Adobe Photoshop Brushes Techniques

Author: David Peters

Brushes are the core component of many tools in the toolbox, and confident brush handling is essential for the effective application of these. You need to master brushes because this gives you many ways in which you can use and edit brushes will equip you with a whole new set of skills, and give you access to a wide range of powerful and creative time-saving techniques.



The Brush Preset picker will help you to find the right brush fast so make the most of it



With some Photoshop tools, such as the Clone Stamp, the Brush Preset picker is used simply to edit the tool's brush size, softness and opacity.



Because the Clone Stamp's function is to subtly replace one area of pixels with another, you don't need its brush tip to be shaped like a rubber duck, for example!



However you can use the Brush Preset picker to arm yourself with a variety of creatively-shaped brushes, should your project require them. Working smarter with the Brush Preset picker means maximising its potential. If you're not already familiar with this interface.



The Brush Preset Picker



Click on the Brustic to open the Brush Preset picker, and scroll down to see the default set of brushes.



Towards the foot of the list of default brushes you'll find a variety of unusually-shaped brush tips, including brushes shaped like stars and blobs.



Click on the picker's menu icon to access other, specialised sets of brushes. You can use the picker's menu to display a thumbnail of the brush stroke, or set it to show the brush tip and name.



The numerical value indicates the brush's initial diameter in pixels. You can customise this to suit your requirements. When you select a new set of brushes, you can either replace the existing default set or append the new set to it so you can use both.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With Easy To Follow Instantly Accessible Online Video Tutorials. photoshop 7 brushes

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/adobe-photoshop-brushes-techniques-125079.html

Basic Photoshop Tutorials Using The Eraser Tool

Author: David Peters

Have an object with edges you want to isolate? This is one way to use the Background Eraser tool.



The Magic Eraser is often used to blast large areas that contain unwanted pixels. It certainly can be effective if you want to get fast results, but it is less than subtle. This works well when you want to eliminate big areas of color that you don't need. It is not always as useful when you are working with areas that are more intricate.



This is one of the reasons that Photoshop is so great. This program provides the user with lots of selection tool choices. Each tool has its own options that can be

customized.



Now, there are some kinds of selection jobs that work better with the Background Eraser than with the actual Magic Eraser.



The Background Eraser is more versatile and gives you greater control over some of the more difficult tasks. For instance, if you are selecting intricately shaped objects, the Background Eraser may be the tool for the job.



Let's say you want to isolate your image in your picture by removing the sky. The sky consists of edges that may prove difficult to work with. Remove the sky along with the detailed edges using the Background Eraser tool.



Some selection tools would not be able to handle the job because of the position of the crenulations and the arches of the towers. This makes it very tricky when you want to try to remove the sky that is hidden among all of that other stuff.



Here is the way that you can work with the Background Eraser tool to accomplish the above task. You can cut out the complex shapes easily using the Background Eraser. Now you may need to spend a little time fiddling with the options to get the most use of the tool when you are working on a complex project such as this one.



Begin by selecting the tool from the toolbox and in the options bar you will want to set the Sampling option to Once. Sample a section of the blue sky by clicking and the

background swatch icon will change color.



This lets you know the pixels that are headed for deletion. If you hold the mouse button down and spray the eraser's brush around the image you will be able to get rid of all the pixels of the same color.



Pixels of other colors will not be removed as you spray around the edge of the building. If you want the best results you can tweak the Tolerance setting.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With Easy To Follow Instantly Accessible Online Video Tutorials. Photoshop tutorials for beginners.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/basic-photoshop-tutorials-using-the-eraser-tool-128773.html

Adobe Toolbox Photoshop 7 Tutorials

Author: David Peters

You've probably been hanging out to get stuck into the very nifty Photoshop toolbox. In this article I'll introduce some of the most frequently used tools found in the toolbox.



You'll notice that some of the tool icons have small black triangles in their bottom right-hand corners. These icons contain hidden treasures! The triangle indicates that there are more related tools available; if you click on the tool icon and hold it down, a "flyout" menu will appear, displaying the additional tools.



Selection Tools:

You can use the selection tools to select certain areas of your document for editing. If you use a selection tool, only the area that's selected will be affected by any changes you make. You can "feather" selections (specify a fuzzy radius for them) using the Feather field in the options bar.



Marquee tools (M) are used to create rectangular or elliptical selections, including selections that are "single row" (one pixel tall, stretching across the entire width of the document) and "single column" (one pixel wide, tretching through the entire height of the document).



To make single-row or single-column selections, click with the appropriate tool on the image area where you want to select a row or column. You can use the Lasso tools (L) to create freeform selections.



The Lasso Tool comes in three different forms:



Lasso Tool (L) Click and drag the Lasso Tool to draw a selection area. Releasing the mouse button will close the selection by joining the start and end points with a straight line.



Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) Click at different points to create vertices of a polygonal shape. Close the selection by moving your cursor to the beginning and clicking once, or pressing the Enter key.



Magnetic Lasso Tool (L) If you think you need help with making your selection, try the Magnetic Lasso Tool. Photoshop will attempt to make a "smart" selection by following the edges of contrast and color difference. Click once near the "edge" of an object and follow around it-Photoshop will automatically lay down a path.



You can also click as you follow the line to force points to be created on the path. Close the selection by pressing the Enter key or clicking at a point near the beginning of the selection. The Magnetic Lasso Tool is not available in ImageRead

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With Easy To Follow Online Photoshop Video Tutorials. Full Details Here: tutorials photoshop

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/adobe-toolbox-photoshop-7-tutorials-125265.html

Advanced Photoshop Fun

Author: David Peters

If you've gotten a good handle on the basics of Adobe Photoshop and just want to take a few tutorials to learn some advanced speedy little tricks here are some neat online Photoshop tutorials to try.



The very newest of the Photoshop tutorials is the lesson on replacing color. This will teach you not only how to replace color throughout the image, but how to go about replacing a series of the same color in various shades with the same kind of color gradient in a different color.



You can take part in this Photoshop tutorial from the vendor's Web site or can download it as a PDF and read it at your leisure.



Should you have no Adobe Acrobat reader installed on your computer you'll need that to use the PDF but it's easily downloaded from the site at no charge in just a few quick seconds.



Another of the clever Photoshop tutorial lessons is the means to form your Photoshop text in a circle. This circular text formatting has traditionally called for a vector but the version 5 lets you create your circular text with much more ease, and no vector.



This Photoshop tutorial, as with the other advanced training programs, can be read online or with a downloadable PDF.



For those of you who like the creative effect of a curling page you can learn how to do this with a Photoshop tutorial as well. In the same lessons you can learn to use Adobe paths and to create gradients of your own.



One whimsical little Adobe Photoshop trick taught through tutorials is called flag in the wind. Created at the request of several Photoshop users who logged onto Usenets, the technique teaches photographers how to use Photoshop's displace filter to create the look of a breezy movement.



Once the above techniques have been mastered additional advanced Photoshop tutorials teaching things like custom interfaces, and the quick photo effects of masking. One of the fun uses for this tactic is to take one head and place it on the body of another person. Everyone needs that technique right?



Some of the Photoshop tutorials are specific to materials and fabric. Tutorial number nine, for example, teaches the use of Adobe Photoshop with metal, while the next lesson number ten teaches the use of wood as a Photoshop material.



Textured spheres and round buttons can be designed with Photoshop with any material once you've taken the basic materials lessons.



Wood texture tutorials teach bevel and button creations, while metal textures can be used for interfaces as well.



GIF lessons are important additions to your Photoshop basic tutorials. GIFs are not that easy to master, but their transparency is the reason they're still important.



You can tackle runny text lessons in advanced tutorials too. Just in case you have a bent for the bloody, say at Halloween time, you can learn this point and click technique with Photoshop classes.



Other advanced Photoshop tutorials teach gold and raised text creation, soft text with a beveled look and an alien skin, chrome and textured 3-D text, and layered masking.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With Easy To Follow Online Photoshop Video Tutorials. Full Details Here: www.learnphotoshopnow.com

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/computers-articles/advanced-photoshop-fun-87565.html

Using Photoshop Actions to Make Ecovers

Author: Grant Freeman

When you hear talk about product marketing, you hear words like, ecovers, ecover generators, and even using photoshop actions and templates to make CD Covers, DVD Covers, Ebook Covers for your products.

If you're selling information products, you want a quick and smiple solution for getting your customers familiar with your product, and increasing sales volume.

The buzz about using ecover software and Photoshop as a time & money-saving alternative started around May of 2003 when several web marketers found thier nitche, and the idea was successful.

Andrew Jackson of MGI Software, an Internet software and services company, says that "there is a 30% increase in sales and a 50% reduction in returned goods with the use of 3D imaging." – Los Angeles Business Journal, December 17, 2000

Do a search on DVD Cover Designs, CD Cover Designs, or eBook Covers, and you'll find a handful of website that sell a kit specifically designed to save you time and money.

Photographers and Graphic designers charge you between $50 to $80 per hour for the work.

When a highly respected product photographer takes a photo, more than likely it will be digitized into Photoshop for color correction and enhancement. Using photoshop for making ecovers just makes perfect sense.

"A growing number of e-businesses are experimenting with the rapidly emerging field of three-dimensional web technology. Others are counting on 3-D to add new levels of excitement and realism to e-commerce websites (...) Photo realism really enhances believability."
CIO Magazine, "3-D Finally Gets Serious"

Some of what you may find are packages containing pre-made Photoshop templates and Photoshop Actions that let you add your own text, have full control of fonts, background images, colors, and even add effects that best match your product or company brand.

Photoshop actions work well because the actions are nothing more than a series of recorded tasks that have already taken place in order to create the stunning ecover.

The awesome combination between premade photoshop templates and actions work much better than the ecover generator sofware for several reasons:

1) You're working with relyable software from a wellknown company like Adobe. You know that the software is stable and is used by design industry professionals.

2) Free Trial Versions are most always available to try for free.

3) The people behind the photoshop ecover designs are more than likely graphic designers. Check thier work for attention to detail depending on how realistic and professional looking you want your ecover to be.

4) Unlike software "generators", you are limited to the effects and options that are knowhere near the expertise, freedom, flexiblility, and raw power of Photoshop & actions.

Where product photographers require you bring your products and to come to their in house studio and pay around $50.00 per hour (not including setup fees), automated product cover software allows you to design and upload a professional image of your product in less than a few hours.

With the speed of automating a 3 dimensional image that looks just as good as the real thing in under 5 minutes, that is cost effective!

But buyer beware. Some automated product cover design packages are not created equal. Most only allow you to make images of your products at only 72 dpi, while others like Grant's 5-Minute DVD, CD, and Ebook Cover Designs and Actions for Photoshop (http://www.designbygrant.com/marketing-products.php) allow you to create images at up to 300 dpi.

This means that you can take full advantage of almost every marketing effort you can think of, including:

-Product Posters & Billboards

-HDTV Broadcast Comericals

-Trade show banners and backdrops

What's the best part you ask? That's simple. The best part is that if you already have Photoshop, you can save hours and even days to effectively market your product on the internet, and anywhere else you can reach your customers.

If you don't have Photoshop, download it directly from the Adobe website and try it free.

© Copyright 2006. Grant Freeman

About The Author

Grant Freeman has been a Freelance Graphic Designer, Web Designer, Photographer, Video Editor, and Creative Director for over 13 years. His most noted clients include Sony, Bertolucci, Land Rover, and various International Recording Artist in the U.S.

Visit Grants website online at www.designbygrant.com for Photoshop learning, and various creative business to business solutions.

About the Author:

http://www.designbygrant.com

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/marketing-articles/using-photoshop-actions-to-make-ecovers-67441.html

Learning The Basic Photoshop Tools

Author: David Peters

Adobe has its own Photoshop tutorials that run the gamut of instruction.



You can find Photoshop tutorials on the Adobe site on abstracts, automation, animation, the basics of using Photoshop, buttons and brushes, using color effectively, digital art, drawing, creating desired effects with drawing or photos, retouching photos, photography in general, scripting, textual effects, Photoshop patterns and textures, graphics for the Web, and layouts for the Web.



One of the most basic of Photoshop tutorials is a complete explanation of all you'll find on the Photoshop toolbar.

You'll learn lessons that include the use of the marquee tools. There are several: the elliptical, the single row, the single column and the rectangular.



The rectangular and elliptical marquee tools lets you expand or reduce an area that is shaped as the tools indicate. You can use a tool to size one row or one column with the appropriate marquee tool.



These basic will be taught in this Photoshop tutorial, along with the use of the move tool which lets you create movement of a layer, the lasso tool which lets you capture a specific area, and the magnetic lasso tools, which lets you change the location of images with varying colors.



The polygonal lasso tool, in contrast, will go from point to point in a straight line or lines. You'll even learn how to use a magic want with Adobe Photoshop tutorials. This magic want tool lets you click inside a one color area and move only that area.



The Photoshop crop tool, part of this tutorial, lets you delete parts of a photo.



Wit h this Photoshop tutorial you'll learn other basic tools such as the spot healing tool, the healing brush tool, the red eye tool, the patch tool, the brush tool, the pencil tool, and the color replacement tool.



With the clone stamp tool, you'll learn how to use Photoshop to copy only parts of a particular image, while the pattern stamp tool will teach you how to take an image and brush a pattern on to it.



The Photoshop tutorial will teach you the mechanics of history brush tool use, how it is used to undo what you've created by simply brushing over the image you've altered and taking it back to the image it was before.



It has an even more advance use, though, in that, you can actually undo the image change in only the specific parts from which you wish to remove your latest alteration.



The art history brush, another tool taught in Photoshop tutorials, is much the same as the history brush except that it also lets you style at the same time.



Photoshop tutorials teach three eraser tools - the standard eraser, the background eraser and the magic eraser tool. With the first you can do just as its name suggests - erase part of the image you've created with Photoshop.



With the background version you can erase only the image background, while the magic eraser which lets you make even more varied choices of what to eliminate from the image.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With Easy To Follow Online Photoshop Video Tutorials. Full Details Here: learn photoshop

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/learning-the-basic-photoshop-tools-85873.html

Advanced Artistry Photoshop Tutorials

Author: David Peters

If you're a Photoshop user with a working knowledge of the basics, you may well enjoy the Advanced Artistry Photoshop tutorials. With this intermediate level training package you can hone some very advanced Photoshop skills. Here is what you'll learn.



The Introductory CD will tell you all about the course and the instructor, including some tips on how best to learn from the Photoshop tutorials. You'll learn about the technical aspects of the presentation and its variations from Mac to PC.



The next of the Photoshop tutorial CDS is called Utilities. Machine basics are included in this lesson plan, as well as PS preference and essential shortcuts. You'll learn navigation shortcuts, as well as those for imaging, tools, and workspace.



You'll get a quick review of all the keystroke and Photoshop super shortcut techniques and help setting up your own workspace.



The next of the Photoshop tutorials tackles the subject of retouching. In this CD you'll learn the professional retouching techniques, how to assess the Photoshop image, how to analyze the histogram, as well as the contrast, lighting and texture.



You learn how to do an analysis of the focus and to manage the contrast controls. You'll learn the ins and outs of contrast levels, and the use of each level. You'll learn to use curves, to enhance color and the advanced techniques to avoid saturation.



These Photoshop tutorials will also teach you to use the patch tool and the healing brush, and to burn and dodge demos without destruction. You'll also master the technique of red eye reduction.



Advanced artistry tutorials in this Photoshop lesson package will also include a CD that teaches how to adjust for focus and the center of interest, how to sharpen the focus, how to enhance the field depth and how to fish or burn edges.



In the fine art toning CD you learn intermediate and advanced techniques of producing black and white photos from color originals, how to work with and create sepia tones, selenium tones, digital cyanotypes and maps with gradients.



Fine art photograph effects lessons include soft focusing, angelic and dramatic posing, high contrast and high keys and cross processing.



Including in this Photoshop tutorial is mastery of fine techniques for people's skin, giving them the look of perfect skin, of radiant and dramatically glowing skin, advanced techniques in metal skin looks, infrared and translucent skin, and the use of maps for displacement.



Natural media and landscape techniques are taught in Photoshop advanced artistry tutorials as well.



Enhancing the skies and adding sky from other photos are techniques taught, as well as using the history and art history brushes, and burning and dodging without being destructive.



If you want to create a professional hand drawn look you can master that technique through Photoshop tutorials, and can also learn watercolor, logos, and vector illustration too. Hand tinting lessons are varied and include painting in a color mode and adjusting of layers.



Grid and Tech glows, TV scan lines, pixel drags, and edges and borders that are soft, painted, beveled or burned are all advanced artistry Photoshop tutorial lessons.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With
Easy To Follow Online Photoshop Video Tutorials.
Full Details Here: www.learnphotoshopnow.com

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/advanced-artistry-photoshop-tutorials-89639.html

Hone your Photoshop Skills

Author: Joesph Till

Photoshop skills relates to the knowledge of using the tools and techniques of Photoshop to get maximum benefits and achieve best output. Once we master the techniques of using the daily use tools of Photoshop we can get started and gradually learn other high end Photoshop skills which can result in optimizing our output quality. Photoshop is such a powerful application that even very expert and continuous users tend to find more and more new techniques to improve their photography.





The most popular Photoshop skills necessary for quality enhancement of imaging are:





Making an optimum selection: This is one of the most fundamental Photoshop skills which is necessary for controlling part of the image requiring adjustment. Photoshop offers various tools for making selections in its applications for editing of images. Since Photoshop offers various tools to do the selection, choosing the most suitable tool is also a challenging task. Professionals use different set of tools for a single selection to get optimum results. Feathering and adjusting selections for sharper edges relates to pixel adjustments over the edges to make it more suitable to the eyes.





Adjusting color and Tone of the Image: This is a basic Photoshop skill which will give a totally improved look to your image. To interpret the color perfectly in a photograph we need to see the strong black and white in the images. Levels can be used to set black and whit in photographs. It is recommended to use adjustments layer to adjust photographs as it leaves the original photograph unchanged for future reference. After adjusting the blacks and whites in photograph you have to fix the midtone using the curves adjustment option. These few simple adjustments improve the color quality of the photo a lot.





Removing imperfections: With the help and use of retouching tools such as Rubber Stamp, clone tool and the handy spot healing brush all imperfections such as an unwanted object or a spot can easily be removed from the photograph. Learning this Photoshop skill will make one master of the photographic art.





Sharpening the image: The images clicked from a digital camera needs sharpening as they tend to get soft while converting from analog to digital. Although there is a sharpening feature inbuilt in the camera but additional selective sharpening is also required to get the best results. The unsharp mask option of Photoshop provides the best tool for sharpening of images. There are options for controlling the intensity and scope of sharpening. Sharpening of Images must be done after making other adjustments and after resizing the image for final output because size of the image is very important for its resolution quality.





Photoshop skill is a skill which is not very common and many people are not master of this skill. So having Photoshop skill can put one above competition in a scenario requiring artistic background. Photoshop skill can be put to work to earn money or even livelihood for families as this is in great demand in today’s world. It needs practice for mastering Photoshop skills.

About the Author:

Written by Joesph Till. Find more information on photoshop tutorials as well as adobe cs3 tutorial

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/digital-photography-articles/hone-your-photoshop-skills-196071.html

Photoshop and Photography

Author: felix

photoshop,a new software that has revolutionalised the photographic industry with its digital imaging and other editing software The advances in digital image handling now allow for endless possibilities in the area of improving photographs through restoration of old and worn-out pictures

What types of improvements are possible by retouching photographs with Photoshop?

marks

Embarrassing skin blemishes like acne or scars can easily be removed using the retouching tools available in Adobe Photoshop. You can learn these Photoshop techniques in minutes.

Print Damage

When a picture get old and worn out it can be scanned and a little retourching added to remove the tears and wears that has affected the photograph over the years.this is one of the areas where photoshop comes in handy.you can also use it to restore the colors that have faded from the picture over time

Making Correction

one of the most frustrating moment when taking a picture is to learn later that either your mouth was wide opened or you were closing your eyes when the bird flew out of the picture.well this is no problem for a skilled user of photoshop you can easily reopen the eyes or closed the mouth whichever case it might be and no one will ever know.

Removing Unwanted Subjects

another magic the photoshop can do for you is to remove object or subject you feel are not necessary needed in the picture.for instance with photoshop you can easily remove a person from a group of persons in a picture and it will get unnoticed

with the advent of photoshop photographers have never had it so easy with editing or retourching of their photograph,when it comes to opening closed eyes,mouth,remove blemishes and marks, color changing,restoration of old to new photograph .etc photoshop has become a darling to photographers world wide.

Wants To Know How To Take Eye Catching Pictures?

Check Out These Review Page

About the Author:

felix broune is a seasoned photographer and a writer visit How You Can Sell Your Photos And Rake In $2000 Monthly

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/photography-articles/photoshop-and-photography-740901.html

Advanced Artistry Photoshop Tutorials

Author: David Peters

If you're a Photoshop user with a working knowledge of the basics, you may well enjoy the Advanced Artistry Photoshop tutorials. With this intermediate level training package you can hone some very advanced Photoshop skills. Here is what you'll learn.



The Introductory CD will tell you all about the course and the instructor, including some tips on how best to learn from the Photoshop tutorials. You'll learn about the technical aspects of the presentation and its variations from Mac to PC.



The next of the Photoshop tutorial CDS is called Utilities. Machine basics are included in this lesson plan, as well as PS preference and essential shortcuts. You'll learn navigation shortcuts, as well as those for imaging, tools, and workspace.



You'll get a quick review of all the keystroke and Photoshop super shortcut techniques and help setting up your own workspace.



The next of the Photoshop tutorials tackles the subject of retouching. In this CD you'll learn the professional retouching techniques, how to assess the Photoshop image, how to analyze the histogram, as well as the contrast, lighting and texture.



You learn how to do an analysis of the focus and to manage the contrast controls. You'll learn the ins and outs of contrast levels, and the use of each level. You'll learn to use curves, to enhance color and the advanced techniques to avoid saturation.



These Photoshop tutorials will also teach you to use the patch tool and the healing brush, and to burn and dodge demos without destruction. You'll also master the technique of red eye reduction.



Advanced artistry tutorials in this Photoshop lesson package will also include a CD that teaches how to adjust for focus and the center of interest, how to sharpen the focus, how to enhance the field depth and how to fish or burn edges.



In the fine art toning CD you learn intermediate and advanced techniques of producing black and white photos from color originals, how to work with and create sepia tones, selenium tones, digital cyanotypes and maps with gradients.



Fine art photograph effects lessons include soft focusing, angelic and dramatic posing, high contrast and high keys and cross processing.



Including in this Photoshop tutorial is mastery of fine techniques for people's skin, giving them the look of perfect skin, of radiant and dramatically glowing skin, advanced techniques in metal skin looks, infrared and translucent skin, and the use of maps for displacement.



Natural media and landscape techniques are taught in Photoshop advanced artistry tutorials as well.



Enhancing the skies and adding sky from other photos are techniques taught, as well as using the history and art history brushes, and burning and dodging without being destructive.



If you want to create a professional hand drawn look you can master that technique through Photoshop tutorials, and can also learn watercolor, logos, and vector illustration too. Hand tinting lessons are varied and include painting in a color mode and adjusting of layers.



Grid and Tech glows, TV scan lines, pixel drags, and edges and borders that are soft, painted, beveled or burned are all advanced artistry Photoshop tutorial lessons.

About the Author:
Master The Basics Of Adobe Photoshop In Under 2 Hours With
Easy To Follow Online Photoshop Video Tutorials.
Full Details Here: www.learnphotoshopnow.com

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/internet-articles/advanced-artistry-photoshop-tutorials-89639.html

Does Photoshop Seriously Damage Your Photographic Talent?

By Gordon Ball

Are you a so called Photoshop specialist photographer who can correct an image that was destined for the 'Recycle Bin' and produced an image that can be uploaded and sold through Microstock?

Do you justify your Photoshop expertise by explaining that the landscape shot was ruined because it had an overflowing litter bin in the foreground? Or are you the portrait photographer telling me how you had saved your embarrassment of a reshoot because they had cloned in a corner section where the background was missing? It's absolutely fantastic that we can all use Photoshop to correct our mistakes. But my question is - Should we make the mistakes in the first place? I come from the days of film and one of the first things that you were instilled to do was let your eye roam around the viewfinder.

Then when you were happy with what you saw, you took the picture. Notice I did use the term we. I admit on a bad day I am just as guilty as anyone else. What we need to do is to pay more attention to the shooting of the image and less to the post shoot correction techniques. In other word stick your camera on a tripod if possible and let your eye roam around the viewfinder looking for anything that you can see that shouldn't be there. It's so easy to simply shoot what you think that you see only to find that object that has crept into the picture that is clearly visible on the monitor. How did I miss that when I took the picture? I ask myself. That's when I also think, thank goodness for Photoshop.

A very experienced photographer once explained to me that when he 'went digital' he got lazy when taking the shots. He had heard before going digital Photoshop solved all your picture taking problems. Like a lot of photographers he began to rely on the qualities of such a superb piece of software. He ended up spending more time working on the images in Photoshop than he did actually taking the shots. He simply had taken for granted the fact that simple mistakes could be easily rectified. But he also realised that every minute spent checking the picture at the time of shooting saved him ten minutes work in Photoshop. He began to wish that he had stuck with film and thought about returning to his old ways.

But after analysing his situation and evaluating his photographs he realised it wasn't the digital image that was the problem. It was his technique; he had assumed that this was how you approached digital photography. So now he has reverted back to his old style of shooting by taking more care when taking the picture. Not only has his picture taking improved but he has a lot more spare time.

Let's suppose that you had decided to shoot a still life set up comprising a bottle of wine, a glass of wine and a few grapes. You spent your time getting the composition looking just right and started to shoot away, changing the viewpoint and moving in closer. You must have at least ten saleable images. You transfer the files to a folder on your computer and open each file. But your excitement turns to horror as the first image has a dirty great thumbprint on the glass slap bang in the middle of your picture. So you decide to rectify the mistake in Photoshop. It'll only take ten minutes or so. That's ten minute per image time ten of course. So in fact it will take you the best part of two hours to correct something that should have been spotted at the shooting stage. Incidentally, when I shoot any shiny objects I always move the objects wearing white cotton gloves.

What you should be doing is simply tweaking the image. Maybe giving is a slight increase in contrast or burning in, very slightly, the label on the bottle. Just the odd corrections that make a good image become excellent. Remember that you can't make a silk purse out of a pig's ear. The same goes for Photoshop.

So maybe you can save the once in a lifetime picture by adjusting it in Photoshop, sometimes mistakes can't be helped. Think of the potential market for a portrait photographer that can make the model look thinner and younger. Photoshop has set the Industry Standard and is a superb tool in the Photographers Arsenal - Providing that the Photographer has the knowledge to use it and realise its limitations.

If you really want to be an expert in 'Post Image Manipulation' or to simply correct your images in Photoshop take a look at my website http://www.gbphotostock.com and go to the Photoshop page.

This is just one subject that is covered in our FREE 'Microstock Photography Market Newsletter'. If you want to make money with your camera sign up for our free newsletter today!

http://www.gbphotostock.com/stock

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gordon_Ball

The Latest Information on Photo Blankets

By: Derek Renald

Photo blankets have been available for personalization and customization for many years now. With changes in technologies and photo clarity, these personal renditions of life have grown and changed as well. Photo blankets are available in a variety of style, but how can we know what each style offers. Comparing photo blankets is a great way to decide which is best for your needs.





Woven photo blankets are most often created from cotton or acrylic yarns. The images chosen for the blanket by the consumer appear as woven patterns. Taking an up close look at woven photo blankets, the consumer will notice individually colored yarns combined to make one large image. Similar to a woven rug, the end result is a clear image from afar, with a grainy result up close.





Woven photo blankets are finished in one of two ways. The edges will either be left in a fringe edging, where the yarn pieces are hanging freely, or in a bound edging. The fringe edging may have a tendency to fray after numerous washings or heavy usage. The bound edging, on the other hand, leaves the woven blanket with a border of color, similar to a photo frame.





Knitted photo blankets are produced in a similar manner to woven photo blankets. While these blankets tend to use both cotton and acrylic yarns as well, the photo image remains woven, in this case, knitted directly into the fabric of the blanket. The knitting result feels just like a knitted sweater. Again, the far away look of the blanket produces an overall total photo, but when an up close look is taken, separate yarn pieces, knots and colors render the picture unrecognizable.





Photo blankets that are knitted also have a stretchy quality unlike their woven alternatives. The photo knitted into the blankets tend to blur and disfigure when stretched. After a period of time, the fabric will lose the ability to retract and the image with remain stretched and deformed.





The yarns used in the manufacturing process of both woven and knitted photo blankets tends to vary, as does the selection process. Some companies use a machine and computer program to select the proper yarns colors through an automated process. This automation does make for a faster turn around time, but if the program is off on a shade or two, the resulting blanket may not look like the photo at all.





The second yarn selection process is completed through hand selection. Individuals choose each color by comparing different yarn shades to the original photo. While this process may seem more intimate, each human eye sees colors in a different way. A teal to one eye may look like a blue-green to another. The human selection process tends to yield a photo blanket resembling the original photo exacting as seen by the person choosing the yarns.





While hand selection and machine selection are both used for full color woven and knitted photo blankets, monochrome or black and white images are generally produced from two colors of yarn, black and white. Unfortunately, using only these two colors removes the residual rainbow of grays present throughout a black and white photo.





A photo blanket creation that is not produced from a knitting or weaving process is picture blankets. These photo blankets take the photo image and reproduce the same image onto a blanket surface. The production process is similar to the printing process of a digital photo and the resulting blanket is just as clear. When the photo is dyed onto or into the fabric, there are not separations of color as with the knitted product. Only sharp photo lines and images both up close and far away.





Unlike the woven and knitted photo blankets, picture photo blankets reproduce the image directly into the fabric. The colors are identically matched just as they would be with a digital photo print. Due to this difference in the manufacturing side of the blanket, there are no mistakes or color variances. The photo from which the blanket is created, is the same photo the blanket displays.





Black and white photo blankets are also available from the picture photo blanket process. Unlike the woven and knitted varieties, again, the picture is printed or dyed into the fabric using all of the colors present in the photo. If there are ten grays, ten grays are used in addition to the blacks and whites. The end product, when grays are used, tend to be clearer and display an increased depth of image.





Another difference between the woven and knitted varieties and the picture photo blanket is the ability to render an almost dual use blanket. The picture photo blanket is backed with a solid color fabric of the customers choice.





All three types of photo blanket creations are offered in various sizes. Ranging from a lap blanket size of 30” X 40” to a queen bed size of 60” X 80”. With every photo blanket the rule seems to stand that the larger the blanket, the larger the original photo image should be in order to produce the best end result.





The processing times for the photo blankets tend to differ as well. While woven and knitted photo blankets tend to take anywhere from 2 to 6 weeks to process (shipping time will be added onto the end of the processing time), the picture photo blanket processes in 3 to 7 days.





While the photo blanket is not a newcomer to the gift giving industry, never before have their been so many different photo blanket creation processes to choose from. Photo blankets can either be woven or knitted from yarns or dyed in to the fabrics. All three processes offer a different look, feel and end photo result. Whether you decide on a weaving process, knitting process, or photo reproduction process, your memory will appear on your photo blanket. The only way to choose which photo blanket is right for your needs is to learn about them all.