Photoshop

One of the many challenges facing today's photographer is how to protect their photos online; that is, once the photo has been uploaded to a gallery for viewing on the Internet. We don't live in the safest of worlds these days, especially when it comes to being online, and it's frighteningly easy for a thief to download your photo from your very own web site and try to sell it as their own. I know it's shocking but people really do steal... often.

Today I'd like to share with you a special little time saver I picked up from the Great Kelby. I've affectionately dubbed it the Halo Zapper because it has an amazing power to blast the heck out of edge haloes leftover from removing a background.

Welcome to the fourth installment of our journey through the blending modes founds in both Photoshop and Elements. Though we're still trudging through the second category of modes which all darken the overall image, I think you'll find Linear Burn to be one of the most useful. That is, if you're interested in creating some really trendy, funkified collages. Linear Burn produces an effect that looks a lot like Multiply, though darker, and more saturated (brighter). It's also similar to Color Burn, though the end effect won't be as high contrast.

Welcome to the third installment of our journey through the blending modes founds in both Photoshop and Elements. We're still exploring the second category of modes that begin with Darken; and, as you already know, these modes have the power to darken the underlying image.

Welcome to the second installment of our journey through Photoshop and Elements' blending modes.

This week we'll continue on through the second category of blend modes that begin with Darken. As you might suspect, modes in this group have the potential to darken the underlying image. Convenient naming, that!

This week is all about the Multiply mode. It will indeed make an image appear darker, and my good buddy Ben Willmore says it's handy to think of this mode as actual ink. Here's what it looks like using the blue and orange circles from last week:

Shrouded in mystery, perched high atop the Layer palette in both Photoshop and Photoshop Elements there sits a pop-up menu that's been baffling folks for ages. The menu of which I speak is called Blending Modes. You've probably clicked on it before and chosen a few of the strange words ontained therein only to be completely baffled by the effects, ranging from making everything dark or making everything light, to turning your image into an x-ray, to having absolutely no visible effect at all.

Grungy, ornamental, highly-detailed vector illustrations are all the rage these days. Graphic designers are plunking them onto any and everything, and using them to spice up backgrounds, dress up the edges, and lead a viewer's eye. But it just so happens that these little works of art are also a *fantastic* option for photo framing. However, if you're not an illustrator or a high falutin' designer, the words "vector" and "illustration" probably sent chills down your spine.

If you've ever perused the home page of iStockphoto.com, you'll see some of the most beautiful photography on display, accented with lovely rounded edges.

Oh sure, you probably know how to create a soft feathered edge (node#216) but did you know that there's a tool custom-built for creating rounded edges of the sharp-edge variety? It's slightly hidden beneath the Vector Shapes Tool, but it's there.

Today we'll take a look at how to use the that tool to create edges even iStockphoto would be proud of (which is where these images came from).

Sometimes it's tough to get a right proper blurry background in your photos if you don't have a digital SLR (interchangeable lens camera). Oh sure some of the point and shoot cameras have specialized shooting modes for this type of thing (namely portrait mode), but what if you forget and shoot in automatic? Are you doomed to be forever in focus? Negative. It's really easy to produce a beautifully blurry background in both Photoshop and Elements, and that's exactly what I'm going to show you today.

What's the simplest way to highlight a certain portion of a photograph? Something that will really draw the viewer's eye to a given area?

As you can imagine, there are a gazillion answers to this question; however, today I'm going to share with you what I truly believe to be the quickest and easiest method: Make part of the photo color and the rest of it black and white. It's a really interesting photo effect, and you'll be amazed at how quick and easy this effect can be to create. Plus, this technique works exactly the same in Photoshop Elements.