Simple Pencil Sketch

1. Open your image
2. Convert to Grayscale - Image > Mode > Grayscale
3. Duplicate background by draging the background to the New Layer Icon or Ctrl+J
4. Filter > Adjustments > Invert (Ctrl+I)
5. Change the Blending mode to Color Dodge
6. Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur
a. 4.5 pixes approximately
b. increase to 8
8. In Undo History Revert back to original color image
9. Redo the steps but don’t convert to grayscale
10. You now have a colored pencil sketch

Good Use of Dissolve Layer Blend Mode

1. With file open that contains an object on a layer in my case it is the Ferrari.
2. Create a new layer and set the foreground color to a dark blue and the background color a darker blue.
3. With the Gradient tool set to reflected gradien drag from the center up about half way.
4. Load car (object) as a selection by clicking on the layer icon with the Ctrl key pressed.
5. Select Menu > Modify > Border > 50 pixels
6. Create new layer and Fill selection with white – Note the edges are soft
7. Change Blend mode to dissolve
8. Create new layer beneath dissolve layer to make the dissolve layer an normal blend.
9. With dissolve layer active Merge down the dissolve layer to the blank layer
10. Filter > Blur > Radial Blur > Zoom > 100
11. This is still grainy so Ctrl+F to apply Zoom again
12. Create a duplicate layer and drag under the car so we have light beams in front and behind the car.
13. On the copy layer Add Outer Glow effect and change blend to Overlay
14. Select top layer and change to Overlay
15. Add text
16. Add drop shadow or other layer styles
17. Reduce Fill in Layers to 0

Seam Carving - Image Resizing

Video showing image resizing using "Seam Carving" can be viewed by clicking here.

HumanSoftwar's new plugin filter XFile V2 for Photoshop uses "Seam Carving" can be found on the HumanSoftware web site, http://www.humansoftware.com/pages1200/XFile/HSxfil0.html

The site for online image resizing using "Seam Carving" is http://rsizr.com/. This is free.

The Fractalius Plugin filter link was placed on this blog earlier but to help find it I've added it again, http://www.redfieldplugins.com/

Posterized Photo of the Mabry Mill

Creating a Posterization Like the Photo Shown Above

1. With color image open change to black/white using Images > Adjustments > Convert to black and white.
2. Change background color to black
3. Increase Canvas size on the left only by 20% using Image > Canvas Size. Put 20 in width box, percent, in adjacent box and check Relative. Alternatively you can use the crop tool to crop the entire image and then drag the left handle to the left about 20 %.
4. Using the rectangle margee tool select a rectangle in the newly created additional canvas.
5. With Default colors drag select the Linear Gradient, Foreground to Background and drag from the top of the selected rectangle to the bottom. Holding the shift key will limit the drag to a straigt line.
6. Image menu > Adjustments > Posterize (near the bottom of the menu)
7. Select 7 levels. This is a level each for the primary rgb colors, the cmy secondary colors and black. This creates 7 boxes of 7 different tones in the selected rectangle.
8. With the Magic Wand, tolerance 0f 10 and Contigious not checked click in the lightest (white) area.
9. Add a new Layer and with this layer active select a color from the Swatches palette. Note that the upper 6 colors in the Swatches palette are rgb and cmy.
10. Use Alt + Backspace key to fill the selected area on this layer with the selected color.
11. Add a new layer
12. Make the background layer active and click on the next lightest color in the tone boxes.
13. Make the new layer active, select another color and fill the selection with the selected color.
14. Add a new layer
15. Make background layer active and click on the next lightest color and repeat steps 13 and 14.
16. Repeat the above until you have selected the 6 tones other than black and filled each layer with a color.
17. Crop your final image.

Photoshop Plugin Filters

Filter Type
There are three main types of filters.

A one step filter applies the filter with no user control. You cannot specify any specific action of the filter it does whatever it does and it's done.
A parameter filter give you choices. You need to set sliders or controls to specify what the filters will do. They can be spotted because they have (....) after their names.
A mini-application filter is a filters that enables you to save and recall settings and creates its own environment inside of Photoshop. Many third-party filters are many-apps.

The Filter Menu – Effects Palette

Photoshop's media filters appear on the filters menu in 13 categories and this hasn't changed since version 3. At the bottom of the menu filter lists will be a line and under this any third-party filters that have been added.

Artistic Set

1. Colored Pencil takes an image or selection and stylized as it to resemble, supposedly, colored pencils on neutral paper stock. In reality, the filter uses the predominant colors in the image and removes areas that it changes to the paper color depending upon the parameter settings. It is color dependent the background color that is the “ brightness” color.

2. The Cutout filter, is an enhancement of the Posterize command that simplifies the colors of your image into the number of levels that you request.

3. Dry Brush imitates the traditional dry brush technique of dragging a loaded Photoshop brush until it runs out of paint. The edges aren't aliased and hard, through the internal shading will retain the variations in soft shadings.

4. Film Grain looks good when used on text but it's not especially attractive as a special advanced filter.

5. Fresco is very similar to the Dry Brush filter but it intensifies the contrast in the image and makes the darks much bolder good for abstracting an image in sharpening the contrast.

6. Neon Glow is extremely color dependent. It reacts to the settings of the foreground and background colors into a third colors selected in the filter itself. Pick contrasting colors for the most noticeable results.

7. Paint Daubs is supposed to look like spots of paint. It doesn't. Some settings can give pleasing results.

8. Palette Knife can make your image looked if it's been painted using a palette knife using the correct settings and if you want to palette knife to be perfectly flat on the canvas. It can be combined with other filters like Crystallize or Emboss.
a.Open image
b.Copy to Layer
c.Background > Emboss Filter
.d Copy Layer > Palette Knife
1.Settings top to bottom are 50, 3, 02.
2. Change Blending mode to Hard Light

9. Plastic Wrap can be used to give a shine to a portion of your image but I've never seen it used effectively. It does worked fairly well to enhance simple line art graphic or when used on text.

10. The Poster Edges filter posterizes the image in its own colors and adds black detail around the edges all settings produce visible changes in the image is can be good for a would cut-type look.

11. Rough Pastels A very complex filter with a large number of parameters that can very the most critical parameters a texture itself, which makes an enormous difference to the final result. The pastels rub off on the high parts of the texture the darks.

12. Smudge Stick looks if you took a towel and smudged a chalk or pastel drawing. It is a fairly good texture-generating filter when used on a blank image as has had noise added.

13. The Sponge filter looks like someone is daubing paint on the image and is one of the more successful stylizing filters. This makes a wonderful grained paper effect when applied repeatedly to a solid color image.

14. Underpainting filter. Using a canvas texture and a small brush with the highest texture coverage you get an image so real that you think the paint was still wet. It looks the way it would if you had sketched in the details with thin oils on a canvas.
a.Image file open
b.Copy to a new layer
c.Filter > Underpainting
e.0, 40, Brick, 100%, 4, Bottom
f. Copy bkgrd to a new layer on tope. Adjustment Layer Mask and hide all
g. Paint in details.

15. Watercolor is supposed to make an image look as if it was painted with watercolors. It doesn't. The Watercolor filters results are very similar to the Fresco filter, but the Fresco filter adds more outlining around the edges of the shape it identifies. It intensifies the dark areas in the image far too much and the final colors are extremely strong.

Blur Filters

The Blur filters are used to reduce the difference in color between nearby pixels the blur and blur more should be ignored because they don't give you any control.

1. The Average filter averages the colors in the image and might be useful for creating backgrounds.

2. Gaussian Blur is one of the most useful and basic filters. It is used to soften the differences between nearby pixels and to help remove grain.
a. To Simulate depth of field
1.Open an Image that you would to show has selective focus or Depth of Field
2.Dupe the background
3.Filter > Gaussian Blur, setting to suite.
4.Add adjustment layer and create a mask
5.Paint with a Linear, Black/White Gradient in the mask starting where you wish the blur to start.
b. A special effect that some call gives an "ivory painting" look. Works best on a portrait.
1.Open image
2. Duplicate Layer
3. change blending mode to darken
4. background layer active
5. Gaussian blur
a.R-12

3. Motion Blur adds motion to an image. I showed a race car that had the car selected and the selection saved.
a.The background was copied to a layer
b. A layer mask was added. (See notes on adding a layer mask in Elements)
c. Add motion blur to top layer
d. Load selection and fill with black , hiding the blur on this layer.

4. Radial Blur is a special effects filter and can be very useful in emulating taking a photo on long exposure while zooming a lens.
a. To blur car wheels, select the wheel and copy to a layer.
b. Load the selection by ctrl+click the layer.
c. Filter > Blur > Radial Blur > Spin and move the center to the approximate position relative to the image. Click OK
d. If it isn’t at the center, undo and try again.

5. Zoom
a. Image open, copy the center of interest to a layer and the select Zoom from the Radial Blur box, centering the zoom behind the layered object.

6. Smart Blur is only with in the area bordered by an edge. Useful for portraits were you don't want to blur facial blemishes.

Brush Strokes

This class of filter is best used to stylize an image or to create texture. All of these filters work wonderfully on a blank image that he has had the Add Noise filter run on it try this as the start of many exciting textures.
1. Accented Edges is similar to the Find Edges filter but it can be used to give more texture to an image hence it the reason is in the Brush Strokes category. It looks best with the Edge Width Very small. At the small edge width, but with maximum brightness and smoothness, you almost feel if you're looking at liquid colored chrome.

2. Angle Strokes makes an image look as if diagonal brush strokes of oil paints of them been applied to a canvas.

3. Crosshatch can create lovely textures. The filter can make an image looked as if a brush was stroked at angles on a campus. You can also give the impression of a random weave.

4. Dark Strokes is similar to the angled strokes but you cannot see the brush strokes clearly not a favorite of mine.

5. Ink Outlines is very similar to the Dark Strokes filter but you have control of the stroke. It also performs a sort of find edges that can be attractive on some images.

6. Spatter can help to enhance a simple line art graphic and looks good when used on text.

7. Sprayed Strokes can't help to enhance a simple line art graphic. I like to use it to put an edge on an image.
a. Open image.JPEGs
b. Changed to a layer
c. add white background
d. add adjustment later
e. makes selection
f. Fill a border with black
g. Add Sprayed Strokes filter followed by Pixelate > Crystallize

8. Sumi-e is a calligraphy filter that works very well with special effects and with text I seldom use it.

Channel Masking in Photoshop

An extremely quick and effective method for selecting a subject with a reasonable color contrast to the surrounding pixels is to create a mask and then to load this mask as a selection.

1. Click on each channel to see which channel offers the best contrast, white and black.
2. Duplicate this channel by dragging it to the new Channel icon.

Depending on the channels contrast you can do one of the following:

Method 1 – For relatively high contrast channels

1. Apply a levels adjustment to the duplicate channel to increase the contrast of the mask.
Slide the shadows, mid-tone and highlight sliders in until the required mask is achieved.
2. The mask may not be perfect but this can be modified using the painting tools.
3. Choose a paint brush, set the opacity to 100% in the Options bar, and then paint with either black or white to perfect the mask.

Method 2 – For more complex channels and those that have soft or hair transition areas.

1. With the duplicate channel active choose Image > Apply Image and in the target box choose Multiply or Overlay to get the best black and white contrast.
2. The mask will seldom be perfect so it will need to be touched up. You can use the Levels adjustment as described in method one and then
3. Make the RGB channel active to see the image and use the Pen tool to create a path on the edges that have a relatively hard edge.
4. As you create the path and you come to an edge with an hair or an otherwise soft edges click inside the soft edge and set a point, moving inside the hair edge setting points as you go.

You should now have a path which is along the hard edge but inside the soft or hair edge.

5. Create a selection from the path using ctrl+plus the Enter.
6. Fill the selection with black using Atl+Backspace
7. With the Paintbrush paint the area in the mask that should be white. Do not paint on the transition area between the white and black that contains the soft or hairy edge.
8. You now will use levels to create the mask in the transition area. You do this by selecting a relatively small area with the Lasso tool using a Feather of about five to 10.
9. With this area selected open Levels, Cctrl+enter, Drag the Shadows slider to the right and the highlight slider to the left until you get good contrast in this area.
10. Select additional areas of the transition and adjust using Levels as in the previous step. Do this until the entire transition area has been adjusted.
11. You now have a mask that can be used to extract an area from its background. This mask can be loaded by clicking on it with the Control key or by selecting it in the select > Load Selection menu.