Photoshop - easier than expected
Photoshop - easier than expected
Author
Discussion

rico

Original Poster:

7,917 posts

275 months

Thursday 17th February 2005
quotequote all
A thread on another car forum made me decide to have a quick go on Photoshop. Previously only used it for cropping and re-sizing but its amazed me how easy it is to get some arty farty effects in really short periods of time.

I took this pic a few weeks back:


Using the filter toolbar, i set it to ink outline:


Then went back to the original and changed it to watercolour

(doesn't show up as well than on the full-sized)

Then back to original then coloured pencil


I posted this as I'm sure there are many people like me who haven't got much of a clue about Photoshop, but these pics show that you can get some pretty cool results just by using one filter. Enjoy



>>> Edited by rico on Thursday 17th February 17:58

slinky

15,704 posts

269 months

Thursday 17th February 2005
quotequote all
I was pottering around yesterday and found an image that I rather liked from the Auto italia show last year...

So I threw it into PS and got this... :



Then I started fiddling a bit more this evening and came up with this strange effort...



but I'm not so sure about that one...

I'd intended to pick out the cars in spot colour, but the reflections always tend to look a little dodgy when the car is on grass... so I decided to do a weird selection and just use the colour in those areas..

thoughts?

slinky

>> Edited by slinky on Thursday 17th February 18:39

woody

2,189 posts

304 months

Thursday 17th February 2005
quotequote all
How do you pick out the colours? (looked at a few examples on here over the last couple of days!) but haven't got that far in the book yet!

Chris

slinky

15,704 posts

269 months

Thursday 17th February 2005
quotequote all
Create a new layer, desaturate the layer, then use the eraser to rub out the desaturated layer...

HTH,

slinky

rico

Original Poster:

7,917 posts

275 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
Slinky. Thats a long way round.

I've found by using lasoo tool to highlight the area you want, then use the colour tools to remove colour. If you want to leave an area coloured, highlight it, then click 'deselect' then remove the colour.

murph7355

40,772 posts

276 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
Layers are the way to go. Get used to using them and it'ss not much slower, plus gives you a lot more flexibility.

PS Is built around the layers concept.

CVP

2,799 posts

295 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
murph7355 said:
Layers are the way to go. Get used to using them and it'ss not much slower, plus gives you a lot more flexibility.

PS Is built around the layers concept.


I'd second this wholeheartedly. Always try and leave your original layer unchanged and then make changes as adjustment and copy layers. Then if you're not sure of changes you have made you just delete the layer and start that bit again. Layers are a very powerful tool.

Chris

slinky

15,704 posts

269 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
rico said:
Slinky. Thats a long way round.

I've found by using lasoo tool to highlight the area you want, then use the colour tools to remove colour. If you want to leave an area coloured, highlight it, then click 'deselect' then remove the colour.



But with the lasso you have to go thru the fiddly arse that is selection...

Layers and an eraser are far easier in my book..

slinky

TRACKDEMON

13,065 posts

281 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
The ultimate (and extremely easy!) way to do spot colour:

De-saturate / gray scale / apply B&W tones to your desire.

Use history brush to bring back colour on selected objects.

Thats it!

fatsteve

1,143 posts

297 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
I used to laso tool for spot colour and agree that it's much more fiddly, plus (and more importantly) it can create some harsh transitions between bw and colour.
I use one of the other recommended methods which is to destaturate the image and then use the history brush. the beauty of the history brush is that you can use an airbrush bush and hence create a smoother blend.

Steve

beano500

20,854 posts

295 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
TRACKDEMON said:
The ultimate (and extremely easy!) way to do spot colour:

De-saturate / gray scale / apply B&W tones to your desire.

Use history brush to bring back colour on selected objects.

Thats it!
Wow - that's so easy! Quick and dirty job - two minutes including finding the file and waititng for Photoshop to open!

dcw@pr

3,516 posts

263 months

Friday 18th February 2005
quotequote all
TRACKDEMON said:
The ultimate (and extremely easy!) way to do spot colour:

De-saturate / gray scale / apply B&W tones to your desire.

Use history brush to bring back colour on selected objects.

Thats it!


Actually there is another way, which can, depending on the specific photo, be much easier and produce better results. Go to Select>Color Range. You can then select a colour (or multiple colours by holding down the shift key), and the tolerance with which they are selected using the slider bar. There are a few different Preview modes too, so you can see exactly which bits you are selecting. When you are happy, press OK and you will have evrything you wanted selected, and all the edges will be feathered too.

This techniques is made or broken by the photo you are working on. You want the colour that you are selecting to only appear infrequently in the picture, for example a bunch of red roses being held by someone in a suit would be good, because the only red is in the flowers. A grey car on a dull day will not be able to be extracted using this technique, ever.

Actually, to be more specific, it doesn't matter if your chosen colour appears all over the photo, as long and it does not adjoin the area of that colour you want to isolate. Once you have made your selection (including the unwanted bits) it is very easy indeed to bin th ebits you don't want by doing a negative selection with the marquee/lasso tool. This is done by holding down one of the modifier buttons whilst selecting, I think it is CTRL, but a minus sign will come up next to the tool cursor symbol as opposed the the plus sign when you hold down shift.

I hope that all makes sense...

trackdemon

13,065 posts

281 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
But using the history brush is like painting the car, and is ergo far more enjoyable

dcw@pr

3,516 posts

263 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
trackdemon said:
But using the history brush is like painting the car, and is ergo far more enjoyable


can't argue with that!

clarkey

1,398 posts

304 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
Thanks for tip on layers and erasing, works really well:



Any other nice easy tips, or is there a book that you recommend?


Pah, can't get this damn picture embed thing to work though.

(ahhhhhh...that explains it. Cheers Rico).


>> Edited by clarkey on Saturday 19th February 21:46

rico

Original Poster:

7,917 posts

275 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all


(click 'quote' to see what i did)

TimW

3,848 posts

267 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
That looks really good rico, simple but very effective!!

rico

Original Poster:

7,917 posts

275 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
TimW said:
That looks really good rico, simple but very effective!!

If you mean the DB9... thanks!

The Porsche one was done by Clarkey... i just adjusted the [pic] codings

TimW

3,848 posts

267 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
both are really good. if u mix loads of filter effects u get great results! i just atempted this.

woody

2,189 posts

304 months

Saturday 19th February 2005
quotequote all
TRACKDEMON said:
The ultimate (and extremely easy!) way to do spot colour:

De-saturate / gray scale / apply B&W tones to your desire.

Use history brush to bring back colour on selected objects.

Thats it!



What and where is the 'history brush' - looked on the help file and in the book and can't find it I have PS Elements 2 - is it on there??