Adobe® Photoshop® CC® Bootcamp
Lesson 47/118 - Selecting Subjects and Masking
Adobe® Photoshop® CC® Bootcamp
Lesson Info
Selecting Subjects and Masking
With select and mask, you have a couple of different options here. You can use a brush to select more or less of the area that's in there. What we want to do with this select and mask is essentially refine the edge of what it is that we're doing. This used to be called refine edge, they turned that off, it's not refine edge anymore, it's called select and mask. If we look at edge detection here, there's something called the radius slider. This alone can be good enough sometimes to make the exact selection that we need. If I move this radius up, you can see how it's pretty smart, it's starting to feather in the sides of the selection there. See that, it's actually, if we zoom in here with that radius moved way up, it's starting to actually select some of the hair. If we pull this up a little bit more, look at how that radius changes. It's pulling it some more, and that's a really good selection for the hair right there. Let's go ahead and zoom out here and see what it's doing to the res...
t of the image. Sometimes what it's doing is it's altering, essentially, the contrast of the mask that we've selected, right? It's allowing that mask, as we talked about before, there's black and there's white but there's also any transition in between. If you see any gray areas around my ear and around the top of my shoulder there, any of those gray areas will be a translucent mask, so if I have the solid color blue behind it, you might see a little bit of blue appearing in my ear, which isn't exactly what we want. We can refine that a little bit more. We can come in here, we can smooth out the edges there, see if that helps. That doesn't necessarily help. Or, we can even use our brush here. If I use my brush and I click on here, right around this area, small brush, this is essentially gonna get me back to what we would refer to as something like the quick selection tool. It's making a quick selection and it's allowing me to modify this mask. I don't want to use a big brush, if I use a big brush it's gonna start selecting a lot of the stuff on the outside but if I use a small brush, notice how it's adaptively doing that, that when I click it, I can see it spinning and thinking. What it's doing is it's making the selection for those areas but it's also calculating the radius at the exact same time. It's a very smart way to make a mask. I'll zoom out here or make a selection, rather I should say. Let's go ahead and put this on, let's look at my ear there, I'm not quite sure what's going on with my ear there. I'll change this too, overlay, that actually looks pretty darn good. It's gonna cut off a little bit of my ear here so I might have to brush in some of this area up here to get some of my ear back, brush in around here to get my ear back. This tool is kind of tricky to use, the select and mask tool. Sometimes you'll be clicking around here and if you click a little bit outside of the area, like the area of that ear, it's gonna start selecting some of the area that's on the outside of that. That's okay, if you do that, just press Command or Control + Z. Command or Control + Z, no matter where you are in Photoshop is going to let you go back one step. If you want to go back two steps, you have to press Control + Alt + Z and that will continue going back in history, two steps, three steps, four steps, five steps. The more you press Control + Alt and then Z, Z, Z, Z, Z, it'll keep going back up in your history palette. If you just press Control + Z and keep pressing Control + Z, it's going to flip back and forth between the two things you just did. Control + Alt + Z will continue going back in history, even if you're right here in something like this. We can zoom out at this point. We had a pretty good selection for this area. If I wanted to select more area though, so say like this area back here. If I press alt or option and I click there, it's gonna make the minus sign. I can start removing other areas within the image that I don't want to be there. I definitely don't want that blue area back there, and if I press OK at this point because I'm really satisfied with that selection, I now have a selection specifically just for me right there. If we want to talk about non-destructive editing, I like to make selections from there and tell it to output a selection for me rather than output that selection as a mask because I want to keep this background layer just in case. If I press Command or Control + J and duplicate that, I now have this area without a mask, okay? If I were to go ahead and go back a little bit here and I were to duplicate this layer, let's go ahead and try to think about how I want to do this so I don't end up destroying anything and still maintaining a mask. What I can do is I can make a mask on this area, which is going to ensure that I have the mask for the selection that I just made and I'm not destroying anything. Non-destructively, I still have my background if I want to paint anything in there ever again. Because I have the background already pulled, I have that selection now, what I can do is I can add a new layer here, drop this down, maybe Shift + F5, fill that with a color. Maybe I want that color to be the blue of Kansas City, rocking my Kansas City pride. It doesn't look that great at this point. I would have to do a little bit more work but that's basically allowing me to separate one element from the background using a selection, using select and mask and also using the focus area. Look at the edge of this mask here. One of the things that I want to talk about is looking at the edge, the edge of this mask doesn't look that great. We have a very fuzzy edge. What we could do with this is I'm gonna go ahead and duplicate this by pressing Command or Control + J, again because I want non-destructive editing. If I right click on this mask, I can say apply layer mask and when I apply that layer mask, what that's allowing me to do is it's allowing me to have the image that I have of myself selected and apply that mask to it so everything else around it becomes transparent instead of being a mask. Why that's important is because we have this thing up here that's hidden in Photoshop that's an absolute gem when you're doing composite work. We go to layer and we come down here to something called matting and go to defringe. That's a little fringe area. I can select this to something like two pixels and press OK and you'll notice it starts to taper in that edge just a little bit, just a very little bit to pull it in. If I need to do it again, I can just go up to layer, go to matting, maybe do another two pixels. It blends it in just a little bit better, a little bit more to get rid of some of that fringe. Because this is still a layer, I still have the capability of going into a mask and brushing away some of those areas, so the areas around the ear that got selected there, I could brush those areas away by coming in with this mask, zooming in here, and just using my brush, very light brush, to brush those areas away.
Class Description
Adobe® Photoshop® CC® is a valuable tool for photographers, but it can also be intimidating. In this all-inclusive 20 lesson course, you’ll go from opening the program for the first time to creating images that really stand out. Join Blake Rudis, Photoshop® expert and founder of f64 Academy, as he shows you how to maximize your use of Photoshop®. Topics covered will include:
Week 1
• Class Introduction & Bridge, Adobe Camera Raw, Setup Interface, Cropping and Layers
Week 2
• Layer Tools, Masks, Selections, Clean-Up Tools and Shapes & Text
Week 3
• Smart Objects , Transforming, Actions, Filters and Editing Video
Week 4
• Custom Creative Effects, Natural Retouching, Portrait Workflow, Landscape Workflow, and Composite Workflow
Don’t let the many aspects of Photoshop® prevent you from maximizing your use of this amazing app. Blake will help you develop the confidence to use your imagination and create the images that you will be proud to share with your clients.
Software Used: Adobe® Photoshop® CC® 2018
Lessons
1Bootcamp Introduction 2The Bridge Interface 3Setting up Bridge 4Overview of Bridge 5Practical Application of Bridge 6Introduction to Raw Editing 7Setting up ACR Preferences & Interface 8Global Tools Part 1 9Global Tools Part 2 10Local Tools 11Introduction to the Photoshop Interface 12Toolbars, Menus and Windows 13Setup and Interface 14Adobe Libraries 15Saving Files 16Introduction to Cropping 17Cropping for Composition in ACR 18Cropping for Composition in Photoshop 19Cropping for the Subject in Post 20Cropping for Print 21Perspective Cropping in Photoshop 22Introduction to Layers 23Vector & Raster Layers Basics 24Adjustment Layers in Photoshop 25Organizing and Managing Layers 26Introduction to Layer Tools and Blend Modes 27Screen and Multiply and Overlay 28Soft Light Blend Mode 29Color and Luminosity Blend Modes 30Color Burn and Color Dodge Blend Modes 31Introduction to Layer Styles 32Practical Application: Layer Tools 33Introduction to Masks and Brushes 34Brush Basics 35Custom Brushes 36Brush Mask: Vignettes 37Brush Mask: Curves Dodge & Burn 38Brush Mask: Hue & Saturation 39Mask Groups 40Clipping Masks 41Masking in Adobe Camera Raw 42Practical Applications: Masks 43Introduction to Selections 44Basic Selection Tools 45The Pen Tool 46Masks from Selections 47Selecting Subjects and Masking 48Color Range Mask 49Luminosity Masks Basics 50Introduction to Cleanup Tools 51Adobe Camera Raw 52Healing and Spot Healing Brush 53The Clone Stamp Tool 54The Patch Tool 55Content Aware Move Tool 56Content Aware Fill 57Custom Cleanup Selections 58Introduction to Shapes and Text 59Text Basics 60Shape Basics 61Adding Text to Pictures 62Custom Water Marks 63Introduction to Smart Objects 64Smart Object Basics 65Smart Objects and Filters 66Smart Objects and Image Transformation 67Smart Objects and Album Layouts 68Smart Objects and Composites 69Introduction to Image Transforming 70ACR and Lens Correction 71Photoshop and Lens Correction 72The Warp Tool 73Perspective Transformations 74Introduction to Actions in Photoshop 75Introduction to the Actions Panel Interface 76Making Your First Action 77Modifying Actions After You Record Them 78Adding Stops to Actions 79Conditional Actions 80Actions that Communicate 81Introduction to Filters 82ACR as a Filter 83Helpful Artistic Filters 84Helpful Practical Filters 85Sharpening with Filters 86Rendering Trees 87The Oil Paint and Add Noise Filters 88Introduction to Editing Video 89Timeline for Video 90Cropping Video 91Adjustment Layers and Video 92Building Lookup Tables 93Layers, Masking Video & Working with Type 94ACR to Edit Video 95Animated Gifs 96Introduction to Creative Effects 97Black, White, and Monochrome 98Matte and Cinematic Effects 99Gradient Maps and Solid Color Grades 100Gradients 101Glow and Haze 102Introduction to Natural Retouching 103Brightening Teeth 104Clean Up with the Clone Stamp Tool 105Cleaning and Brightening Eyes 106Advanced Clean Up Techniques 107Introduction to Portrait Workflow & Bridge Organization 108ACR for Portraits Pre-Edits 109Portrait Workflow Techniques 110Introduction to Landscape Workflow & Bridge Organization 111Landscape Workflow Techniques 112Introduction to Compositing & Bridge 113Composite Workflow Techniques 114Landscape Composite Projects 115Bonus: Rothko and Workspace 116Bonus: Adding Textures to Photos 117Bonus: The Mask (Extras) 118Bonus: The Color Range Mask in ACRReviews
a Creativelive Student
Amazing course, but don't be fooled into thinking this is a beginner's course for photographers. The problem isn't Blake's explanations; they're top. The problem is the vast scope of this course and the order in which the topics are presented. Take layers for example. When I was first learning Photoshop (back when we learned from books), I found I learned little or nothing from, for example, books that covered layers before they covered how to improve/process photographs. These books taught me how to organize, move, and link layers before they showed me what a layer was actually for. Those books tended to teach me everything there is to know about layers (types of layers, how to organize them, how to move them, how to move them two at a time, how to move them two at a time even if there are other layers between the two you're interested in, useful troubleshooting tips, etc. ) all before I even know (from a photographer's point of view) what it is the things actually do. The examples of organizing, linking, and moving mean everything for graphic designers from Day One, but for photographers not so much. Blake does the same thing as those books. Topics he covers extremely early demand a lot of theoretical imagination for a photographer who doesn't already know quite a bit about what he is talking about. Learning about abstract things first and concrete things later only makes PS that much harder to understand. If you AREN'T a beginner, however, this course is amazing. I thought it would be like an Army Bootcamp, taking you from zero and building you into a fit, competent Photoshop grunt. Now I think it's more like Army Bootcamp for high school varsity jocks. It isn't going to take you from the beginning, but the amount you'll get out of it is nonetheless more than your brain can imagine. I've been using PS for years to improve my photographs, and even to create the odd artistic composite or two. The amount I've learned in the first week is amazing, and every day I learn something -- more like many things -- which I immediately implement to improve my productivity and/or widen the horizons of what I can achieve. If you ARE a photographer who's a Photoshop beginner, I'd take very seriously the advice Blake gives in the introduction: Watch one lesson, and practice the skills and principles you learn in that one lesson for two weeks. THEN watch the next lesson. You can't do that of course without buying the course, so it's up to you to decide whether you'd like to learn Photoshop and master Photoshop all from the same course. Learning it first and mastering it later will cost more money, but I think you'll understand everything better and have a much more enjoyable ride in the process. As for me? I'm going to have to find the money to buy this course. There is simply way too much content in each lesson for me to try to take on all at once, but on the other hand I don't want to miss anything at all that he has to share.
Esther Gambrell
WOW!!! I've been purchasing CL classes for several years now and have watched HOURS of "How-To Photoshop" classes, but this is the first one I've actually purchased because of the AWESOME BONUS content!!! SERIOUSLY??!!?!? A PLUG-IN??? But not only that, Blake is SO easy to understand, and he breaks down concepts in different ways to connect with different people's learning styles. I REALLY appreciated this approach because I am a LEFT-BRAINED creative that has an engineering background, so I really connected to what Blake was saying. THANK YOU FOR THAT! There are TONS of Photoshop courses out there, but I found this one to be the most helpful in they way Blake teaches concepts so that you know WHY you're doing what your doing. I feel like he taught me how to fish with Photoshop to feed me for a lifetime instead of just giving me a fish to feed me for one day. This is the BEST overall PS course out there!!! Thank you!!!!
Sonya Messier
I'm been using Bridge, Adobe Raw and Photoshop for 12 years. I thought I knew those programs until I started to follow Blake and do this Photoshop CC Bootcamp. This course is AMAZING. I love the way Blake teach, brakes down concepts and tools... excellent teaching qualities! I'm half way in this course and I change all my workflow already. Much better results and better use of what Adobe offer me. This course is an investment! When I will be done, I will listen it again. Great job and congratulations on your success Blake!