Layer Comps

Hi.

Today I'd like to talk about somethingg not very common but very easy to use and that can help you a lot.
I am talking about Layer Comps.
Layer Comps it's kind of the Snapshots.It records the order, the visibility, opacity and layer styles.
The brilliant thing about it is that you can save many different versions of a document in only a document.This way not only is easier to show to a client or just for yourself or other reason that doesn't occur to me :).

But enought Talk and more action!

Here is a video where I show you how cool Layer Comps can be.


I hope you like it

Take care and see you next time

Miguel

Patterns with Content Aware

Hi.

For those who don't know me,I am always trying different and crazy things in Photoshop, sometimes with some cool results, other times with no results at all, but I don't give up and keep trying.

A couple of days ago I was "playing" with content aware fill, and I came up with a cool way of creating patterns, and like always I like to share, therefore here is a video of that.
Another Filter very cool and that a lot of people don't use is Pixel Bender.Well, it's not a native filter from Adobe but you can download for free http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/pixelbenderplugin/
And while "playing" with pixel bender I came up with another way of creating Patterns.

I hope you like it:)

Take care and see you next time

Miguel

HDR Toning

Hi.

HDR has been in previous versions of photoshop, however in CS5 Adobe introduced HDR Toning.

With HDR Toning you can create HDR photo with a single photo, to be fair, to achieve the best results I still would advise to use at least 3 photos taken in a tripod and at different exposures, but this new adjustment is very good.
In this video I' go though the best settings and what the sub menu looks like and how it works.

Take care and see you next time

Miguel

Photoshop and video

Hi.

Today I'd like to talk about Video and Photoshop.

A lot of you know that in Photoshop you can create Animation, work in 3D and lots more, but what about video?
Well you can do lots of things with video inside Photoshop.

In this 2 videos I show different ways of working with video and a couple of ideas for your own projects.

Take care and see you next time

Miguel

Patterns in Photoshop

Hi.

Today I'd like to share a video tutorial that I created a couple of months ago.

In this tutorial I show a different way to create patterns in photoshop but in this case using 3D tools to create it.
I sounds weird but it works!As I am about to show you.

Take care and see you next time

Miguel

NAPP-National Association of Photoshop Professionals

Hi.

Today I'd like to talk about one of the best things that happened to me last year.

Yes, you guessed, becoming part of the NAPP community.
And I'd like to give a special Thank you to Dave Clayton who is the NAPP evangelist in UK, and obviously to Nancy from NAPP Headquarters as thanks to them I joined NAPP, as there was a Competition to win a 1 year membership and it's thanks to them.

Well, since I started in the world of Photoshop I always heard about NAPP and how good it was, but now I can say in my own words if it's good or not.

I have to say that it's not good is Brilliant!!!
In a way I thought that NAPP was a website where you could see some cool tutorials from the best in the world and that the members would get Photoshop User Magazine.

NAPP is more than that, there is a forum where people ask questions about anything from Photography to Photoshop and lots more, but the fact that if you have a problem or just want an opinion, that is the place as there is always someone willing to help, I am one of them :).
There are exclusive tutorials and exclusive Webinars.
And there's lot more.
One of the things that a lot of people say it pays for the membership is the discounts, and believe me there are very cool discounts in all sort of stuff, and not only in camera gear or photoshop or computers, even to rent a car you get discounts.But it's not only that.
You get a Help center where someone is there to answer any question that you may have.


To all of you that know me can see how much my photography has improved since I became part of NAPP.
So once again, thank you Dave and Nancy.


Long Live NAPP!

If you would like to join NAPP, just visit this link http://www.photoshopuser.com/?aid=xlkfkb

Here are some links that may be usefull to have

http://www.facebook.com/nappmember

http://www.nappmember.co.uk/

Kind regards to all

Miguel

HDR Effect

Hi

Today I'd like to share a technique that gives a subtle HDR effect created in Camera Raw.

Well, you can also use Lightroom for the same effect.
The technique is very simple, just moving some sliders and obviosly adjust as you like.








And that's it for today, I hope you liked it

Regards,

Miguel

Fix a photo

Hi

As you all know I always try to find different ways to make my work flow as easy as possible.

Recently I found another way to fix the exposure in a photo with full control of the photo, so I decided to share this technique with everyone.

Improve a Photo

Hi

Today I'd like to share with you what I have done a couple of months ago.
I went out and Took my camera and I took a few photos which were OK, the reason of beeing OK is because I could't go too close to the subject and didn't have my tripod, and the biggest reason to call it OK is because of the background.

As I wasn't Happy with this photo I decided to do some work on it...

So to achieve the final image I selected every part of the subject and masked.
Having completed all the masking(long hours)I took a picture of the Sky and added to the project.Obviosly I had to clone some areas, dodge and burn aswell.
After a few hours I added a Vignette and a Black and White preset that I created for this type of photos.

And here is the final result.




If you need a Tutorial about any of the techniques mentioned above or others, just let me know and I will do as soon as I can.

Animate a photo

Hi.
Today I decided to do a tutorial on animation.

Sometimes we want to create a slideshow or something similar and if we animate a bit the photo it can make a difference, so I decided to animate a sky in a nice photo.

Selections in Photoshop

Hi, we all use selections inside Photoshop, in this article I go trough the Selections and will give some tips as I go along.

So let's start with the Elliptical Marquee.
If you can't see the Elliptical Marquee, you can click and hold the mouse over the marquees, you can right click on the marquees or if you like to use the shortcut key, Holt SHIFT and click M until you get the Elliptical.
Now that you have the Elliptical selected you can draw a oval shape or a perfect circle, to achieve a perfect circle hold SHIFT while dragging the desired selection, but if you want to select a circle in an existing image, once you have the center of that circlewith the marquee start dragging with the mouse and after you start Hold SHIFT,(to get a perfect circle) and hold also ALT (Option on MAC) holding the ALT(Option on Mac) it will select from the middle, however if the selection is slightly off you can move it with the mouse or with the arrow keys, if you add SHIFT to the arrow keys you can move every 10px.

When you have a selection if you want to add to the existing selection, just Hold SHIFT and start selecting whatever you like.
But lets say that you want to subtract something from the existing selection, its very simple, just Hold ALT(Option on Mac) and start subtracting with a selection tool.
However if you want to intersect with an existing selection just use SHIFT+ALT.
If you have a selection that you want to copy, just select the move tool and hold Alt and just drag the selection.But if you have a very complex selection and you want to save, just go to Select->Save selection, that you create a new channel based on your selection, so when you need it again when working on that project it's always there.

I will continue to explain how to work with selections and will make some tutorials so you can see the possibilities of selections.


Kind Regards to all

Miguel

New Year and .....Action!

Happy New Year to all and welcome to my new and improved Blog.

I am going to start the year explaining Actions, the reason for that is that a lot of people don't know how to use it and also how it can improve the productivity.

So, Actions records every step inside Photoshop, as soon as you click "Record" it will record everything you do.
Let's get an example...You have a nice picture that you want to upload to your website or a blog and has to be resized, if that's your case, crating an action it will make your life a lot easier, I'll explain.


First go to Window and select Actions



Now you can see the Actions panel.....

As you can see Adobe were kind enough to give as some presets.
However we want to create our new action, to do so just click on the icon create new action on the action panel and a window opens so you can name your action for future reference.
In my case I name it resize because it's what we want to do.
And just click "Record"!
It's now recording, so let's resize our image going to Image->Image Size and resize to the size we want.
Now we can save as(personal option) in the Desktop or a folder and click STOP in the actions panel.

So next time you need to resize an image to the size that was especified just click Play in the Actions Panel and Photoshop will do all the work for you in a second(depending on your machine).

Please watch my video where I show how to create this action and another with a nice tip on sharpen a photo.


Kind Regards to all

Miguel