While on a shoot the other week, Oscar Alexander came up with this stunning make up. Thank you Oscar !!
This shoot has become an inspireation for a whole set, which will be shoot in late Feb.
Adobe Lightroom 2 +
Just some workflow insight ,
I have been a HUGE fan of Lightroom for a while. Proof checking, editing, printing, web gallery creation, the list of time saving functions is crazy. If your a Pro photographer and your not using Lightroom, your doing something wrong. If your working with a batch of frames, Photoshop is only really used in a final editing stage. Most of my edit work happens with in Lightroom these days.
There are a few functions that I would still love to see in Lightroom, It would be great to able to run Photoshop actions (using the photoshop engine) inside Lightroom, Add layer styles, create comp layers also, it would be really cool to able to sync your Presets into layer styles in Photoshop. Just some of these little additions would make Cross Platform (cross software) editing much streamlined projects when colour matching is important. Using the correct tool for the correct job. Why use Photoshop for simple things like contrast changes.
Anyway, here is some Lightroom fun , You can put the Web module of Lightroom into “advanced mode” (an “experimental and unsupported” feature – so try this at your own risk) which will expose MANY more customization options in the Lightroom panels.
To go into Advanced Mode you’ll need to use a keyboard combo:
“Control Alt Shift /” on PC
“Cmd Alt Shift /” on Mac
Do the same to Return back to the normal version.
I get asked alot, what the best editing processes are , Its really simple. Do whats best and most logical for you. I use this work-flow as a rule
Adobe Bridge > Lighroom > Photoshop > Lightroom > Bridge
I use Bridge to remove blank frames or frames that are clearly not useable, Rename files and upload into Lightroom a quick selection of photos that are going to be edited.
Lighroom is used to pull out a final selection of photos, Crop and Colour the photos, Overall pages edits are done. Vignettes, tones, curves, hue, saturation and Camera Calibrations are also done ( I never sharpen at this stage !!- you only ever want to sharpen a Final Product. Its always the last step. If you are not going into Photoshop after, then finish your photo in Lighroom )
There is no way I could list the steps in here of what can you can do. As a rule though, Skin is touched up and sharpened for which ever media the product is headed towards, Change colour Sets depending on the Products destination ie : RGB or CYMK etc..
After this stage no other editing process should be needed.
Back into lightroom to make batch size changes, Create Web Galleries, Contact sheets, Slide shows etc..
Bridge is then used as the content management tool, Using the Pre-made Actions you can send photos into other programs such as Photoshop to add watermarks borders, Prep for web, Border or any other Presets that you use.
Each stage is very important, and should leave you with a clear workflow. Pick the Photos, Edit the Photos, Make them PERFECT, Edit them for purpose. Store them in a correct manner.
If you use your noodle, you should not go far wrong. Just do what works for you, but ONLY IF YOU ARE USING LIGHTROOM !!
The main idea behind this project was the angel wings. I have been wanting to find some good angel wings for quite while. I really wanted to build some proper ones of my own.
Our Model is Danny Bennett, who is playing the role of the devil.
This one is a little harder than the last 
Step one !
Build some wings! Last year I was down in London, walking around the Natural History Museum, I grabbed a few photos that I could use at stock photos for some projects just like this one.
Having a good stock libary is a very important tool in the birth process of any project. The first step was to strip back all the things I didn’t want to use in this photo. Using the EXTRACT tool I freed my bones wings that would become the main shape of the wing and give me a proper shape to work from. Once the wings were free I used the STAMP tool to smarten back up the wings. For me building things up in layers in the main object here.
Once I have my bone wings, I used the PERSPECTIVE tool to shape the wings ( you can use any tools you like.) Using two Wings shaped to show the top of the wing and the under-feathers ( I can build up the feathers and colours to show the different sorts of feathers) I want real looking wings, yet wings that can not attached to any normal bird, after all, we are making Angel wings ! I created a few patterns using brushes and started to work on the wings to give them texture and depth. Using about 4 or 5 layers in different shapes and sizes, using blurring effects to blend them I started to build them up. Remember, you only have to build one wing !
Once you have your wing, ( mine took quite a time to build ) you can spin a copy over to make your full set. Maybe again shape them to give you a shape you like when you have your full wing span. Most people never colour angel wings, its up to you though. Since you should have all your wings elements in at least 3 layers ( top layer, middle layer, bottom layer, the top layer being the bigger feathers at the bottom of your layers ) They should be really easy to colour. Make a Layer section for each wing section, Flip the layer into some nice blending mode and colour, Simple. Using a Layer mask, remove the bits to show off the parts of the wings that have colour and give them a realistic looking layer system. I have built some quite Gothic looking wings with sharp feathers and lines. I used some photos of Bats and Insect wings as my references.
So you have some KILLER wings.. Lets make our Angel.
Our Model is Danny Bennett , but use anyone of anything you like !! Get your self a cool photo, Cut them out and attach. Simple. This is your first chance to see how your wings really sit and what they look like. After I had placed Danny infront of the wings, they looked light and unreal. I added some heavy black feathers that curl over. and gave some darker colours to the underneath. Go away, Have some tea and come back to have a look at what you have with some fresh eyes.
So now after your break, What have you got. Is it any good ? what changes would really make this photo POP out ? I decided the end of the world was about the right setting for my new Demon. After a quick flick over my stock image gallery, I pulled out some good stuff that I was going to use as my background. Pull them all out, open them all up and place them over the screen. work out where they can go, where they fit best and look good. I have used a flaming Demon and a Sewer Drain. The ideas behind this setting are taken from a comic book.
Once you have your background layered up and blending all sorted. ( I have about 20 layers just for the background ) Use Alt+Ctrl+E to merge them, Group up the layers you don’t want and clean up your layer stack. Keep stuff named and grouped, Colours are cool to use too ! I would expect you to have about 40-50 odd layers at this stage. A cool tip is to drop some DOF (Depth of Field) in the photo, mask out the layers that are far away and use a nice LENS BLUR to work in a nice look.
Bring in the final element, (top layer elements, that are not affected by your background light sources ) In this case is only Dan with his new wings. Place him where you feel fits in the photo. Remember the golden rules. Work in thirds and you can not go far wrong. If you need to edit the top layer ( Dan ) now is the time, clear up skin, tones, curves colours and anything else you want to fiddle with. I decided that Dan wanted to be Hell Boys little son, So painted him red. ( new layer>Sat blend>mask layer>paint out> Done.)
So your done! you should have your New Born Angel with a pair of stunning wings !! Now is a good time to go to town and edit your photo as if you have just taken a snap of the world burning. Not 100% sure why the Angel is posing for a photo while there is a Flaming Demon behind him, but that’s art
Final Photo
Thanks to Jak Flash, George Eko and Danny Bennett
Stock photos from Div Art
thewolf1607
tankphoto
Mini Guide to how I made this.
Photoshop CS3 ,
Stock Photo taken by myself,
I just wanted to show how quick and simple a couple of photos can be used to create some dramatic photo-manipulations. This one has yet to be named, It took less than an hour. I guess if you have used photoshop before at some level, you should be able to follow this. If not. sorry !!
There are roughly 8 or 9 steps, I have tried to keep it nice and simple. Using a process of layers and masks it should be pretty easy to follow. Remember, using masks, is great for going back to re-edit steps at later levels. Photoshop is designed to edit in a non-distuctive way.
To start with, open up your main photo element, make sure you have a clear focus on where you want to go and ensure you have enough room to work with. Any simple photo edits should be done now. The photo I used was a pretty good starting point, I used the stamp tool (key short-cut (s)) and did some quick free hand work to clean up the back drop. There is not a lot of point in doing any make up changes or skin changes at this point as I know we are going to use lots of colour in the final photo.
I wanted to keep some light background clouds and tree line, using the mask layers remove the bits you dont want.
Using another layer and another stock photo, I added some more baseline details, the layer was flipped into screen mode (blending layer). This dropped out the darker sections of the photo and gave me just the details i needed. Create a mask and remove the bits you dont want.
Create a couple of new layers, I used 3 or 4. Using the brush tool, add some funky details. I grabbed some custom brushes, created some layer styles and combined them down into a group, then flipped them in to Colour Burn mode. I kept most of my small details away from my Treeline on the bottom layer and away from the main subject. If you just Google for Photoshop brushes you can find loads of great freebies out there. Next step is to add some colour.
Open up another layer ( try and keep them named and group them !) I used a golden gradient set at a 45 degree across the photo to give stronger colours at the edges. I think the layer was in screen mode, or overlay. Have a play around, see what fits for you. If you want, mask the layer, highlight areas or darken others. Remember, using masks is the only way you should be doing this. Next step is to add the main element, the wings. Don’t worry to much about your main photo getting hidden. Everything is masked, or maskable. we can go back and sort this later.
Using the stock photo of the flames (try i-stock or something), I cut out one section, created another layer, flipped it over, grouped them and duplicated them a couple of times. Once I had a couple of wings, I used some motion blur, made some bigger and layered them up to give me a fuller wing shape. Once I was happy with the shape. Once again the mask tool was used to leave some flick of flame across the photo. So we should have almost our photo coming to shape at this point. For my photo, a really strong facial look was important so i could not leave my model under the flames. I went back the very first layer (the stock photo of Emma), duplicated it and brought her onto the top of the stack and masked out the the background.
Once I have my photo its time to make the fire burn. I find its much better than having to worry about colour as I go. Using some photo filters, curves and levels ( all using masks to place where I want the certain changes to fit on the photo), I brought in the sides and started to enhance the flames. I use the rule, of masking every single layer. Its very rare a change I make will look good on the whole photo.
This paper look texture, flipped into overlay, or colour burn, or what ever funky layer style will give you a great look and save you a whole bunch of time . Using textures combined with a mask is fun and effective. From here, I edited up the skin, the border with another set of levels and curves. Added my logo, added some smoke to the flames and gave Emma some evil skin. Simple ! Oh some cool motion blur around the feet with some flames around the feet. There is no limit to the things you can add ! Just remember to use lots of layers, masks and you wont go far wrong.
Send some sample of what you can come up with ! All the elements used are below !!
“Adobe Photoshop, or simply Photoshop, is a graphics editing program developed and published by Adobe Systems. It is the current and primary market leader for commercial bitmap and image manipulation, and is the flagship product of Adobe Systems. It has been described as “an industry standard for graphics professionals” says Wikipedia,
Adobe’s Photoshop is a powerful work tool. As the whole world is pretty much using digital cameras now Adobe Photoshop is becoming a household name when it comes to editing photos. But, using Photoshop to do simple contrast and white balance changes seems a bit overkill for me, most cameras these days come with tools just for those jobs. All the time I am asked what programs i use to edit, store and look after my photos; what is a photo’s digital life like; how does a photo end up in a usable size and format. I am going to do a set of blogs covering these mini topics and try and cover some of the time when Photoshop should be used and when it should not be used.
For the first instalment, I am going to use a wedding shot of a bride and take it though the steps to making an photo suitable for online display.
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compare before and after photos
( I am using CS3 extended, with Camera Raw 4.0, on a Windows Vista machine, any questions, ask away if i can answer them I will.)
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Adobe bridge screen shot
1) After you have the photos backed up, stored safe on your drive, its time to think about how you are going to use them. I pick photos for a use, rather than find a nice photo and think what can i use it for. It’s better to have an end product in mind. Adobe Bridge is the first step, so open Bridge and find your photo, click open.
2) If you are using a raw file, then Camera Raw should open as your RAW converter. Even if you are using JPEGS, you can still use Camera Raw to do a pre-edit on your photos and save them back into the folder. It’s a simple and useful way of editing on mass, but we want to take this photo into Photoshop and prep it for the web, giving it some sparkle along the way. So tweak your colours, your white balance and the rest of the normal changes, then open the photo into Photoshop using the OPEN button. I have increased the Saturation, Vibrancy, Fill light and introduced some slight vignetting to brighten up the corners.
camera raw screen shot
3) You should now have a colour corrected photo open in Photoshop. For good practice I always create a duplicate copy of the layer and hide the background. Dunno why, it just makes me happier. If you need to use levels or curves to perfect the photo, now is a good time. Crop away to get the perfect look you’re after: cropping photos after you have started to put effects on the them is a not a good idea – its simpler to get it right in camera, then to perfect in the edit. Once happy with the photo, lets play with photoshop. I want to use a Tilt/Shift lens effect on the photo, its something that i think looks great on portraits.
lens blur menu screen shot
4) Another layer is needed to create the blur, so duplicate the layer with your photo again, (you should have 3 layers the same), the background is hidden and 2 are visible. Using the top layer to work on, and making sure it’s highlighted, go up to your Filters menu (alt + t), select the Blurs menu then Lens Blur. ( If your not sure what all the sliders do, have a play and find out. Be creative, that’s what is all about.) Once you have your nicely blurred layer its time to mix it in to create our simple effect. We are going to use a layer mask, some funky gradients and the salt and pepper of the Photoshop world, the Dodge’n Burn tools. The Sponge tool will be used to highlight the bits we want to sparkle.
lens blur menu
5) Open a layer mask (on the bottom of the layers selection box), making sure it’s going to effect the correct layer. Select the layer mask you just made, and ensure your colour selections are set to black and white. We are going to use the Gradient tool (G) with a Radial effect to mask the blur over the sections of the photo that we want in focus. When you have selected the black to transparent style in the gradient tool box, start the radial effect over the main feature of the photo moving away into the foreground. Once done, you get a good idea of how the effect can be used, it might take a few goes to get the perfect size and placement, I find a quick ctrl-alt-z (backstep) and redraw is the best way, but keeping the layer mask selected and using the levels (ctrl-L) can give fast control over the power and size of the effect.
6) The effect is pretty much complete – all that really needs doing now is dodge and burn to suit your creative style. Use the Sponge tool to create the contrasts that make the effect look more realistic. Its always a good idea to compare how real focus blur effects things and bring those into your digital work. Have a look at how the light would fall, how would it change after the effects that you have created?
7) Time to save your photo for the web, remember to size the image at a good size for how you intend to display it, there is no point in uploading 5mb files to the web. Use the Ctrl + Alt + I selection to size your work. Save as jpeg. If you want to use the SAVE FOR WEB tools, feel free to have a play, but i find unless you want a .gif or .png its not really needed.
8)Have a play, save the stuff you have just made and then have 5 minutes changing effects. Motion blurs, zig zag effects, ice effects, go crazy if you are going to edit in photoshop you might as well use 100% of the program.
E-mail me the results! Dave@davepiper.org.uk
Tilt/shift lense effect
