Comments on Be Creative #28

[lisabee]

Comments and questions go here.

We love to hear your comments. :)

Images are here (http://www.elementsvillage.com/forums/showthread.php?p=381142#post381142).

[mljrbg]

Is it possible to post the before photos also? Is it possible to do it side-by-side (insturctions needed)? For those of us who are not so experienced I think that would help to see the change in the photos. Just a thought.

I also need to be able to understand the function of masks and when to use them. I've done a lot of searching on this forum and also on the PET website and can't find a good explanation. I can do masks from a tut but I really need to know when to use masks and why I am doing it!! Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Mary Lou

[vawitt]

My best understanding is that you use a mask when you only want to affect part of your image with some effect - like changing the saturation, or levels, etc. PSE does not ship with a true mask, but you get a built-in mask with an adj layer. When you add a mak, its thumbnail is filled with white, so the effect is on your entire photo. If you use a brush to paint on the mask with black, the places where you paint black no longer show the effect

There is an add-on mask available for various versions of PSE - Grant's Tools includes one.

Hope this helps. If you have 21 days and $24 you should take the Layers course in the PSE members area. It cleared up a LOT of masking/layer questions for me. Well worth the $$.

~Val

[Joe M]

Is it possible to post the before photos also? Is it possible to do it side-by-side (insturctions needed)? For those of us who are not so experienced I think that would help to see the change in the photos. Just a thought.

I also need to be able to understand the function of masks and when to use them. I've done a lot of searching on this forum and also on the PET website and can't find a good explanation. I can do masks from a tut but I really need to know when to use masks and why I am doing it!! Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Mary Lou

Mary Lou, Val explained it perfectly and I thought I'd give an example.

On the image below you can see I made a background copy and applied a very strong blur. I then applied a layer mask to the layer. With my foreground and background colors set to default black and white, I painted black with my brush tool on the inside of the bear. This removed the effect of the blur. To fine tune it I used color white to add back the blur around the edges of the bear where I went too far in removing the blur.

This can be used for any changes you make to the layer. Whether it be blur, hue and saturation, B/W adjustment, or just about anything else.

I hope this helps.

http://www.pixentral.com/hosted/1TbBEq0vt5z056LB1V4SaHBwfjbK1_thumb.jpg (http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=1TbBEq0vt5z056LB1V4SaHBwfjbK1)

[mljrbg]

Thanks Val and Joe. I'm going to have a busy weekend trying all sorts of new things!! I also saw a post on layermasks with a tut so I will do that too.

ML

[Bayla]

Mary Lou,

Butch has done an excellent Layer Mask Video Tutorial (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7723020561810181483&pr=goog-sl) - the quality of the video isn't brilliant but the content more than makes up for it! He did it for PSE 3 & 4 but it's the same fot later versions.

Bayla

[lisabee]

WOW, we're definitely seeing lots of WOW-factor :D

Toni - both images look great, I have never seen a Robber Crab, but he looks pretty ferocious.

Val - brilliant on the parrot. You have some lovely shots from the zoo.

Clara - both are stunning images, in the second image the composition is great and also the tones, the contrast between the richness in the reds/oranges and the sky, it's super.

Joe - fantastic, very dramatic.

Tony - a beautiful orchid, I like colourful too :) and the banana tree is very exotic! Thanks too for the tut on adding a vignette.

Larry - looks stunning, I really like how the lighting and vignetting draw in the focus.

Christell - pretty sunflowers, lots of 'pop'.

cfair - lovely rich blue tones and lots of drama, definitely an intensity to this image, very very nice.

Kim - that's fantastic, the yellow 'pop' makes all the difference.

Bill - elegance with a capital 'E', very classy. :)

Sharon - both images look great. Using the burn tool you might need to experiment with different 'strengths'. I used the vignette under 'correct camera distortion' in the filter menu, why not try Tony's method for creating the vignette and let us know how you get on.

Martha - that's great, the contrast really adds a sense of depth, very nice.

thanks for such great images :)

[lisabee]

Just to say the 3 PET training courses for Elements (which Val mentioned) have moved over to http://www.kelbytraining.com/

You can get a month's access to all the courses for $19.99, however if you only want 1 month, you do need to contact customer services so that you don't get put on an automatic billing cycle.

Lisa

[TonyW]

Tony - a beautiful orchid, I like colourful too :) and the banana tree is very exotic! Thanks too for the tut on adding a vignette.

Lisa: Thanks. There is a fatal flaw in that tutorial (which basically uses the method the action uses). It works fine on square images but because it uses spherize to round off the rectangular selection it doesn't work as well on rectangular images. For those using the elliptical marquee tool works much better. That's one of the problems with actions - it's easy to write them for specific image shape/sizes but a lot tougher to write them so they will work on all shapes and sizes.

Tony

[Zeria]

Lisa

Another option for darkening the edges can be found in the Lighting Effects. The Style pop-up (found at the top of the Lighting Effects window) gives access to some presets. I used the Soft Omni setting --- here, as you adjust your lighting, a vignette is applied. Size and intensity of the vignette can be adjusted.

Great images everyone----:)

[lisabee]

Pete - a fun image and it looks great.

Mary Lou - that's a pretty bird, what is it? (Definitely not a native here)
Lovely tiger shot too.

Seachelle - Both of those are absolutely beautiful, I love those warm orange tones.

Julie - a fantastic look, lovely perspective in your shot. And your violinist looks great too. Your subject must be very happy with that.

Tony - very pretty flowers, the effect really gives them pop.

Tammy - super, gosh everyone must be going to the zoo these days! :D

Debra - the lighting effect creates a very evocative image, it's great.

Es - those are both lovely, is that a magnolia bloom it looks beautiful.

Thanks everyone, a new challenge will be posted tomorrow :)

Lisa

[efarnstrom]

Yes, it is a magnolia. We went to a garden tour a couple of weeks ago and got some great shots. I think this one was improved. The bell still looks out of focus, but is an improvement, also. I used Tony's tut on this one.

Looking forward to the next challenge.

[mljrbg]

Lisa, not sure of the name of the bird. I took the photo in Florida. I'm still searching to see if I can find the name.

Mary Lou

[lisabee]

Lisa, not sure of the name of the bird. I took the photo in Florida. I'm still searching to see if I can find the name.

Mary Lou

:) don't worry if it means hard work to find the name, it's very pretty whatever its name,

Lisa