| Michael Roane - Member Profile | |
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Member Name: Michael Roane
Interest/Experience with graphics software: Hobbyist
Operating System: Windows 9x
The CD cover was "inspired" by a photo of my grandson at Christmas.
It was done in Photoshop and, with the exception of my grandson,
all the "performers" and audience were drawn from click art.
Auto FX textures were used to create the stage and background
curtain. The most interesting effect I learned doing this piece
was how to create the shadows of the performers. The shadows
were created by making a second copy of the performers in the
layers palette, filling them with black in the multiply blend
mode, and reducing the opacity to 75%. Then, using Free Transform,
and I dragged the center point to the bottom of the transform
frame making this the axis and dragged the top of the frame
through the center point and down until the shadow looked about
right. This gives you a completely accurate shadow for the figure.
You will want to blur and feather the shadow some also.
What
graphics software do you use on a regular basis?
Photoshop and Painter
What
was the first graphics program you learned?
Picture Publisher
What
is your all-time favorite graphics program and why?
Photoshop can go as deep as you need to go - and then some.
You can approach a task from many directions and Photoshop has
the tools to successfully complete it.
How
long have you been working with graphics software?
Three years
How
do you use graphics software in your day-to-day activities?
Unfortunately, my profession affords me no opportunity to use
graphics software.
What
is your best graphics tip or piece of advice?
Don't be afraid to experiment with different methods. If you
save often and use the history palette, you can recover from
just about any "mistake."
Where
do you get your inspiration?
Much of my inspiration comes from pictures of my grandson. He
is the foil for my humor and many pictures of him give me ideas
for a project. Inspiration is everywhere, however. You just
need to keep an open mind to the possibilities.
This project was again suggested by pictures of my grandson.
An Auto FX background was used and the film frames were taken
from Extensis Photoframes to give it the effect of being frames
from a video program. The title at the top inside the chipper
just kind of fell into place. The chipper is a photo I took
of my own yard equipment. The image is a composite of layers
built from many separate parts.
This was a very blah photo taken with my digital camera along
side the road one August morning. I decided to experiment with
curves and selections and this image is the result:
I randomly selected areas of color using the magic wand and
saved the selections for later use. I ended up with maybe ten
saved selections. Then after activating each selection and giving
it a rather large feather (seems to me it was about 200 pixels),
I started experimenting with the colors using curves. The frame
is from the Extensis Photoframes plug-in.
This photo was an exercise in blend modes. I think now, it is
a little too busy. I did this when Survivor 2 was just starting
and guessed pretty good. Survivor 3 is going to be filmed in
Africa.
One tip related to this photo. The image of my grandson at the upper right was too dark. I could have used curves to adjust the lightness but there is another way that sometimes works better. I made a second copy which was placed just above it in the layers palette and linked to the original (so that if it gets moved accidentally, both images move together). This layer was set to the screen blend mode (or maybe it was overlay) but, at any rate, it has the effect of lightening the image and adding some color which improved the look.
Again, the inspiration was simply the context of the picture.
The technique for creating the caption frame may be the most
interesting thing about this picture to other Photoshoppers.
Here is how to do it: Create a new layer in the layers palette
above the main image. Make sure this layer is active. Place
four guides on the image which will define the borders of the
frame. It may be better to go ahead and type and format your
text first so you can see how large the frame will have to be.
If you do the text first, the working layer has to be below
the text layer. With the circle tool, create a small circle
at one of the corners while holding down the shift key. This
will become your rounded corner. Continue to hold down the shift
key and draw a similar circle at the other three corners. Change
to the rectangle tool, continue to hold down the shift key and
connect the four circles. You will have to do this twice. The
"snap" feature is a help here. Finally, still holding down the
shift key, select the polygonal lasso and add a triangle from
inside your active selection to the individual who you are attributing
the statement to. Leave the entire selection active (you might
even want to save the selection) and open the curves dialog
for this layer. Lift the lowest point on the graph (lower left
hand corner) up to about 80%. This creates the semi-transparent
white area inside the frame. Then stroke the frame using black
as the color by how ever many pixels looks right. (You can alway
Edit> Undo, then redo if it doesn't look right.)
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