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[ 37 ]› › DOWN & DIRTY TRICKSStep One: In Photoshop, go to File>New,
name the document “Alternate Carbon
Poster,” set the Width to 1500 pixels and the
Height to 2200 pixels, and click OK or Create.
Once the file is created, grab the Gradient tool
(G), and in the Options Bar, select the Linear
Gradient type, and click on the gradient pre-
view thumbnail to open the Gradient Editor.
Select the Foreground to Background preset,
and click OK. Click on the Foreground color
swatch near the bottom of the Toolbar, set
it to a deep green (#024136), and click OK
to close the Color Picker. Set the Background
color to a very dark blue (#040f21). Holding
the Shift key, drag out a gradient from the
bottom to the top of the document.
Step Two: If you’d like to download the
low-res watermarked versions of the images
that we’re using here to follow along, click
this link for the first image, log in with your
Adobe ID, and click the Save to Library but-
ton. Double-click the image in the Libraries
panel (Window>Libraries) to open it in Pho-
toshop. To make it easier to work with the
image, increase the resolution of the practice
file. (We normally don’t recommend enlarg-
ing images, but this is only for practice pur-
poses.) Go to Image>Image Size, turn on the
Resample checkbox, select Preserve Details
from the Resample drop-down menu, set the
Width to 3,200 pixels, and click OK.
Using the Move tool (V), drag this image
into the working file, and position it so the
man’s shoulders extend just off the sides
of the canvas as shown here. Then, use the
Quick Selection tool (nested below the Object
Selection tool [W] in the Toolbar) to select
the model’s head and shoulders, everything
except the white background. Press Com-
mand-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to copy the selection to a
new layer. Double-click the name of the new
layer, rename it “Man,” and convert it to a
smart object with Layer>Smart Objects>Con-
vert to Smart Object. Then hide the original
stock layer by clicking its Eye icon in the
Layers panel. ©Adobe Stock/Djomas