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ICON ADVERTISING’S AJITH PRAN REVEALS HOW SELECTIONS CAN ADD DYNAMISM AND A

SENSE OF ENERGY TO EVEN THE MOST STATIC OF IMAGES

MIMIC MOVEMENT

“This visual was created for an advertising campaign

for one of Dubai’s leading sports magazines. Titled

‘Adrenaline Rush’ by Icon Advertising, the visual was

conceptualised by Firas. O. Tiirhi, creative and

managing director at Icon Advertising, with the

objective being to dramatise a visually stunning

representation of the rush experienced behind the

wheel of a Formula 1 car.

“We used the Pen tool for most of the selections in

this visual. I prefer using the Pen tool for a perfect

cut-out. The car itself was selected using the Pen tool

as it offers more flexibility in editing the path and

making a perfect selection. The other elements were

selected using the Pen tool in combination with the

Quick Selection tool and by using the Color Range. For

grading we used Channel Mixer and Color Balance.”

DANIEL HAHN ILLUSTRATES HOW

SELECTIONS CAN BE USED FOR MORE THAN

JUST CUTTING OUT A GROUP OF PIXELS

ADD A DEPTH OF

FIELD BLUR

001 USING DEPTH OF FIELD
In close-up shots of my characters I usually create
some areas in focus and some out of focus. This
creates a similar result to shooting a portrait shot
with a real camera. The way I approach this leaves
me in control of where I want the blur to be
exactly, so I can show or hide the areas I wish.

002 USE THE LASSO TOOL

To create depth of field using selections, open an

image and Ctrl/right-click on the Selection tool in

the toolbar. Choose the Lasso tool and draw a

rough selection around the area that you want to

be in focus, but be sure to make it smaller than

you want the final effect to be.

003 CREATE THE BLUR
Press Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+I to invert the selection.
Next, press Cmd/Ctrl+J to copy that area of the
image onto a new layer above. After this go to
Filters>Blur>Gaussian Blur and choose how
much you want to blur the selected areas of the
image. Now you can take the Eraser tool with an
airbrush tip and simply brush-erase out the areas
that should stay in focus.

“To create realistic motion blur, I

used the Path Blur in Photoshop CC and added some light flares.

atmosphere using Color Balance, Following this I created the

Curves and Levels. For the final HDR tone, I merged a duplicate

layer in Linear Light blend mode, then used Desaturate>Filter>

Other>High Pass with 1.6 radius.”

BEFORE

AFTER

© Icon Advertising LLC

AFTER

BEFORE

© Daniel Hahn

Daniel Hahn currently works as a vehicle designer

at BMW Designworks USA, where he not only

creates designs for the BMW brand, but also for

that of the Rolls Royce make.

As such, careful use of selections is key to

creating images that really sell a concept or idea, as

they can be used to highlight certain sections,

drawing the eye where it needs to go. Of course,

they come in useful in his personal work too, where

robots and sci-fi are something of a favourite.

“I use the selection function a lot by getting a

selection directly from a shape or an object sitting

on a layer,” begins Hahn on his uses of selections.

“If you Cmd/Ctrl-click on the thumbnail image of a

layer (containing images, text or shapes) you get a

selection in the form of what is on the layer.

“So if I want to cut out something very exact – for

example, metal pieces covering technical parts of

my robot designs – I use the Pen tool and set it on

Shape. I then draw around a silhouette of

something. Photoshop creates a shape layer in the

Layers window. If you now Cmd/Ctrl-click on the

layer thumbnail image of the shape layer, you get

that shape as a selection.

“As I never use the function to save selections,

using this workflow I can always go back to my

selections by clicking on the shape layers. Another

beneficial result of working with the Selection tool

in this way is that I can create layer masks where I

can paint inside an exactly defined boundary.”

■ Topaz ReMask

For approx £41/$70, Topaz

ReMask promises the

“quickest and easiest way to

extract a subject from your

photo.” The user simply needs

to use the brush tools to paint

over what they want to cut out and hit Apply. It also

comes with refinement tools to perfect your mask.

■ Perfect Mask 8

onOne Software’s Perfect

Mask 8 is marketed as the

essential cut-out tool for

photographers. It allows users to select subjects

and isolate objects with ease, and offers a range of

brushes and clean-up tools to help with the

process. It’s available for approx £58/$

■ EZ Mask

EZ Mask is an interactive

image masking tool capable of

extracting almost any object in

a given image, which includes smoke, reflections

or fine hair detail. It’s currently available for $150.

The same company also develops Power Mask for

$150, where the user simply paints along the edge

of the object to be extracted.

MASKING PLUGINS

PRO GUIDE TO SELECTIONS