Computer Graphics with Photoshop - (Help) Can someone teach me how to do this in Photoshop 7?

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(Help) Can someone teach me how to do this in Photoshop 7?

Jon J. Yeager

2004-12-07, 7:14 pm

Can someone teach me how to do this?
http://www.autofx.com/gallery_pages...es/12_small.jpg

While my experience with Photoshop is senior enough, my achilles' heel has
always been brush effects. I've evaded using the brush my whole life. But
now, I decided to tackle the problem head-on. So explain it to me like I'm a
5 year old. :)

Many many thanks to anyone taking the time...

Bill Hilton

2004-12-07, 7:14 pm

>From: "Jon J. Yeager" nospam@please.com

>Can someone teach me how to do this?
>http://www.autofx.com/gallery_pages...es/12_small.jpg

What they're (apparently) doing is creating a mask and distressing it and
filling with white around the mask.

>my achilles' heel has
>always been brush effects. I've evaded using the brush my whole life.

You can do the distressing with filters and still keep on avoiding the brush
for the rest of your life :)

>So explain it to me like I'm a 5 year old. :)

Open your file and use rectangular marquee to select a box around the part of
the image you want inside the edges ... what is not selected will be filled
with white later. This makes a selection ... do select > inverse and then do
select > save selection and give it a name like 'edge mask' or whatever ...
open the channels palette and you'll see this selection as an alpha channel ...
deselect and run a filter to distress the edges, something like say filter >
brush strokes > sprayed strokes to get a ragged effect ... adjust the filter
parameters until the black-white border is ragged enough for your taste.

Go back to the original image and do select > load selection and the Edit >
Fill with white to create the border ... you can get any effect you want by
mucking around with the alpha channel and using it as a mask, doing the mucking
with filters or with brush strokes painting white or black or whatever other
operation you want to do on the alpha channel, so experiment with that step to
get the edge effects you want to see.

Bill

Hunt

2004-12-07, 7:14 pm

In article <20041207161523.06323.00001119@mb-m26.aol.com>, bhilton665@aol.
comedy says...
>
>
>
>What they're (apparently) doing is creating a mask and distressing it and
>filling with white around the mask.
>
>
>You can do the distressing with filters and still keep on avoiding the brush
>for the rest of your life :)
>
>
>Open your file and use rectangular marquee to select a box around the part of
>the image you want inside the edges ... what is not selected will be filled
>with white later. This makes a selection ... do select > inverse and then do
>select > save selection and give it a name like 'edge mask' or whatever ...
>open the channels palette and you'll see this selection as an alpha channel
....
>deselect and run a filter to distress the edges, something like say filter >
>brush strokes > sprayed strokes to get a ragged effect ... adjust the filter
>parameters until the black-white border is ragged enough for your taste.
>
>Go back to the original image and do select > load selection and the Edit >
>Fill with white to create the border ... you can get any effect you want by
>mucking around with the alpha channel and using it as a mask, doing the
mucking
>with filters or with brush strokes painting white or black or whatever other
>operation you want to do on the alpha channel, so experiment with that step
to
>get the edge effects you want to see.
>
>Bill

That is basically the best way to get what you want in the form of edge-
effects. One could also buy pre-done Alpha Channels to use as edge-effects
from FX, or another supplier. There, one just sizes (and maybe does some of
the adjustment that Bill pointed out), and then use as Layer Mask over a
filled white Layer. On Adobe's Website . PS Forums, there are several
different edge-effects masks for d-l. For me, I take Bill's approach, even
though I have the older FX suite. Sometimes, I will start with one, but
usually create them in PS, or often Painter (some different media available,
especially the Papers).

Hunt

Bill Hilton

2004-12-08, 7:14 pm

>From: noone@hunt.com (Hunt)

>Sometimes, I will start with one, but usually create them in PS, or
>often Painter (some different media available, especially the Papers).

Hunt, how did you learn to use Painter, if you don't mind me asking?

I've got Painter 8 and the "Painter 8 Wow!" book and have worked thru the pdf
tutorials from Corel's site but damned if I can get very good results with that
program. I can never get the color management to work right (deletes any ICC
profiles, for example) and other than using Auto Clone on a few images it has
been a real disappointing program for me. Are there any on-line tutorials or
any step-by-step books available? I asked these questions on the painter NG
and one author told me "well, color management is HARD!" ... :)

TIA.

Bill

John McWilliams

2004-12-08, 7:14 pm

Bill Hilton wrote:

>
>
>
>
> Hunt, how did you learn to use Painter, if you don't mind me asking?
>
> I've got Painter 8 and the "Painter 8 Wow!" book and have worked thru the pdf
> tutorials from Corel's site but damned if I can get very good results with that
> program. I can never get the color management to work right (deletes any ICC
> profiles, for example) and other than using Auto Clone on a few images it has
> been a real disappointing program for me. Are there any on-line tutorials or
> any step-by-step books available? I asked these questions on the painter NG
> and one author told me "well, color management is HARD!" ... :)
>
FWIW, one teacher I know has her students convert everything to PS for
printing....

Also, I feel relatively helpless with Painter, whereas in PS, I feel
merely inexperienced.

--

John McWilliams

Hunt

2004-12-08, 7:14 pm

In article <20041208114958.06251.00000935@mb-m27.aol.com>, bhilton665@aol.
comedy says...
>
>
>
>Hunt, how did you learn to use Painter, if you don't mind me asking?
>
>I've got Painter 8 and the "Painter 8 Wow!" book and have worked thru the pdf
>tutorials from Corel's site but damned if I can get very good results with
that
>program. I can never get the color management to work right (deletes any ICC
>profiles, for example) and other than using Auto Clone on a few images it has
>been a real disappointing program for me. Are there any on-line tutorials or
>any step-by-step books available? I asked these questions on the painter NG
>and one author told me "well, color management is HARD!" ... :)
>
>TIA.
>
>Bill

I started with it at about ver 2, and, like you did not like the color
management aspect, or their "masking" techniques. Photoshop was always much
better for me. I used 3-5 a great deal, until my computers got too much RAM. I
did try 6-8 and liked the latter, after Corel finally got it together. I even
built a machine specifically for Painter 5 and a few 3-D paint programs from
that time frame.

As for tutorials, I like the www.lynda.com materials. I've got DVD and several
of Lynda Weinman [SP?] books with CD's. All have been excellent, even though I
am more of a book, than CD/DVD/e-book person. I also liked the Painter WOW
series and had them for most versions.

A lot of what I do, is PS ancillary sort of stuff (very little actual creation
in Painter), but I still use the heck out of it for the "natural media" looks,
and keep Painter 5 on at least one machine.

I do agree that earlier versions were counter-intuitive, especially for PS
users, but I just do/did the stuff I needed in PS, then brought in pieces, or
worked on the image in Painter, and brought back to PS for finishing and
always printing or output.

Take a look at the newer ver IX, as Corel has worked hard to match it more
closely to PS.

Hecate, the real one, would be another source for info, as I think she uses
Painter quite a bit, and probably much more extensively than I do.

Hunt

Hecate

2004-12-09, 4:14 am

On 8 Dec 2004 21:01:49 GMT, noone@hunt.com (Hunt) wrote:

>I started with it at about ver 2, and, like you did not like the color
>management aspect, or their "masking" techniques. Photoshop was always much
>better for me. I used 3-5 a great deal, until my computers got too much RAM. I
>did try 6-8 and liked the latter, after Corel finally got it together. I even
>built a machine specifically for Painter 5 and a few 3-D paint programs from
>that time frame.
>
>As for tutorials, I like the www.lynda.com materials. I've got DVD and several
>of Lynda Weinman [SP?] books with CD's. All have been excellent, even though I
>am more of a book, than CD/DVD/e-book person. I also liked the Painter WOW
>series and had them for most versions.
>
>A lot of what I do, is PS ancillary sort of stuff (very little actual creation
>in Painter), but I still use the heck out of it for the "natural media" looks,
>and keep Painter 5 on at least one machine.
>
>I do agree that earlier versions were counter-intuitive, especially for PS
>users, but I just do/did the stuff I needed in PS, then brought in pieces, or
>worked on the image in Painter, and brought back to PS for finishing and
>always printing or output.
>
>Take a look at the newer ver IX, as Corel has worked hard to match it more
>closely to PS.
>
>Hecate, the real one, would be another source for info, as I think she uses
>Painter quite a bit, and probably much more extensively than I do.
>
Cue,,, me :)

Firstly, I haven't got hold of the IX upgrade yet (it's on it's way
from Amazon) but, unless they've changed something the printing
capabilities aren't great. I always save as a .psd or .tif and then
use Photoshop where I'm much happier with the colour management.

As for it being hard - well, yes, it is. It has as much power as PS,
but in a different way and you can't expect to learn it any quicker
than you can learn PS. I've been using both for quite a few years and
I *still* buy books and find stuff I haven't really completely
grasped, or new ideas on ways to use the software.

Painter only really matured, IMHO, when version 8 came out. It's much
easier to use, but just as hard to get good results. In the end it
comes down to three things: perseverance, creativity and an A4 Wacom
tablet ;-)

As for using the auto clone - I use it sometimes, but the best way to
get good results is to use the tracing function if you're intending to
start from a photograph. I use it quite a bit for creating original
images though. I may well start with a photograph, but it'll be one
I've specifically taken for the purpose. And I won't be tracing it,
it'll be printed out and sitting propped up next too me as a general
guide to what I'm trying to do. And, in the end, IMHO, that's what
Painter is really for - creating original images.

--

Hecate - The Real One
Hecate@newsguy.com
veni, vidi, reliqui

Bill Hilton

2004-12-09, 12:14 pm

>From: Hecate hecate@newsguy.com

>As for it (Painter) being hard - well, yes, it is. ...
>you can't expect to learn it any quicker
>than you can learn PS.

But with PS there are several hundred books out for all levels of users ... I
can take someone who has never used PS and have them work through "Classroom in
a Book" and then selected chapters in say "Artistry" and they can do many
useful photo editing tasks ... there doesn't seem to be a book for Painter
comparable to "Classroom" that takes you from zero knowledge to low-level
intermediate on your own at your own learning pace, or at least none that I've
seen ... there are typically only 3-5 books on it for any given edition, given
the slow sales of the program and lack of volume for books I suppose.

>Painter only really matured, IMHO, when version 8 came out.

That's the one I have ... I shudder to think what earlier versions did if this
one is "mature" :)

Thanks to you and Hunt for your Painter comments ... if there's a "Classroom"
type book out there for it let me know.

Bill

Hecate

2004-12-09, 11:14 pm

On 09 Dec 2004 15:32:07 GMT, bhilton665@aol.comedy (Bill Hilton)
wrote:

>But with PS there are several hundred books out for all levels of users ... I
>can take someone who has never used PS and have them work through "Classroom in
>a Book" and then selected chapters in say "Artistry" and they can do many
>useful photo editing tasks ... there doesn't seem to be a book for Painter
>comparable to "Classroom" that takes you from zero knowledge to low-level
>intermediate on your own at your own learning pace, or at least none that I've
>seen ... there are typically only 3-5 books on it for any given edition, given
>the slow sales of the program and lack of volume for books I suppose.
>
>
>That's the one I have ... I shudder to think what earlier versions did if this
>one is "mature" :)
>
>Thanks to you and Hunt for your Painter comments ... if there's a "Classroom"
>type book out there for it let me know.
>
Not that I know of, but I can recommend www.lynda.com. Their tutorials
are really good. And, if you buy the Painter IX upgrade, and register
it, the Lynda.com basic Painter tutorials come free (you can log on
the site for the tutorials).

As for the books, the best one I've found which takes you from the
basics is the User manual. It's clear, easy to follow and tells you
everything you need to know to get started. After that, there's the
Wow book you mentioned and then there's Painter Creativity: Digital
Artist's handbook which I'd also recommend. I haven't found I've
needed much else.

--

Hecate - The Real One
Hecate@newsguy.com
veni, vidi, reliqui

Bill Hilton

2004-12-10, 7:14 pm

Hunt

2004-12-10, 7:14 pm

Bill Hilton

2004-12-10, 7:14 pm

Bill Hilton

2004-12-12, 7:14 pm

Hecate

2004-12-13, 4:14 am

2004-12-19, 7:14 pm

Try a google search for frame actions.

I remember seeing an action for this a few years back, and was free to
download. It may have even been on the Adobe site somewhere. I really
can't remember.

"Jon J. Yeager" <nospam@please.com> wrote in message
news:wwotd.22219$Ou1.1255722@weber.videotron.net...
> Can someone teach me how to do this?
> http://www.autofx.com/gallery_pages...es/12_small.jpg
>
> While my experience with Photoshop is senior enough, my achilles' heel has
> always been brush effects. I've evaded using the brush my whole life. But
> now, I decided to tackle the problem head-on. So explain it to me like I'm
a
> 5 year old. :)
>
> Many many thanks to anyone taking the time...
>
>

Tom Nelson

2004-12-20, 7:14 pm

This might get you close: http://tnphoto.com/tutor_b.html

The particular effect you referenced looks like real brush strokes. If
that's the look you want, paint black paint over white mount board and
scan it. In Photoshop use image>Adjustments>Threshold to make it pure
black and white. Drag the painted image over your photo to make a new
layer. Set the blend mode of the paint layer to Lighten. You're there!

Tom Nelson
Tom Nelson Photography

> "Jon J. Yeager" <nospam@please.com> wrote in message
> news:wwotd.22219$Ou1.1255722@weber.videotron.net...
> a
>
>

2004-12-22, 12:14 pm