the Magic Wand to select the transparent area in the layer and click the Mask icon. Your shape will be masked. Now select the mask (a frame appears around the mask in the Layers palette) and use the Brush tool to paint white inside the mask as appropriate. You will get as much transparency as the opacity of the white paint you use allows.

Regardless of the technique used, if the surface of what you knockout is even slightly reflective, you will probably have some traces of the original background color around the edges. This reflected color is easily eliminated. Choose the Brush tool and choose Color from the Options bar's Mode menu. Go to the Layers palette and click the Lock Transparency icon. Press Opt/Alt to momentarily convert the Brush to an Eyedropper and click in an untinted portion of the item to pick up its color. Now, just brush over the reflected color from the old background. When you place the same knockout into a target image, you can do that same thing, but this time pick up the color from the layer that will be the background image. You can see the result of the re-coloring in Figure 9-10.

Figure 9-10. This cutout was made with the help of one of the Frames Custom Shape tools. You could also use Layer Style to bevel the edges of shapes and to cast shadows.

9.3.3.2. Using the Extract filter

The images that are really tough to knockout are those that are in a complex background, have highly irregular edges (flying hair), or very soft edges (semi-transparent or blurs). Fortunately, Photoshop 7+ comes with a tool called the Extract filter, which improves with every new edition of Photoshop. It's not the most sophisticated of the knockout tools, but you don't have to pay extra for it. And most of the time, with a little practice, you can do a credible job of making the knockout. The lady with the hula-hoop in Figure 9-11 was knocked out with the Extract filter. Figure 9-12 shows you the original image and the resultant knockout. To do this:

Figure 9-11. The subject was knocked out with the Extract filter.

Figure 9-12. The Extract dialog box.

1. Open the image you want to knockout and immediately choose Image Duplicate. There's no hot-key for this, so make yourself an Action to do this and then assign that Action a hot-key that you're not using for anything else. You should always duplicate any image that you're going to do very destructive things to so that you can use the messed-up image as a layer without destroying the original.

2. Since the Extract tool won't extract from the background layer of an image, in the Layers palette, double-click the background layer of the duplicated image. When the New Layer dialog appears, enter knockout and the subject name as the name of the new layer.

3. Make sure the Knockout layer is still selected and then choose FilterExtract. The Extract dialog shown in Figure 9-12 appears. Double-click the Zoom tool to make the preview window show the image at full (1:1) resolution.

5. Choose Gray Matte from the Display Menu in the Preview Options. This will temporarily place a neutral gray background behind the preview image so that you can more easily see what edge corrections need to be made.

6. Choose the Fill (bucket) tool and click inside the Highlighter selection. It will fill with blue. If the blue fills the entire image, you have a space in your Marker selection. Simply zoom in to 1:1, press the spacebar to pan, and pan around until you find the gap(s). Then use the Marker to fill them in. Then use the Fill tool again. Repeat until only the area inside the marker is filled with blue.

7. Click the Preview button. You will see Figure 9-13, which clearly shows the goofs made by the Marker selection. You can either try a new Marker selection or use the cleanup tools. The cleanup tools are those that have a tool in front of a Mask icon. The Brush cleanup tool erases edges with some intelligence. Press Opt/Alt to make it replace instead of erase. The Marker cleanup tool smooths and cleans up edges. It either does a great job or really messes things up. If it's the latter, quickly press Cmd/Ctrl-Z to undo and use the Brush cleanup tool.

   Figure 9-13. Extract in Preview mode, so you can easily see what needs cleaning up.

   When you're cleaning up edges, it really helps to switch background colors. Then you can see all the colors that need cleaning up, whereas grays may not be visible against gray, etc.

8. Once you've finished your cleanup, click the OK button. You see the result in the righthand image in Figure 9-11.

Third-Party Compositing Tools

There are a couple of tools that make parts of the compositing process much easier.

The first tool, onOne Mask Pro, originally made by Extensis, was recently acquired by onOne. Mask Pro is a third-party plug-in for Photoshop that does quite a good job of knocking out both smooth and fuzzy-edged images. Available for both Mac (Universal code yet to come) and PC at a reasonable $199.95, it is quite versatile for its price. If you've lit the background evenly enough and in such a way as to minimize reflections, you can knockout almost anything in a totally realistic way.

There are two main tools for designating what should be kept and what should be thrown away: Marker and Eyedropper. The Eyedropper tool is best used when you have a plain-colored background. You simply click the three or four most different shades in the background and foreground. You then use a Magic Brush tool to remove all the colors that should be thrown out. It's an excellent tool for removing a colored background from a portrait or a furry animal. You can see in Figure 9-14 how well it separated the teen model's hair from the background. The beauty of this technique is that, because you don't brush inside the object to be kept, there's no chance of knocking out details that are the same color as the background.

Figure 9-14. The onOne Mask Pro interface showing a portrait that is being knocked out with the Eyedropper and Magic Brush tools.

The Marker tool works best when you have a complex background and object that contain many colors. It's similar to the technique used in the Extract tool. Use the Green Marker to designate the area to be deleted and the Orange Marker to designate the area that will be kept. You then use the Magic Bucket to click in the area that will be knocked out. As you can see in the toolbox in Figure 9-14, there are also numerous tools for cleanup. To find out more, go to www.ononesoftware.com.

The second tool is Ultimatte AdvantEdge, which is designed strictly for removing matte green and matte blue (aka green screen and blue screen) backgrounds. You have to shoot in a studio to use these backgrounds. The other piece of bad news is the cost of this plug-in: $1,495. That's roughly twice the price of Photoshop CS2 at full retail. Yet an amazing number of pros buy this package. Why? Because it does a perfect or near-perfect job of knocking out even the most complex images from their backgrounds. Furthermore, you can do it in seconds. Pretty much all you have to do is open the image you want to knock out in the plug-in, click once on the background, click a button telling the program to process, and then watch for a miracle. To find out more, go to www.ultimatte.com.

9.3.3.3. Using the Select Color command

When you want to knockout a solid color background but you're having trouble getting exactly what you want from the programs mentioned above, give the Select Color command a try. It's right in Photoshop and won't cost you a penny extra. The main secret to getting what you want is learning how to judge the setting of the Fuzziness slider. Find a photograph that has been taken against a reasonably solid color background and open it in Photoshop. Then:

1. Choose SelectColor Range. The Color range dialog, shown in Figure 9-15, will appear.

   Figure 9-15. You can see that the main portion of the selection is well defined, although you'll want to use Quick Mask Mode after the selection is made to "paint over" details inside the selection that you don't want selected.

2. Choose the method of color selection you want to use from the Select menu. I don't have room to show you that menu here, but your choices are: Sampled Colors; any of the primary RGB colors or their complements, highlights, midtones, or shadows; and Out of Gamut. For making knockouts from solid color backgrounds or taking out monotone skies, the best choice is usually Sampled Colors.

3. Choose Quick Mask from the Selection Preview menu. You'll now be able to see exactly what is selected when you drag the Fuzziness slider. You'll also see the orange quick mask superimposed over your image.

4. If, in the preview window, you still see areas of color that haven't been selected, choose the + Eyedropper and click on those colors until everything you want is selected.

5. Drag the Fuzziness slider as far to the right as you can without letting the Quick Mask cover any of the image that you want to knock out. The most important thing is to get the edges right. You can always fix the Quick Mask after the fact, as I'll show you in a second.

6. When you have the Fuzziness and the selected colors just right, click the OK button.

7. You'll see a selection marquee appear on your image. You will probably want to mask some of the interior details in this selection, so click the Quick Mask icon in the Toolbox. The orange mask will re-appear on the image. Press D to make sure your foreground color is pure black and the background colors is pure white.

8. Choose the Brush tool and set its Opacity at 100 percent and its Blend Mode to Normal and paint over any interior details that aren't fully masked. If the image you're masking is as geometric as our example, you can just make a selection inside its boundaries the then choose EditFillBlack. In Figure 9-16, you can see what the fully masked image looks like in Quick Mask mode and what the resulting knockout looks like.

   Figure 9-16. Using Quick Mask mode to knock out this building.

9. Save your knockout, duplicate it, and drag the duplicate into a layer in your composite image.