The Professional Photoshop Book - Volume 7 2015

12

PERFORM FINAL ARRANGEMENTS

AND REVISIONS

We’re about to head into the final stages of this project where we’ll apply a battery of

adjustments and filters to nail down the look we’re going for. At this point, take some time

to go through the composition and scrutinise the arrangement. Because we haven’t

Rasterized any of the images we placed, we’re free to Scale and Transform without fear of

blurring pixels. Make sure to zoom up close and examine mask edges for faint lines you

may have missed.

13

ST ART ADJUSTMENTS

Let’s begin our adjustments. It’s advisable to create a new

group in which we can place the final layers. Click the Create New Fill or

Adjustment Layer button in the Layers palette, choose Brightness/

Contrast. Increase Brightness to 60, Contrast to 12. Paint black in the

mask to reduce in areas. Now add a Solid Color layer with the same

button. Pick #f4eabd. Set to Multiply blend mode. Next, add a Levels

adjustment layer. Choose the Blue channel. Slide the black Output

Levels slider to 115.

FINALISE THE PIECE

APPLY SEVERAL MORE ADJUSTMENTS, THEN CALL UPON THE CAMERA RAW FILTER FOR THE FINISHING TOUCHES

14

ADD MORE ADJUSTMENTS

Let’s continue with some more adjustments, again using the Create New Fill or Adjustment Layer

button at the bottom of the Layers palette. Add a Color Balance adjustment. For Midtones, set the sliders to

(from top to bottom) +24, +16, -19. Next, add another Solid Color layer. Pick #35ccff. Set to Color blend

mode. Click the mask, press Cmd/Ctrl+I to invert. Paint back with white to add some cool touches here and

there, both in and out of the owl.

GROUP ADJUSTMENTS

It’s a good idea to keep your adjustment layers

in a group. By doing so, you can turn the

visibility on and off to see how the adjustments

are affecting your image. You can also lower the

group’s opacity to tone down all the adjustments

at once. You can even try applying blend modes

for some potentially wild results. If you have a

set of adjustments you want to replicate in

another image (say you want to do a series of

these double exposure animals), just drag the

folder over. You may need to adjust the masks

you’ve fiddled with.

Photo editing

56 The Professional Photoshop Book

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