Adobe Photoshop is one of the best applications that you can use to pick and remove those troublesome hair strands from your photo subjects. It allows the use of a mask feature which isolates the fur and hair from your main photo subject.

Check out the following techniques that you can use to remove strands and fur from your photo background.

1. Select File and Channels

Select your target photo image that contains the hair or fur that you want to extract from the background. If you are an amateur and want to hone your retouch skills, you can work on a simple portrait. You will notice that such portraits have a background that is uncluttered.

Choose "Windows" and then "Channels". Ensure that you identify the channel that has the significant contrast between your selection and what you choose to leave out.

From the Channels Panel menu, select the "Duplicate Channel" option. You can access the dialog box where you will be prompted to name the channel mask after which you will click the OK button.

What you will have achieved is the creation of an alpha mask which you can edit without interfering with the original.

2. Make Adjustments

In the Channels Panel, select the alpha mask. Choose "Image", "Adjustments" and then "Levels". Drag the mid-tones, shadows and highlights' input sliders. This allows you to boost the image contrast.

Ensure that the element that you want to select should either be all white or all black. The thin areas in between should be a shade of gray.

Select your photo subject, along with their hair. You can also invert the selection after selecting the background.

By default, the white area in a mask represents a selected area while an unselected area is denoted by the black color. An area that is partly selected on the mask is denoted by the color gray.

Click the OK button once you feel you have done a good job. In so doing, you will be able to close the Levels dialog box.

3. Make Tweaks

At this point, you can select the Eraser tool so as to make adjustments and improve on the mask appearance. The Options bar on the Eraser tool allows you to select the Block mode. The Block mode is useful when you need to spruce up the mask.

Paint inside the mask using the Block Eraser feature. This way, your paint job will not have any edges that appeared feathered.

4. Sort Out the Colors

To access the default colors, press D. Usually, the Eraser tools makes use of the background color while painting. Make sure you confirm the color before dragging the tool.

In order to switch the foreground and background colors, press X.

5. Touch Up the Details

Use short strokes as you paint your mask with black and white colors. The rationale behind using the short strokes is that you will be able to Undo. This is important especially when you make a mistake while painting.

To paint areas using the Block Eraser, you need to zoom in as the tool comes in only one size. To erase a large area on your photo subject, zoom out.

It would be wise if you left some gray color around the wispy areas. This eliminates the possibility of the gray areas appearing cut off from the main image.

6. Polish Up

Load the mask as an image selection by clicking the first icon at the bottom of the Channels panel, on the left. In so doing, your mask will be highlighted with a selection marquee.

Your composite photo image will have a selection outline once you click the RGB channel.

Select Invert in order to invert the image selection.

7. Save Your Work

Once you are through with your hair or fur removal project on your photo subject, save your work for future reference.

Refine Edge Photoshop Tools

There are lots of Clipping Path Companies for your digital images and photos editing. The Adobe Photoshop software application has a valuable tool you can use to remove hair from your photos. The Refine Edge tool is revolutionary.

In the Refine Edge dialog box, you will be able to choose which view suits you best. You can also feather your image edges in order to achieve a softening effect.

The Refine Edge tool has an Edge Detection feature. Here, you can use the Smart Radius box to paint around your images' hair. Photoshop will be able to discern between what the background is and what counts as hair. It can eliminate the parts of the Background sky that you are not interested in.

Adobe Photoshop is a very cool program, enabling you to do lots of awesome stuff. More specifically, it is a layered graphic editing program. Which means that if you learn how to exploit all its functions, you can create, edit and manipulate any image you want.

It might sound confusing at first, but once you spend some time with it, you’ll grasp everything in no time. First of all, layers. Every new piece of data that you add to an image is called a layer. You still see the whole image as one, but with every new piece of data added a new layer is also added. However, this doesn’t mean that you have the entire image selected and active. If you’re trying to apply something to the whole image, but you see only one portion affected, then you’re in the wrong layer.

As mentioned above, a new layer is added with each action you take. For example, if you use the text tool, by adding text to your image you will create a new layer. However, if you return to that text, edit it, change colors or whatever, you won’t create a new layer, you will still be working in the same layer. But don’t worry, you don’t have to memorize all layers in order to change something. Just press F7 to bring up all layers in the lower side of the screen.

Photoshop is an incredibly useful tool, a real powerful ally to every photographer, whether amateur or professional. It has tons of cool tools and features, and you can do just about anything you can think of to your images. If you learn how to use it, that is.

This is a question a budding photographer would eventually ask himself. Photography and photo editing are two different forms of art. Does processing your photo make you less of a photographer? Or is it a must for all photographers to post-process pictures? Is Photoshop necessary?

While many people can download Photoshop free of charge, the rest would have to spend around 700 dollars to get a copy. The legit version is expensive. If you have photography as a temporary hobby, then purchasing the full version is not a practical option. If you do not do much photo processing on editing software, then you really do not need to spend that much.

The question is: is it possible to create a masterpiece; a perfect photograph without using Photoshop?

The answer depends on what type of photographer you are. But it is possible to come up with a great image without doing post-processing. A good photographer should be able to capture their desired photo by setting the camera settings right and taking into account ambient conditions, before taking a snap. Important settings to consider when taking a shot are:

• ISO

• Exposure Compensation

• White balance

• Aperture

• Shutter speed

• Composition

So if you get things right in the camera in the first place, your chances of getting the perfect photo is so high, that you would not need to post process it later. If you set the ISO right, you may not have to go through aggressive noise reduction on software. The right exposure compensation ensures the photo looks just right-neither dark, nor bright. White balance ensures colors come right. Proper composition eliminates the need for unnecessary cropping or image rotation on the software.

However, there are many cases where even professional and seasoned photographers have to edit their photos. These are some of the cases:

• When there is time constraint in photography – You can get the settings right, as long as your subject can wait for you to set the camera and get the right composition. In so many cases, this is impossible. Outdoor, travel, street, sports, and wildlife photography involves taking photos continuously, without much time to tinker the settings. It is during these crucial moments when you have to prefer capturing the picture and just making adjustments on the image later. Setting the camera each time would mean missing precious moments.

• When the photo needs to be enhanced – There are those that already look right, but can still look better through post-processing. Portrait, wedding, and fashion photographers are heavy users of post-processing techniques. For instance, you have a nice portrait; everything is set right, but your subject’s face has blemishes. You see, no in-camera setting can remove these facial blemishes. You have to resort to the removal of these imperfections on Adobe Photoshop. This is a usual trick many professional photographers do.

• When a photo needs to be altered artistically – Advanced photographers usually do not settle with just a snap straight from the camera. There are several ways to change the image to make it look entirely different from the original photo. For instance, the background can be blurred significantly, or the subject can be made to retain its color to make the background recede into grayness. Photographers can also add elements to a photo or change the background entirely, or clip photographs together to form a panorama.

3 simple tricks that will save you hours and headaches

So you can navigate your way around Photoshop but are frustrated by all the things you can't do? Here are 3 simple tricks to help you design better logos more quickly and easily.

1. Learn to duplicate. Many logos require duplicate images or shapes. Maybe you just need two arrows pointing back to back. Drawing them twice and trying to size them is time consuming and imperfect. To duplicate an image you can right click on the layer in the layer navigation menu and choose duplicate image. The image will appear exactly under itself and will only show once you try and drag it to a different place on the page. My favorite way to duplicate and image, however, is to hold the alt key and click to drag the image. You should see a little white duplicate mouse arrow under the normal black arrow if you are in duplication mode. You can create copies as fast as you can click with this neat little trick.

2. Make custom shapes. Most people don't know that you don't need to be able to draw to create great looking art. If you want to create say, a perfect head shape, you can simply borrow an image you want to imitate from a Google image search. Once you have opened the file and dragged it onto your existing pdf you can create a mask over the image like a paint by number. Go to your pen tool and click once at your starting point to create a little black dot called an anchor point. If the image is a polygon with all straight lines than you can click at every angle until you end up at the original point. Once you have clicked on the original anchor point you can right click to create a mask and fill your new shape with any color you wish. If your shape has round edges make 3 anchor points. One at the beginning of the curve one directly in the middle and one at the end of the curve, then click on your original point to close the shape. Now find the convert point tool that looks like a less than math symbol and click on the middle point and drag your mouse up and down until the line bends like the image underneath.

3. Save for web – It is a good rule of thumb to always create logos in 300 dpi (dots per inch) or better quality but when you want to save them for use on the internet it is best to use the option "save for web "in the file tab. Save for web automatically converts pixel ratio and colors to standard web preferences and does it all smartly for you. There is also a huge preview screen for you to see what your option choices are doing to your image before you save it for good.

In this trick, I will explain the change the color of your skin become white and slippery as a mannequin. By using smart filters feature in Photoshop CS3, we no longer need to use a lot of image layer to achieve this result.

Step 1

Find the picture of a Model that has a high resolution. Open the image in the File Menu> Open. Convert the layer to Smart Filters, by clicking on the menu Filter> Convert for Smart Filters.

Step 2

After changing into Layer 0, follow these steps to remove the skin texture by clicking on the menu Filter> Noise> Reduce Noise. Set the slider until it reaches the Strength to 10, the Preserve Details to 0%, Reduce Color Noise to 100%, and 0% Sharpen Details. Check the option Remove JPEG Artifacts and Click OK!. Repeat the same to click CTRL + F. to get the texture really slick and smooth, repeat this step two or three times by clicking Filter> Reduce Noise or Ctrl + F, especially in large resolution images.

Step 3

The next step, click the Filter Menu> Blur> Smart Blur and set the slider to get the scale Threshold Radius to 4.7 and 37.8 and click OK. Next, activate ‘Layer Smart Filters’ by clicking the left mouse to modify the mask.

Step 4

Now activate the tool ‘Brush Tool (B)’ and set the Opacity to 100%. click options Rounded Soft Brush with Foreground Color set to black color. Brush on all parts of the picture except the skin areas. This step aims to restore the original texture of hair, clothes, and background. Do it gradually with caution. Next, zoom out the size of brush, then brush on the brow, eyes, nose and lips part to restore the character’s face. If something goes wrong, you just fix it by using the Brush tool with the Foreground Color tool set to white color.

Step 5

Next, click on Layers> Create New Fill or Adjustment Layers and select Black & White. Drag the slider Reds and Yellow to the right so that a skin color is very bright and click OK. Next, change the Layer Blending to Screen and return the color information in the image other than the skin area by using the Brush Tool (B) and still set the Opacity to 100% and the Foreground Color to black color. After that, reduce the Opacity to 35% and brush on the eyebrows, eyes and lips. Do it slowly and repeatedly carefully to restore the color information in these parts.

Step 6

Now, Shading image using Burn Tool (O). Still working in Black & White Layer Mask, brush on areas darker. To make it easier, use the original image as a reference model. Return the Layers Menu > Create New Fill or Adjustment Layers> Hue / Saturation and Drag the slider to the numbers -52 and click OK. Now, return the restoration color information on character faces and don’t forget to set Foreground Color to Black and Brush Opacity to 100%.

Step 7

Next, select Levels from the menu Layers> Create New Fill or Adjustment Layers to get level with better contrast. Set the slider to the position of Input Levels to 28, 0.9, 255 and click OK. Furthermore, re-done restoration color information by using Brush Tool (B). If you want an easier way, you can press Ctrl + left click on the Layer Mask Thumbnail Hue / Saturation or Black or White. By continuing to work on the Layer Mask Levels, click Edit> Fill> Black.

Step 8

Press Ctrl + Click on the fourth layer, then right click and select Duplicate Layers. Return to fourth layer results in a doubling of the current situation, right-click and choose Merge Layers (Ctrl + E). After merged, rename the layer to be Flattened, and then set the other layers in Invisible Mode. Because the layer with Smart Filters cannot accept editing commands in addition to Filter menu, we need to make a conventional layer. This is the reason why this flattened layer is made. Stay save another layer as a preventive action if you want to pull through improvements in some initial steps.

Step 9

Then, activate the tool Clone Stamp Tool (S). Fix the shading area on the cheeks and other parts to get the impression of a smoother skin and without disabilities. Use a brush with the Opacity to 44%. Press Alt + Click on the area to be used as the source point and click on the skin to be repaired.

Step 10

To get the glow characteristic of the plastic mannequin, activate tool Dodge Tool (O), set the Range Highlights> Exposure to 36%. Brush enough in the area ‘T’ in the face and other body parts. And to improve the appearance of pale mannequin skin, remove some details remaining colors using the Sponge Tool (O). Desaturate Mode switch on the Flow 75%

Many digital cameras come with a utility to download photos from your camera to your computer. Oftentimes, the photo editing software that came bundled with your camera either falls short of being effective for post-production work flow, or you were given a trial version of a fairly expensive software application. As an alternative, many people buy an off the shelf photo package that may cost nearly as much as the camera itself. There is a solution that will cost you absolutely nothing except a little bit of time with a software application called GNU Image Manipulation Program, known more affectionately as GIMP.

GIMP is available for free for Unix, Windows, and Macintosh. This is not a scaled-down version of a costly application and there are no limitations to using the program. You may be wondering how good could a free software package be. After all, if it were that good, why wouldn’t they charge for it? That is an excellent question and I am very glad you asked. GIMP was originally packaged for the Unix open source environment, which means a global effort was made by very talented programmers to build and package the application. This was a truly altruistic effort and the package was never intended to be placed on the commercial market.

If you have used Photoshop in the past, then you will immediately notice how familiar GIMP feels. The toolbox, layers, and channels are relatively in the same locations as you are used to. A quick tour of the menu functions and you will find everything where it belongs and very similar language. It is almost like traveling between America, the UK, and Australia; they all speak the same language, but it takes a little bit to get used to.

The GIMP package not only feels like Photoshop, it also behaves very much the same as well. GIMP will suit most of your post-production editing that you will most likely need. For instance, you can add layers to edit elements, use curves and levels to make quick color fixes, apply masks to edit and copy elements, apply a variety of filters, remove red-eye, crop, you name it, you can do it with GIMP.

Are you sold on GIMP yet? I hope so, because you have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain by using this application.

It goes without saying that you need to have an aptitude if you want to pursue drawing digitally. It is not an easy process and requires some kind of learning. Firstly, to be able to draw digitally you need the correct digital art software.

Photoshop

This digital software will allow you to draw digitally. It has many tools that will allow you to draw, paint, erase and create shapes. Get started initially with common shapes like a rectangle, circle. You can elaborate on these shapes and use your imagination to create drawings. You can begin withdrawing flowers, trees and other simple pictures. As you progress you will also be able to draw portraits and other intricate things.

Tool for drawing

Your primary tool for drawing would be the mouse. However, now a digital art tool called the WACOM tablet is also available that helps you to draw.

Brush: You will have to experiment with the correct brush to determine the best applicable for you. You have the option to change the size, type and behavior of the brush that you choose.

Eraser: Ditto like the brush, you have the options to choose from a set of erasers from the software. Even this has the option to change the size, type etc.

Burn tool/Dodge tool: With the Burn tool you can make your colours to appear darker. Conversely, you can choose the Dodge tool to make the colours to appear lighter.

Layers: This is one of the most unique tools in digital drawing which is not available in physical drawing. This function allows you to draw in layers. This can be explained like this – it is a transparent cell that allows you to work on every layer in such a way that you can either allow a layer to interact with the other layer or vice versa.

As you move towards drawing intricate things you can make use of the following options:

Grids: Using grids will help you to capture the drawing cleverly and easily. It will enable you to check proportions and placements etc.

Shading: Shading can also be used here like in physical drawing. It gives your photograph the characteristic of a physical drawing.

Colour: When using colours, you need to take care that you make use of realistic colours.

Adding a Background: Giving a background to your picture is quite important. It helps you to give a story to your picture.

The most important feature of drawing digitally is that it gives you a chance to enhance your subject. It helps you to correct and add more to features. Sometimes, this can make your subject look unreal; therefore you need to take care that you do not take away the essence or personality of the subject in the drawing.

Conclusion

Drawing is an art and doing it within a digital ambit it gives the artiste the freedom to experiment and do a lot more with its subject. It is good if you try to learn about art before starting with digital drawings.

Learning about importing and exporting images from Photoshop can boost your credibility in creating images from this graphics software. Once you learn this, you will be able to do just about anything using Photoshop.

If you are going to use an image in a Photoshop file that was already created, you can import it and use it as a layer. People that look to have several images to put together implement this step. With the original image in the background, the other image will be a separate document.

The new image can be transferred to a layer where it can be adjusted or edited. Move the new image over the original document. The new image will stay the same, but there will be an additional layer with the first image.

If you have an image to import as a layer, you can use the Place command to do that. Look in the File menu for this command. The image would be placed in a Photoshop document. If you have to make adjustments you can save the image to the first file. So, if you make changes to the Photoshop file image, the same thing will be done to the image file.

If you have movie frames that you want to import, you can use the video frames to layer command to do that. You will have several choices that you can use to import certain parts of the movie. You can also import frames in a certain succession. This means that not every single frame has to be imported.

Use the shift key and place the slider on the movie clip to get certain portions of the movie. The “Limit to frames” component allows you to choose frames that you want. You can choose every second, third or fourth frame if you wish. It depends on how you want it set up. If you don’t choose anything, every frame will be imported.

Resizing images is one of the quickest things you can do in Photoshop. If you’re uploading photos online or emailing them to friends and family, the massive pictures that come off your digital camera (or photo cd) are going to take forever to send, and may even not by received because of their size.

To start, load photoshop and open the image file. Now that you’ve gotten the image loaded, Go to the Image menu at the top, and click Image Size. Input the size that you want the image to scale down to, and hit the OK button.

You should choose your image size based on where you plan on using the image. If you’re sending it in an email, it would be fine to have an image around 1024×768 (if it’s landscape oriented) or 768×1024 (for portraits). Web images generally are a bit smaller, so you can show them on a webpage without it running past the edges of the browser or messing with the navigational elements on the page. Most of the web images I save are around 640×480 or so.

When you’ve selected the size and hit okay, simply go to the File menu and hit Save As. If you just hit save, it’ll overwrite your source image and you’ll lose the higher resolution version. When I make copies of images, I usually store them as filename_resolution.jpg (for example: filename_1024x768.jpg for an image scaled down to 1024×768). This lets you easily keep track of all the resized versions of your images.

One of the most fundamental and utilized skills of retouching portrait images with photoshop, is skin correction. Fine lines, discoloration, etc are prominent especially in closely framed shots and can make the subject feel insecure. The dilemma with skin retouching is that often, the final product looks over-produced and fake. The goal is not to erase the subject’s personality, but to highlight the best features by minimizing distracting shadows and lines. If there are specific areas you want to conceal, first start by using the clone tool or spot healing brush on those places. Then, try this trick to achieve a soft, natural glow without turning the subject into a plastic doll.

1. Open image in Photoshop.

2. Click and hold ‘Cmd J’ to create a new layer from the background or combine previous layers for a cohesive slate by holding, ‘Shift, Option, Command, E.’

3. Click the ‘Filter’ tab from the main toolbar and navigate to “Blur” → “Gaussian Blur”

4. When the pop-up box appears, make sure the preview screen is zoomed out enough to see your image. Increase the percentage blur until facial imperfections disappear, but not so much that facial feature distinction disappears. In most cases, I land somewhere between 18%-30%.

5. Click ‘OK.’ Your image now has a significant blur over it entirely. Don’t worry, we’re not done! At the bottom of your adjustments panel, click, ‘add layer mask.’ A box will appear to the right of the blur layer. This is your mask. With the mask highlighted, click ‘Command I’ to invert the box so that it is black and the image appears sharp again.

6. Select the brush tool and decrease the opacity slider in the layers panel to about 30-40%. This is up to your discretion, depending on the level of blur your want. For the most natural looking effects, I find that somewhere between 30-40% yields the best results for smoothing without looking overly retouched and allowing the skin’s natural texture to show.

7. Select a soft, round brush with 0% hardness and make it white. Zoom in on the features you want to smooth in your image (Command +) and with a small, circular brush tip, paint over the features. The areas you paint with the white brush will uncover the Gaussian blur on the black mask below your image. Only the parts you paint will reveal the softer texture, while the rest of the image remains sharp.

8. Once you are happy with the results, zoom out (Command -) and start a new layer to continue your edits (Shift, Option, Command, E).

I use this technique for editing almost all my close portraits and often in wedding photography as well. It is especially flattering and once you get used to the process, the whole thing takes me only 1-2 minutes! I hope it works for you as well!