Meeting 24

In vino veritas

Topics: Computer-generated lightning, Paths, Clipping paths for cut-out pictures, Smart Objects in Photoshop, Creative #5

Chi tace acconsente.

Stump the Chump

Making Computer Generated "Lightning"

Start a new document or create a new layer in an existing illustration (let's use joe.tif from Exercises #4).

Set the foreground and background colors to their defaults (black and white) by pressing "D" on the keyboard or by clicking the default color icon in the tool box.

Choose the gradient fill tool, and drag from about one third of the way from the left edge to about one-third the way from the right edge. Note: The eventual lightning bolt will be constrained within the gray area of the gradient.

Choose a medium gray color for the foreground color.

Select Filter>Render>Difference clouds.

Invert the tones of the image by choosing Image>Adjustments>Invert (or type Command-I).

Adjust the appearance of the lightning bolt with Image>Adjustments>Levels and sliding the black point triangle very close to the white point triangle in the histogram. This should look very much like a bolt of electricity.

If you are working on a separate layer, choose Screen as the mode with which this layer interacts with underlying layers. This superimposes the light tones on the underlying layer, but makes invisible the dark part of the lightning-bolt layer. The black becomes transparent.

TIP: If you want the electricity to have an electric blue cast (or any other desired color cast), use Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation. Click on the Colorize check box, and adjust Hue and Saturation for the desired effect.

ANOTHER TIP: After you place the gradient on its layer, you may use the airbrush to alter its appearance, and control somewhat the direction the lightning bolt takes.

Paths

Created a new 7" x 5" x 72 dpi RGB document filled with white.

Click on the Pen tool.

Click on the Paths tab in the Layers dialog box.

Older version alert: You must click the New Path icon at the bottom of the Paths palette (upturned page icon) if you have Photoshop versions 7 through CS5.  This creates a new path in the Paths palette. You don't need to do this in CS6 because a new path is created automatically as soon as you create the first path point using the Pen tool. This is an example of an interface change made by Adobe that didn't work out after several versions, and they returned to the old way of doing them.

Click straight lines and draw a cartoon-style lightning bolt.

Choose the Path Selection tool (the version that looks like a white arrow) located above the Pen tool icon.

Move individual nodes around if necessary to improve and perfect the lightning bolt shape.

Choose a red foreground color.

Click on the Paintbrush tool icon to make it the active painting tool.

Set Transparency (Options bar) to around 25%

Choose an appropriate brush size for the Paintbrush tool.

Stroke the path by dragging the Path name onto the Stroke Path icon in the Path palette. It will use the brush settings for the currently selected Paintbrush tool, i.e., size, opacity, etc.

Choose Yellow as the new foreground color.

Fill with Yellow by dragging the Path name onto the Fill Path icon in the Path palette.

Note: A selection can be created from a path. Drag the Path name onto the "Load Path as Selection" icon in the Paths palette.

More work with Paths - working with curved lines

Open the file 04Paths.psd (in Exercises 8)

Click on the Paths tab and create a new Path by clicking on the icon at the bottom of the palette (be sure you are not working in the Layers tab because new paths will be filled automatically).

Make curved paths using the Pen tool. Click and drag in the direction of the curve before releasing the mouse.

Adjust the paths with the other tools in the Pen flyout menu. These tools include:

• Pen tool
• Freeform Pen tool
• Ad Anchor Point tool
• Delete Anchor Point tool
• Convert point tool

TIP: Hold Command to turn your Pen tool to the Arrow tool for editing. Hold Option to turn the Pen tool into the Convert Point tool temporarily.

Demonstrate how to make a clipping path with the file called 04Pepper.psd

A clipping path can be used to create a cut-out picture in a design. Most photos placed in a page design show a rectangular bounding box. Even if the photo's background color is white against the white page, the pixels within the rectangle normally obscure what's underneath. A cut out picture has no apparent background to it. The Pen tool is used to create a "clipping path" to hide the background so that underlying type or objects can show right up to the cut-out's edge.

Open the file 04pepper.psd (Exercises 8)

Click on the Paths palette

Click the New Path icon at the bottom of the Paths palette (upturned page icon)

Trace around the pepper with either the Lasso selection tool or the Pen tool. If you use the Lasso tool, turn the selection area into a Path using the Make Work Path from Selection icon. Note that using the Lasso tool often creates rough paths that must be refined later.

Name the path by double clicking on its name in the Paths palette and typing the new name.

Save the file as an Photoshop EPS file. EPS files can contain paths drawn in Photoshop.  Remember also that a Postscript printer is required to render EPS files at their full resolution.

While the new implementation of the TIF file format can now include paths, it might not be as reliable as EPS in older pagination systems. The Photoshop file format can include paths of course, but importing Photoshop (PSD) files into non-Adobe programs or proprietary systems may not work.

Create a new InDesign document (start InDesign, File>New>Document).

Use the Type tool in InDesign to create a headline - "Peppers Illustrated"

Resize and choose an appropriate typeface for the headline (60 point Times Bold?)

Draw a picture box in InDesign.

Choose File>Place and place the saved pepper EPS file into the picture box.

Choose Object from the top menu, and scroll to Clipping Path

Click the drop-down list and choose Photoshop Path. The name of your path should now appear in the dialog box indicating that it will use this path to clip the subject from the rest of the picture. When you click OK, the area outside the pepper will disappear.

Copy and past another pepper image and see how multiple pictures can overlap on the page without a bounding box showing.

Similar steps used to work with QuarkXPress, although it has been a long time since I used it to verify.

When done, please place exercise files in the Trash to minimize hard drive clutter.

Remember that EPS files require a Postscript printer to print well when they are used in a page layout program.

Transparency for the Web
Two different file formats can carry transparency for web pictures - GIF and PNG. Other file types cannot produce transparent backgrounds.

To obtain transparent backgrounds for web pictures, rename the background layer to something else, select the object you wish to keep, then select inverse to select the background. Next delete the background away - you should see the checkerboard pattern around your object.

Finally, choose File>Export>Save for Web (Legacy). In the case of pictures for the web, you can select either GIF or PNG format files because both are able to carry transparency. PNG has a better transparency feature, but GIF is a very common web format compatible with all browsers. To make transparency work, check the transparency check box.

Remember that JPG won't be able to have a transparent background! It will show as white and this can be seen in the preview.

An Optional Exercise with Paths:

Open BULB.JPG (Exercises 4).

Click on the Paths tab (not Layers)

Draw a Path around the bulb using the Pen tool

Name the path.

Turn the path into a selection area in the Paths palette.

Select>Modify>Feather 5 pixels.

Select>Inverse.

Edit>Fill with 50% gray.

Add noise (Gaussian, level 32).

Gaussian Blur about 4-5 pixels.

Image>Adjustments>Threshold.

Choose the paintbrush tool, use 100 pixel brush, 25% pressure, airbrush behavior button, with a pale yellow foreground color.

Give it a "glow" by stroking the path in the Paths palette.

Add a second, lighter color to the glow using a smaller 35 pixel brush.

Smart Objects

Smart objects in Photoshop provide flexibility in editing. For example, a smart object on a layer can be scaled down to a very small size, but when sized back up lose no resolution. Another common use of Smart Objects is to be able to replace one smart object with others in a template for a card, etc. Smart objects can be either raster objects, or vector objects from Illustrator. One common use of Illustrator smart objects is to create simple graphic elements to serve as navigation buttons, etc. for web sites. Employing these smart objects makes it easy to experiment with the shape and color of them.

Getting started
In Exercises 6 you will find a sub-folder named Smart Objects. Drag the contents to your desktop (there are some RAW files there, and only one person at a time can have a RAW file open in Camera Raw over a server).

Open the file BWRingAround.psd. Note that there are a number of different adjustment layers that convert a color picture to grayscale and produce a different "look" for each of the examples.

In the Layers palette, click the down arrow next to the group named Row 1. At the bottom of the stack, you will find the master smart object named "Original photo". Right click on the Original Photo layer (and click on the layer name, NOT the thumbnail!), and choose "Replace Contents..."

[NOTE: If your Mac won't work with a right-click, then Control-click the layer name instead.]

Use the file Neon2.psd, and notice how all the former variations of the flower are now replaced with variations of the sign.

Repeat using the portrait picture Retouch.psd, and see how this works for flesh tones.

To determine which layer affects which variation, merely click the eye icon in the Layers palette to see which variation gets hidden.

The steps for creating a smart object file begin with File>Place Embedded. Then create layers and adjustments as adjustment layers.

Note that you can edit the contents of a smart object stored in a layer. Right click (or Control-Click) the smart object layer in the Layers palette (again, click on the layer name, not the thumbnail), and choose Edit Contents. This will open the copied smart object in a new Photoshop window where you can change it. You may be asked to flatten a changed smart object if you had added new layers. Save it, and return to the original document where the changes should be reflected. This will not change your source picture file that was placed in the document.

Another exercise
In yet another sub folder called Card_PSD, open the file named "CardTemplate.psd". Currently it's a blank card awaiting placement of a photo.

Click on the Background layer in the Layers Palette, then add a new layer above it by clicking the upturned page button in the Layers Palette.

Right-click (or Control-Click) this layer and choose Convert to Smart Object from the list.

Right-click the name of the layer once again, and choose Replace Contents. Choose the raw file DSC_010.NEF (Note: in class only one person at a time can have this file open in Camera RAW on the network. Copy it to your desktop to assure access to the RAW file. The file will open with resize handles and an X connecting the diagonals. If it is about the right size, merely double-click to accept the current size.

Note that this creates a smart object layer in the layers palette, and the contents can be edited or replaced by right-clicking on the layer name. With a RAW file, editing opens it once again in Camera RAW for further toning. With a TIF, JPG, PSD, etc, it will open the file in another Photoshop window for editing. After editing, click Save to accept the changes, and to update the smart object with the changes.

Let's replace the contents of the card template with a studio photo, so right click the smart object layer in the Layers palette, and choose Replace Contents. Navigate to SMITH_1327.psd, and Place it.

Resizing without fear
One of the problems faced in making collages is that while experimenting, you might use Edit>Transform> Scale to reduce the size of an element. This throws away pixels when reduced, and if you change your mind, resizing upwards later gives a fuzzy, pixilated image.

If you place objects on layers as smart objects, then you can size downward, then back up without losing the sharpness of the original picture.

 

Notes: All digitized content (scans, digital photos, etc.) used in the making of your creative assignment must be submitted in a separate "assets" folder named "lastname_assets" (substituting your own name, of course.)  If you create some graphic components in Illustrator or other program, please include all of those files. If you create the illustration completely in software, include some partially-completed steps in the assets folder. This folder is due on the day that the assignment is due. Please don't place your completed assignment into the assets folder though.

If the assignments don't meet the specifications given above, they won't be considered for a grade. That means if a file is submitted in sRGB instead of AdobeRGB, it gets a failing grade. Not having a quality print, not having an assets folder with all contents, or not meeting the minimum picture size or resolution also results in a zero for the assignment. Please pay attention to the assignment specifications!

Open Topic
One digital illustration or animation is requested. Open topic - exercise your creative freedom.  Please don't use text in the illustration unless it is part of a picture you have included. If you type or draw text in the final illustration, there will be a one-letter grade reduction!  If pictures do not meet the minimum size/resolution requirement or have been obviously "upsized", they will be given a failing grade! Have the picture or animation ready for presentation in class during the final exam time period.

Submit the files in JPEG format (Quality 7 or higher) to save server space, but be sure to also save the original layered file for your own future needs. Files must be in the AdobeRGB(1998) working space to be considered for a grade. Animations are exempt from the color space requirement.

The files go into the Creative_05 folder. The assignment files are to be accompanied by portfolio-quality 8-1/2x11 inch prints of the files. The quality of the print (color, resolution, photo-quality, etc.) will be evaluated as part of the score for this assignment.  Please print these before the final exam meeting - no printing will be permitted on the day of the final.

This creative work is due on the day of the final examination.

Tips for a better grade on creative assignments...

Final exam period schedule:
In addition to the creative assignment, the final exam will be given during the exam period. The Registrar's Office is responsible for the final exam schedule, and a link can be found on my Digital Imaging start page. If there are discrepancies, please let me know and we will adhere to the Registrar's schedule.