JUST FOR FUN88 DIGITAL CAMERA^ JUNE 2019 http://www.digitalcameraworld.com
Take any subject you like
and add it to another
photo, with Jon Adams
Create
surreal
composites
C
omposites are mixtures of different
picture elements that, when combined,
take on the guise of a genuine photo.
Provided you can make a good, accurate
cutout of a subject from one scene,
it’s really simple to place it into another picture, then
match up the relative scales of subject and background.
The viewer’s eye won’t accept the composite as ‘real’
unless a few additional burdens are met, however. First,
the light source has to come from the same direction
in both picture components; and second, you’ll need
to add a shadow if the ground is in shot. The obvious
temptation will always be to pick a new background
that’s in harmony with the subject, but here we’ll
take a rhino from its zoo background and place
it in a tourist-laden street scene!
The first task is to cut out your subject in Photoshop.
There are lots of ways of doing this, but it’s worth
learning how to use the Pen Tool: because it’s fully
manual, it will always give you an accurate selection.
Select the Pen Tool, then zoom in to the edge of the
subject. Click on it, then click further round the edge,
dragging slightly to create a curve. Do this all the way
round the edge until you return to your starting point,
then right-click inside the path and choose Make
Selection... Apply a Feather Radius of 0.5px, then press
Ctrl/Cmd+J to punch the selection into a new layer.
Press Ctrl/Cmd+C to copy the cutout. You can now
delete the Background layer and save your cutout
as a Photoshop PSD file, in case you use it again.^1
Open your pic with the new background, and press
Ctrl/Cmd+V to paste in the subject. Drag the handles in
Free Transform (Ctrl/Cmd+T) to resize and position it.
To make a shadow, press Ctrl/Cmd+J to copy the layer.
Press D to default the colours. To fill the selection with
black, select the lower cutout layer and Ctrl/Cmd-click
on the Layer thumbnail, then hit Alt+Backspace. Press
Ctrl/Cmd+D to lose the selection lines. Free Transform
the shadow; while holding Ctrl/Cmd, pull the handles
to distort the shadow in the right direction. Set the
Blending Mode to Multiply, and reduce Opacity until it
matches other shadows in the photo. Make a new layer
above the shadow, and paint in a small contact shadow
where the subject connects with the ground.^21
2
FILE & VIDEO
Download the
disc: http://www.bit.ly/
dc217disc