Showing posts with label photoshop. Show all posts
Showing posts with label photoshop. Show all posts
Friday, March 25, 2016
Working with Photoshop Color Range
Photoshop guys are very familiar with the color range option of Adobe Photoshop. Color range command is a great tool for selecting the areas of an image based on sampled color. And its somewhat similar to Magic Wand Tool. In Magic Wand Tool you need to manually click on the areas of an image that needs to be selected. But if you use the color range option, you just need to choose the sample color. And Photoshop will make the selection by itself!
This tutorial applies to all running versions of Adobe Photoshop including CS4, CS5 and CS6. But Ive prepared the tutorial using Photoshop CS5. All the images of this post will be based on Photoshop CS5.
Color Range
Color Range belongs to the Selection part of Photoshop. You will find it under the Select Menu. Run Photoshop from your PC > Open an image from your hard disk > Go to the Select menu > Choose Color Range. You will get the following image:
Have you noticed Marks PC Logo on color range window? Here the white part is currently selected. If you would like to expand the selection area then click on the pencil button from the right side with plus mark. Now go to your image and hit on the part that you want to add to your selection.
Make sure Sapmled Colors is enabled in the Select option.
You can also increase/ decrease the amount of Fuziness adjust the selection. If you make any wrong selection or if youd like to remove something from your selection then choose the Pencil button with negative sign. Then hit on the part of image you want to deslect.
Eyedropper Tools
The three tools just below the Save button is know as eyedropper tools. The left one is called Eydropper, middle one is Add to Sample and the right one is Substract from Sample.
Fuziness and Range
Ive told earlier that Fuziness will control the amount of selection. By increasing and decreasing the range, you can control the amount of selection. And Range will control how much area of the image will be selected.
To be honest, color range command is somewhat difficult to explain. You need to practice it by yourselft. If you click on the options, increase or decrease the value of different fields, you can easily understand. So, try to explore!
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Change Photoshop Transparency Grid Color!!
If youre a Photoshop user, you must know about transparency grid. Transparency Grid is a checkerboard which appears when youre working with an image with transparent background. If your image has no color in the background, this checkerboard appears behind the image.
Okay fine. Transparency will be indicated by the checkerboard. But you may ask, why I will change the color of transparency grid. In this post Im gonna answer this question. And I will also show, how to change the color of the transparency grid.
Why to Change?
Suppose youve an image with white background. And you need to remove this background behind the image. You know there are different ways to remove background. Im not gonna discuss it here.
In the critical part of the image, Magic selection tool may not be able to select the white part. In that situation you can manually select the unselected portion. But you may also fail remove the white background properly. Because you cant select the white background as your default transparency grid is looks like a checkerboard that contains white color! So after saving the image you will notice there are some scattered white spots in the background.
To get rid of this problem, you can change the default transparent grid.
How to Change?
Very simple. Im using Photoshop CS5. Run Adobe Photoshop from your PC and follow the instruction -
- Go to the Edit Menu.
- Select Preferences > Choose Transparency & Gamut.
- Now you will get the Preferences window with Transparency option selected.
- Keep the Grid size Medium or as your wish.
- Choose Dark from Grid Colors. Or you can customize the color using the custom option. You can also use any other color from the list if any of them is suitable for you.
- Hit OK after choosing the Grid colors.
Remember, the default grid color may need to changed when youre gonna remove any white background from your image. Or background that is light black. Otherwise you dont need to change it.
Turning off the Grid!
You can totally turn off the grid! Yes! If youre bored with the grid that is shown for transparent layer, then you can turn off the grid from preferences window.
Go to the Grid size as shown in the image above. And choose None. Now create a new document from your Photoshop with transparent layer. You will just see white background instead of a grid. But your image will have transparent layer.
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Sunday, February 28, 2016
Optimize the Performance Settings of Photoshop
Adjusting the performance settings could double your Photoshop experience. Though Photoshop automatically sets the performance depending on your hardware configuration. But sometimes you may need to adjust the default settings to improve the performance. If your hardware configuration is strong, you should customize the performance settings.
Couple of days ago, I got a new CPU you know. And the following parts will affect the Photoshop performance:
- Intel Core i3 Processor (3.3 GHz, 3 MB Cache)
- 4GB DDR3 RAM (1600 Bus)
- 1 TB HDD
And I always use Photoshop CS5 (Portable) for edidting or creating image. The hardware of my old PC was not strong enough. And it didnt allow me to customize the settings so much. But the new one lets me customize the performance settings.
Optimize the Performance Settings| Photoshop CS4, CS5, CS6
Dont be confused! All the images used in this post, options Im talking about are based on Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended. Since I dont have old versions of Photoshop Im not sure whether the options are same or different. But I hope, there could be a bit difference, not more than that.
Lets start -
- Run Adobe Photoshop.
- Go to Edit Menu and Choose Preferenes > Performance.
- Now you will get 4 sections: Memory Usage, History & Cache, Scratch Disks and GPU settings.
Lets customize one by one -
Memory Usage
This is the most important part of this topic. I mean the usage of RAM.
This is the most important part of this topic. I mean the usage of RAM.
Look at the memory usage part. Available RAM indicates your usable RAM. Ideal range is the range which Photoshop thinks optimum for your PC. By default, Photoshop use 60% to 70% of available RAM. But Ive 4 GB RAM installed in my PC. Why do I use 1585 MB only?
Ive chosen 100% of the available memory. There is a slider too. You can increase/ decrease the memory usage by sliding the indicator to the right or left.
History & Cache
The next one is History & Cache. Look at the image below:
In this part our main concern is Cache. History doesnt matter. By default photoshop can save up to 1000 history states. But never do that. Remember, the more states will consume more hard disk space. Lets keep it to 20. Or you can reduce the value to 10.
If you have more than 3 GB usable RAM, set the Cache Levels to 8 and Tile Size to 1028 K. Or you can choose more cache levels for bigger documents with few layers. And fewer cache levels for smaller documents with many layers.
Choosing higher cache levels and bigger tile size may slow down the speed while opening a document. But it will significantly improve the processing capacity. So if you have faster RAM and large hard disk, choose the higher cache levels and tile size.
Scratch Disks
What is Scratch Disks? A list of your hard disk volumes! Before talking about this lets have a look at the snapshot:
How much RAM you have? 2 GB, 4 GB, 8GB or more? Sometimes this is not enough for processing images. Thats why Photoshop uses a part of your hard disk as scratch disk. By default, Photoshop uses the Drive C: to scratch. Normally we use C as booting drive.
But using booting drive as scratch disk is not a good idea. Lets choose another drive which is faster and having plenty of free space. Here Ive choosen the drive D: as scratch disk. You can also choose more than one scratch disk if necessary. In that case you can rearrange the order using the up and down arrow.
Suppose, youve selected drive D as scratch disk. Now if you run photoshop, you will see a temp file in the D drive. ie. Photoshop Temp54895112832. And after closing the photoshop, this file will be vanished automatically.
If you have any external disk which is faster than your internal hard disk, you can use that disk as your scratch disk.
GPU Settings
You can only use this feature if your video card supports this. Look at the above image.
Detected Video Card: Intel(R) HD Graphics 2500.
Here you can Enable OpenGL Drawing. You may not be able to find any difference directly. But this option will enable some features that enhance the overall performance.
OpenGL Drawing enables the following features:
- Rotate View Tool
- Birdseye Zooming
- Pixel Grid
- Flick Panning Preferences, Scrubby Zoom
- HUD Color Picker, Sampling Ring etc.
Enhancements:
- Smooth Pan and Zoom
- Drop Shadow for Canvas Border
- 3D Interaction Acceleration etc.
Hopefully, adjusting these performance settings will help you a lot to have a better photoshop experience. If youre confused with any option, please knock me . . .
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Friday, February 5, 2016
Create Sample Barcode using Photoshop !!
In this post, Im gonna publish a funny tutorial of Adobe Photoshop. Now I will show you how to create a sample barcode (fake) by Photoshop. It will not be a real one but look like an original barcode. And maybe all of you know that original barcodes are machine readable. A real barcode includes product information like country of origin, manufacture and expiry date etc.
Im using Adobe Photoshop CS5 for this tutorial. But so far I know, any version of Adobe Photoshop will produce the same result for you. Okay lets start -
- Run Adobe Photoshop and open a new file with following settings
- Choose Width 250 px, Height 100 px, Resolution 72, RGB Color Mode with 32 bit, White Background and hit OK.
- Now you will get a white rectangle in the screen.
- Go to the Filter Menu > Noise > Add Noise . . . > Amount 400 > Distribution - Gaussian > Select Monochromatic > Hit OK.
- You white rectangle will take the following look.
- Again go to the Filter Menu > Blur > Motion Blur . . . > Angle - 90 degree > Distance - 999 pixels > Hit OK.
- Look, Ive just cut the bottom part of the image with Rentangular Marquee Tool. Choose Rectangular Marquee Tool from the toolbar. Now click and drag as my image shows above leaving a small portion from left and right part. Hit on the delete button and choose white color.
- Press T or simply open the Type Tool > Choose Arial font with 10/12 pt size > Type some digits randomly as below.
Were almost done. But you cant save it! Because at the very beginning, you chose 32 bit color mode. But if you want to save the image as JPG or PNG, you must select 8 bit color. Then why I suggested to use 32 bit? Because 32 bit will give you a better look which 8 bit or 16 bit cant.
If you choose 8 bit or 16 bit color, there will be no problem. You can directly save it as JPG or PNG. But the quality will fall somewhat.
Then How to Save?
- Look at the layer panel. Possible there are two layers - Text and Background. Press Shift key > select both the layers > Click right mouse button > hit on Convert to Smart Object.
- Now press Ctrl + A > Ctrl + C > Ctrl + N > In the Color Mode - Choose RGB and 8 bit > Hit OK.
- Press Ctrl + S > Select either JPG or PNG > Hit OK.
I prefer PNG due to its brilliant quality.
Note: If you avoid using 32 bit color mode while opening the new document you will not face any problem while saving it. Simply use 8 bit when you create the document at the beginning. Then you can easily save it just after completing the barcode. But in that case, the bars will not be so clear.
Do you like this tutorial? :)
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Friday, January 22, 2016
How to Create Transparent Image by Photoshop
Im really sorry for the long break in writing. I published the last post few weeks ago. Because there were weeks but no weekends. Due to the serious political crisis in Bangladesh, Banking Sector and business activities were down. And Govt. was trying to recover the loss through continuous banking. And I had to attend the office every day. In this week, bankers got weekend finally. And Im gonna publish a new post.
This is an exclusive post for this site. Ive never published any tips on Adobe Photoshop. This is the first time Im writing about Photoshop. Today I will discuss about creating transparent image. You know transparent image has no background color. It looks very smart when transparency is used with any design or logo. A logo with a white background is not as fine as transparent logo.
If you use transparency, only the image or logo will be displayed. There will be no background of that image. If you place the logo in a black color, background will be black. If you place it on red color, background will be red. Thus whenever you place any transparent logo on a color, the background will take that color.
Ive used Photoshop CS5 to create this tutorial. All images of this post are from CS5. CS4, CS5 & CS6 looks almost similar. But in previous versions, options could be slightly different.
Okay lets start. Look at the above image. This is a sample settings for creating transparent image. Follow the procedure below:
Run Photoshop from your PC > Hit Ctrl + N > Choose Height, Width & Resolution as your requirement > Select Transparent from Background Contents > Enter.
Now you will get transparent layer as the image below. It looks like grid. Whatever you draw or write here, it will be transparent. But you must save the file with .PNG extension. Otherwise transparency will be disappeared.
To save your file, Press Ctrl + S (Save)/ Shift + Ctrl + S (Save as) > Type your File Name > Select PNG as File format > Save.
If you write or draw anything in this transparent layer and save it as PNG file, it will have no background color. But if you place any image or logo which have a background color, it will appear in the saved file. In that case your picture will not be transparent. But you can erase the unnecessary color from your image using the eraser.
When you erase any part of your image, make sure the transparent layer is visible. Otherwise your picture will not be transparent. And when erasing anything, make sure you have selected the proper layer from the layer panel. If you select wrong layer, then you will not be able to erase the necessary part of your image.
Remember, whenever you write or draw something in Photoshop, it will create a new layer. Whenever you place something in your Photoshop document, it will create a new layer. So, while editing anything, make sure youve selected the exact layer where you wanna edit.
If you use transparency, only the image or logo will be displayed. There will be no background of that image. If you place the logo in a black color, background will be black. If you place it on red color, background will be red. Thus whenever you place any transparent logo on a color, the background will take that color.
Ive used Photoshop CS5 to create this tutorial. All images of this post are from CS5. CS4, CS5 & CS6 looks almost similar. But in previous versions, options could be slightly different.
Okay lets start. Look at the above image. This is a sample settings for creating transparent image. Follow the procedure below:
Run Photoshop from your PC > Hit Ctrl + N > Choose Height, Width & Resolution as your requirement > Select Transparent from Background Contents > Enter.
Now you will get transparent layer as the image below. It looks like grid. Whatever you draw or write here, it will be transparent. But you must save the file with .PNG extension. Otherwise transparency will be disappeared.
To save your file, Press Ctrl + S (Save)/ Shift + Ctrl + S (Save as) > Type your File Name > Select PNG as File format > Save.
If you write or draw anything in this transparent layer and save it as PNG file, it will have no background color. But if you place any image or logo which have a background color, it will appear in the saved file. In that case your picture will not be transparent. But you can erase the unnecessary color from your image using the eraser.
When you erase any part of your image, make sure the transparent layer is visible. Otherwise your picture will not be transparent. And when erasing anything, make sure you have selected the proper layer from the layer panel. If you select wrong layer, then you will not be able to erase the necessary part of your image.
Remember, whenever you write or draw something in Photoshop, it will create a new layer. Whenever you place something in your Photoshop document, it will create a new layer. So, while editing anything, make sure youve selected the exact layer where you wanna edit.
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Tuesday, January 12, 2016
Working with Photoshop Stroke
Photoshop Stroke belongs to layer style. You can add stroke outside of an image, text or shape. When you apply stroke over something, it looks like a border or outline. You can also choose different colors for stroke. And you can also adjust the size, position and opacity while applying stroke.
Last month I wrote about how to work with Fill & Opacity in Photoshop. I think you should also have a look to this tutorial. It will be helpful for you.
Photoshop Stroke
Look at the two images below side by side. The left one has no outline. But the right one has a border outside of it.
No stroke has been applied on the left image. And the right image has a stroke outside of it. You can also use stroke with texts and shapes. Stroke can highlight something. Sometimes after applying stroke over something, you can minimize the fill. In that time, you will get stroke highlighted and the inside dimmed! Learn more . . .
How to Apply Stroke?
If you wanna apply stroke over an image then open it. Or create a new document and then type something or take any shape on which you wanna apply stroke. Now make sure youre on the right layer I mean your image or text is selected. Also make sure that your Layer window is turned on. Now go to the strong as shown in the image below.
Hit on the fx (Add a layer style) at the end of layer panel and choose Stroke. Now you will get the Layer Style window. Look at the Stroke options below:
Adjust the size and look at the effect of your stroke outside the image or text. This is very important. Sometimes 1 px doesnt make any sense. Though it depends on the situation I prefer 2 or 3 px. Certainly a fat stroke will not make any sense.
Keep Position - Outside, Blend Mode - Normal, Fill Type - Color and Opacity - as your wish. If you minimize the opacity from 100% to 60 or 70%, then your stroke color will be darken somewhat.
And finally choose a brilliant color for the stroke. Hit on the color box and select different colors to test the result. After choosing the color, hit on the OK button.
You can also explore some additional options from Layer Style window. Suppose Drop Shadow, Gradient Overlay, Satin, Bevel and Emboss these are really cool options here. These can turn your normal image into an outstanding one. And these are really awesome for creating superb text!
After applying stroke, also adjust the Fill and Opacity of the layer. These control the transparency of your image. Adjusting the transparency will give you a completely different look.
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Tuesday, January 5, 2016
Awesomeness of Watch Folders in Photoshop Elements Organizer
Watch Folders : This functionality is a little hidden in Elements Organizer (File>Watch Folders) and not many know about it usefulness. It is one quick way to get media into your Organizer catalog without bothering about manually importing into it.
To use it, just make the parent folder (of all your photo folders) as the watch folder and it auto imports the media into your Organizer catalog. As soon as any new picture is added to your watch folder in windows explore or to any child of your watch folder, it would be auto-imported to your Organizer catalog.
For example, mostly all my pictures are dumped to one of following three folders (shown in screenshot). So i have made all three as my watch folders. Hence I never need to import any media to my Organizer catalog.
Awesomeness is added if you say exchange photos or receive photos through dropbox. You can add dropbox as your watch folder. Hence all media comes to your Organizer catalog automatically.
I find this feature very useful as it saves a lot of my time. The dropbox idea was shared by one of the Elements user(Thanks Mellissa) and I really found it useful. So just thought to share this tip with everyone!
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Managing Photoshop Layers
This is gonna be my second post on Adobe Photoshop. Earlier I wrote about creating transparent image by Photoshop. Hope you all enjoyed it. Today I will discuss about the basics of Photoshop layers. And I think this will be really helpful for Photoshop beginners.
Note: This tutorial is prepared using Adobe Photoshop CS5. Marks PC Solution will not be responsible if you find any limitation of this tutorial with the other versions of Photoshop.
What is Layer?
Id like to start with a brief on Layers. Layers are like sheets. Whenever you create any text, shape or object in Photoshop you will get this on a new layer. A layer is somewhat like a page. In other programs such as illustrator, you dont get layers.
Beginners may find layers quite confusing. Because they may not understand how to handle layers. But layers make it easier to work with a object without destroying others. Thats why someone must know how to manage layers. And thats my todays topic.
Look at the image below:
There are four layers. The first one (bottom) is a Background Layer. And the next three is Layer 1, 2 and 3. Look at the marked and highlighted icons carefully. These are very important for working with layers.
Selecting Layers (Auto Select):
New users get confused while selecting a layer. Most of the time they try to move something without selecting the right layer from the layer window. Before moving something, you should find to what layer it belongs to. Then choose that layer and move it.
Another easy way to select any object is Auto Select. Look at the image below. Ive market the Move Tool (V) and highlighted the Auto Select option. If you check the Auto Select option then you dont need to choose the layer manually. Simply click on something and the layer will be selected automatically!
Turning Visibility Off/ On:
This is a cool option of layer panel. With this tool you can make a layer invisible. Look at the Photoshop Layers image. At the left of each layer, you will see an eye icon. If you click it once, your layer will be invisible. If you click again, it will be visible.
Suppose you have created several layers in a document. But you dont need all the layers at once. You dont need to delete any layer. Just turn off the visibility of that layer which is not necessary :)
Creating and Deleting Layers:
Look at the Photoshop Layers image. Click on the third highlighted icon to create a new layer. And click on the last highlighted icon to delete a layer (Select the layer before deleting it). Or select the layer you wanna remove and then simply press the Del key from your keyboard.
Renaming a Layer:
When you create a new Photoshop document, it will be named as Background. And this layer has some limitation. You will see a lock next to the Background layer. Simply double click on the background layer and rename it.
While creating a text layer, Photoshop will name it as your text. But if you create object layer, it will be named as Layer 1, 2, 3. And if you work with multiple layers, it will be difficult to manage them. So rename those layers so that it can be easier to work with.
Linking/ Unlinking Layers:
If you need to move multiple layers at once or if you need to resize them at a time then you can link those layers.
Press and hold down the Shift key and then click on the layers you wanna link. If those layers are not side by side (ie. layer 3, 6 and 9) you have to use the Ctrl key instead of Shift. Then hit on the link button (First highlighted icon of Photoshop Layers image). After linking the layers, you will get a link icon next to the layers.
Suppose youve linked layer 1 with layer 2. Now when you move the layer 1, layer 2 will be moved too. If you resize any object of layer 2, the object of layer 1 will be resized too!
If you wanna unlink the layers, select one of the linked layers, and then hit on the link icon again.
Rearranging Layers:
Sometimes you may need to rearrange the layers. Suppose you have to put a rectangle on top of the other. For example, an oval will be on the top of a rectangle. But that oval is behind the rectangle.
Look at the layer window. The rectangle layer is on the top of oval layer. Click and drag the rectangle layer to the bottom of the oval layer. Now you will get the oval on top of the rectangle.
Maybe this is a long and boring tutorial. But try to read this with patience. Hopefully you will enjoy . . . :)
Note: This tutorial is prepared using Adobe Photoshop CS5. Marks PC Solution will not be responsible if you find any limitation of this tutorial with the other versions of Photoshop.
What is Layer?
Id like to start with a brief on Layers. Layers are like sheets. Whenever you create any text, shape or object in Photoshop you will get this on a new layer. A layer is somewhat like a page. In other programs such as illustrator, you dont get layers.
Beginners may find layers quite confusing. Because they may not understand how to handle layers. But layers make it easier to work with a object without destroying others. Thats why someone must know how to manage layers. And thats my todays topic.
Look at the image below:
There are four layers. The first one (bottom) is a Background Layer. And the next three is Layer 1, 2 and 3. Look at the marked and highlighted icons carefully. These are very important for working with layers.
Selecting Layers (Auto Select):
New users get confused while selecting a layer. Most of the time they try to move something without selecting the right layer from the layer window. Before moving something, you should find to what layer it belongs to. Then choose that layer and move it.
Another easy way to select any object is Auto Select. Look at the image below. Ive market the Move Tool (V) and highlighted the Auto Select option. If you check the Auto Select option then you dont need to choose the layer manually. Simply click on something and the layer will be selected automatically!
Turning Visibility Off/ On:
This is a cool option of layer panel. With this tool you can make a layer invisible. Look at the Photoshop Layers image. At the left of each layer, you will see an eye icon. If you click it once, your layer will be invisible. If you click again, it will be visible.
Suppose you have created several layers in a document. But you dont need all the layers at once. You dont need to delete any layer. Just turn off the visibility of that layer which is not necessary :)
Creating and Deleting Layers:
Look at the Photoshop Layers image. Click on the third highlighted icon to create a new layer. And click on the last highlighted icon to delete a layer (Select the layer before deleting it). Or select the layer you wanna remove and then simply press the Del key from your keyboard.
Renaming a Layer:
When you create a new Photoshop document, it will be named as Background. And this layer has some limitation. You will see a lock next to the Background layer. Simply double click on the background layer and rename it.
While creating a text layer, Photoshop will name it as your text. But if you create object layer, it will be named as Layer 1, 2, 3. And if you work with multiple layers, it will be difficult to manage them. So rename those layers so that it can be easier to work with.
Linking/ Unlinking Layers:
If you need to move multiple layers at once or if you need to resize them at a time then you can link those layers.
Press and hold down the Shift key and then click on the layers you wanna link. If those layers are not side by side (ie. layer 3, 6 and 9) you have to use the Ctrl key instead of Shift. Then hit on the link button (First highlighted icon of Photoshop Layers image). After linking the layers, you will get a link icon next to the layers.
Suppose youve linked layer 1 with layer 2. Now when you move the layer 1, layer 2 will be moved too. If you resize any object of layer 2, the object of layer 1 will be resized too!
If you wanna unlink the layers, select one of the linked layers, and then hit on the link icon again.
Rearranging Layers:
Sometimes you may need to rearrange the layers. Suppose you have to put a rectangle on top of the other. For example, an oval will be on the top of a rectangle. But that oval is behind the rectangle.
Look at the layer window. The rectangle layer is on the top of oval layer. Click and drag the rectangle layer to the bottom of the oval layer. Now you will get the oval on top of the rectangle.
Maybe this is a long and boring tutorial. But try to read this with patience. Hopefully you will enjoy . . . :)
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