Photoshop Compositing Secrets: Unlocking the Key to Perfect Selections and Amazing Photoshop Effects for Totally Realistic Composites

194 Pages·2011·2.6 MB·English

by  Matt Kloskowski

PUBLISHED BY
Peachpit Press
Copyright ©2012 by Kelby Corporate Management, Inc.
The Photoshop Compositing
Secrets Book Team
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Felix Nelson
ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR
Jessica Maldonado
TECHNICAL EDITORS
Kim Doty
Cindy Snyder
TRAFFIC DIRECTOR
Kim Gabriel
PRODUCTION MANAGER
Dave Damstra
PHOTOGRAPHY BY
Matt Kloskowski
SETUP SHOTS BY
Rafael Concepcion
Brad Moore
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This book is designed to provide information about compositing photography in
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To my grandparents, Catherine and Carl Zumbano. As a child,
you were there to spoil me. And as an adult, I’m proud to say
I’m able to share my children with you, so they can see just
how blessed I’ve been to have you in my life. The strength,
wisdom, and unconditional love you two have given me is
something I’ll always treasure. I love you guys!
1. Selection Secrets
When Photoshop CS5 came out in 2010, the natural question I heard from a
bunch of people was “What’s your favorite feature in CS5?” I’ve always
been into HDR photography and I think everyone thought I’d say HDR Pro
(the new and improved HDR feature in CS5). But it wasn’t. I immediately
found that the new features in the Refine Edge dialog were my favorite,
because just about everything we do in Photoshop involves a selection at
some point.
Today, I still stand by my favorite feature from over a year ago. Refine
Edge, combined with the Quick Selection tool, is absolutely the best
selection tool I’ve found in Photoshop, and most of the selections that we’ll
do in this book use this.
A Compositor’s Best Friends
When making selections, the Quick Selection tool and the newly enhanced
Refine Edge dialog are going to become your best friends. I’ve demonstrated
them in my classes since Photoshop CS5 came out and when people see the
results, you can actually hear the oohs and aahs in the crowd. One of my favorite
parts about them is that they’re really easy to use. The Quick Selection tool is
basically a brush, so if you can use a brush, you can use it. And, Refine Edge has
only a few settings that we really need to worry about. Trust me, you’ll have
them mastered in no time and be well on your way to killer selections.
STEP ONE:
Go ahead and open a photo with a person you’d like to extract from the
background. In this example, I’m using a photo of a person who is fairly well-
defined all around, but there is a little more detail in his hair. Don’t worry,
though, I just want to get through some of the basics in this tutorial. We’ll get to
the flyaway hair stuff later in the chapter.
STEP TWO:
Grab the Quick Selection tool from the Toolbox (or just press W) and start
painting over the subject in the photo. The Quick Selection tool works just like a
brush. It’s got Size and Hardness settings in the Brush Picker (up in the Options
Bar), just like most brushes do. So, if you’re selecting larger areas, then using a
larger brush is faster. You can press the Right Bracket (]) key to quickly make
the brush larger and paint in those areas.
STEP THREE:
The main idea behind the Quick Selection tool is that it’s quick. At this point,
just use a large brush and try to get as much of the subject selected as possible,
even if you miss some smaller areas or over-select some other parts. And you
don’t have to make the entire selection in one brush stroke. If you look at the left
side of the Options Bar, you’ll see three little icons: a brush with a dotted oval, a
brush with a dotted oval and + (plus sign), and a brush with a dotted oval and −
(minus sign). The Quick Selection tool is automatically always in Add mode (the
middle icon; and you’ll see a + in the middle of your brush). This means every
time you click-and-paint with the brush, it adds to the selection.
STEP FOUR:
I noticed a small area near the right edge of his shirt that wasn’t selected. So, I
zoomed in on this area (by pressing Command-+ [PC: Crtl-+] a couple times),
made the brush smaller by pressing the Left Bracket ([) key, and painted in that
area. Remember, the tool is automatically in Add mode, so it simply adds what I
just painted on to the overall selection.
STEP FIVE:
The Quick Selection tool got a little overzealous in the bottom-left part of the
photo (notice how I blamed the tool and not the user) and selected part of the
background. No problem. Remember how I said the Quick Selection tool is
always in Add mode? Well, you can temporarily put it into Subtract mode by
pressing-and-holding the Option (PC: Alt) key. You’ll see the − (minus sign)
symbol in the middle of your brush, which means that anything you paint will be
removed from the current selection. Now, just paint over any areas that shouldn’t
be selected.
STEP SIX:
It’s a good idea to try and get most of the subject selected here. Even if you have
to zoom in and spend a couple of minutes with a smaller brush, you’ll be happy
you did. Here, it also selected too much under his arm on the left, so I’ll put the
tool in Subtract mode again and paint to remove this from the selection. It
doesn’t have to be perfect, but you’ll want to have a good selection around the
subject before you move on.
STEP SEVEN:
Okay, now that we have a pretty good selection around the subject, let’s move on