Chapter 4. Digital Imaging

Digital imaging is tough to nail down. One minute it's an abstract, futuristic-looking art piece on a company brochure, and the next it's a soft drink ad depicting a penguin in the Sahara. Real or surreal, literal or abstract, digital imaging is all about creativity and communication.

The fact is that with today's digital imaging toolsand some experienceyou can produce any artistic concept that pops into your head. You have all the creative freedom in the world. But don't go Photoshop-crazy just yet. When you take on a professional graphic design project, your creative ideas and digital imaging expertise have a single goal: communicating the client's message.

As we explore a wide range of digital imaging techniques in this chapter, from photo touch-ups to realistic scenes created from scratch, consider the images you see every day on packages, in magazines, and on billboards. What do they communicate to the audience? How have retouching and other artistic techniques helped get those messages across?

COURSE DEVELOPER: MATT KLOSKOWSKI

This lesson was developed by Adobe Certified Expert Matt Kloskowski, author of Extreme Photoshop, Illustrator Most Wanted, and other books on design.

Figure 4.1. Would you believe this image created by famous artist Bert Monroy is not a photo? This wow-inducer was painted from scratch in Photoshop.

In this chapter you will:

• Learn to use the Healing Brush tool and Patch tool to retouch blemishes in photographs.

• Learn to use the Color Replacement tool to change the hue of an area of a photo.

• Apply a Shadow/Highlight adjustment to quickly repair lighting problems in a photo.

• Learn to use Levels and Curves for precision lighting and color correction.

• Learn to use a variety of Filters to create abstract artwork and modify its properties.

• Explore the settings available in the advanced Brushes palette.

• Learn to create and save custom brushes.

• Create a photo-realistic image using custom brushes.