Create an Animated gif with Photoshop

It is easy to make an animated gif with Adobe Photoshop.

1st Make the layers needed for your animation.

2nd Open the Animation palette which is located at Window > Animation.

3rd Make the frames in the Animation palette needed for animation and set layer visibility for each frame.

4th Set the length of time each frame will show. Use the drop down menu below each frame.

5th Preview your animation by pressing the play button.

6th Save your animation. Go to File > Save for Web and other devices. Make sure the file format is gif not jpeg.

7th Post your gif to your web site.


Cheers,
Mike

Hollywood comes to Oshkosh - Depp as Dillinger

I know this blog is reserved for all things photography, Photoshop and Corel Painter but Hollywood has come to Oshkosh. A movie about John Dillinger, starring Johnny Depp is partially being shot in Oshkosh about three blocks from my house and one block from where I work.




The streets were closed off on 4/10/08 and filming should start on 4/13/08 and continue till the end of April.


The downtown has been transformed with classic awnings and vintage signs.


Cobblestone is being placed over the street in preparation for filming





This is a before and after from a art gallery I have showed at numerous times.






I will try to put a couple more photos up this week.

Cheers,
Mike

Enlarge Your Background - After the Shoot

Often people use the clone tool in Photoshop if they didn't have a large enough background. A fast way to add more background is to use the marque tool and make a selection around the area you want to fix. Choose Edit, Free transform and simply drag the right or left side of the image until it covers the missing background.

Cheers,
Mike

Ripping Out Someone's Eyes Doesn't Have to Hurt.

Sometimes you take the perfect photo but the eyes aren't so perfect. Here is a way to replace eyes in Photoshop.
I just look for another image with a similar expression. Open both images in Photoshop. With the lasso, select around the good eyes. With the move tool drag the eyes to the other image. Lower the opacity of this layer to make it easy to position the eyes. Raise the opacity back to 100 percent. Holding the Alt key add a layer mask. Note that the eyes disappear. With the brush tool and white in the foreground color box select a soft edge brush and brush back the eyes.

Cheers,
Mike

Layer Blending Mode in Photoshop

You can use the Layer Blending Mode to put tone back in a blown out highlight. First duplicate the layer and change the layer mode to Multiple. Next bring up the layer blending options dialog box. Then slide the "this layer" under the blend if dialog box to achieve the desired level of tone in the highlights. Hold the Option Key (Mac) or Alt Key (Win) to separate the arrow into two arrows for further refinement.

Cheers,
Mike

I Don't Let My Over Exposure Show

Sometimes you take an amazing photo except it is slightly over exposed. This is how I fix it with Photoshop.
With the file open, duplicate the image by going under l layers and click on duplicate. On this layer change the mode from Normal to Multiply. Multiply looks at the color information in each channel and multiplies the base color by the blend color. The result color is always a darker color. Therefore multiplying a color with black makes black and multiplying a color with white leaves the color unchanged.
Keep duplicating this layer until you get the density that you like. After your finished you can do two things the first being use the eraser tool on the multiplied layer and erase the parts of the image that are to dark. Make sure to lower the opacity on the eraser tool and have it set to a softer setting. There is a good possibility that there will be a color cast on the areas that are still dark. Some photos this doesn't look bad others it looks horrible. To fix this refer to our advanced article on Layer Blending Mode.
Second option would be is to flatten the layers and convert the image to Black and White. I find by simply converting the image.

Cheers,
Mike

Corel Painter Forum

Another great resource for all of you digital painters out there is the official Corel Painter Forum.
It is a good place to find answers besides this blog.

Amy