As many people are aware, Photoshop used to support a pretty decent 3D feature set. These were beefed up in Photoshop CS6 Extended and continued through CC for a number of years. See tutorials on Photoshop 3D here. Adobe started to retire these features because of changes in Direct X and other technologies. This tutorial, shows how to keep legacy 3D working in Photoshop.

I think the most common way people used it, was to composite 3D objects into Photoshop. The advantage of 3D is the ability to change the angle and lighting to make everything match perfectly. Another thing I loved about the 3D was the ability to animate different properties.

3D is back, but in a different way. By Using the new Substance 3D viewer, you are able to position your objects, light and texture them in a much more powerful way than before. You can even generate 3D objects from text. What you don’t have is the ability to interact with the 3D objects, directly in Photoshop, nor the ability to animate the 3D. All that said, for compositing, the results are better than ever, lets take a look.

Getting Set up

At the time of this writing (it will change in the future), this feature is only supported in the Beta Version of Photoshop.

In the creative Cloud App, choose apps>beta and install Photoshop.

You will also need to install Substance 3D viewer beta. This will also install a plugin in Photoshop beta.

Free 3D library

While you are in Creative Cloud app, click on 3D & AR

You will see Substance 3D assets. Click to go to the page, it will open in your web browser.

Here you can download a number of different assets, including models, procedural textures and lighting models. I clicked on the sofa and choose download.

Open an image in Photoshop and Drag and drop the 3D model into Photoshop.

It will appear as a Smart Object layer.

Either double click the smart object, or choose Edit Contents

Substance 3D viewer will appear with your composition in the window.

You can easily position and scale the 3D object, by right, left or middle mouse button dragging. (More in the video at the top).

Position the object. Click to Photoshop and the image in Photoshop will update to match what you see here. This is where the nice integration takes place.

Choose the environment button on the left-bar. (lightbulb icon). Now you can adjust the Lighting to match the angle of the photograph.

Click on light presets to change the lighting environment, you can also load in your own HDR image and use that. This sets the light color and reflections.

Click the texture icon. This is where you change the textures and materials (a material is a texture preset). Here I increased the roughness to make the cushions look more like velvet. You can change many things about the textures.

You can choose a different diffuse color, here we made the cushions red.

If you want to use once of the material presets. click on Material presets and a panel will appear.

Drag the material onto the object. Here I used a velvet preset.

Notice a blue bar appears and says:

Replace all instances: Which will replace all the cushions, or whatever objects are grouped together, or

Apply to all Objects: Will apply the material to the entire 3D model.

Notice all the cushions receive the new preset.

All the properties can be changed including the color. We went for red again, as it matches this scene nicely.

If you choose the bottom-left icon this takes you to the generative window. Here I added the text prompt Victorian Ballroom. Substance uses the 3D object (this is the way I positioned it in 3D space) and generates a background based on the prompt. I made a tut on generative ai and 3D in Substance viewer here.

When you are happy with your 3D model, click the Ray tracing button to render it.

When happy, click To Photoshop in the top Right.

Go back to Photoshop and the image is updated to Match what’s in Substance viewer. To change it, go back to Substance viewer, or double click the smart object. It’s really easy and fun.

Hopefully you found this week’s free Photoshop tutorial useful!

Great to see you here at the CAFE.

Colin

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This tutorial shows how to add a loo to any object is a hyperrealistic way.

Start with a leather bag in this case. This will work on any surface.

If you have the logo in your Library, drag it into your document.

If the logo isn’t in the library, choose File>Place and find it. Or choose FIle>open and then Combine the images in your object document. 

They will now be on 2 layers.

If the Logo is a Smart Object, as indicated by the Smart Object Badge; Right-Click and Choose Rasterize layer

Press Ctrl/Cmd+T for Free Transform

Drag the corner handles to resize the logo and position it. Don’t press Enter yet.

Right-Click and choose Distort

Drag the corners to match the perspective of your object.

Right-Click and Choose Warp (If right-Click doesn’t work, make sure to Press Ctrl/Cmd+T Again)

Drag to match the roundness and bends of your object

We need to hide the black. Don’t select it, here’s a faster way.Where it says Normal in the layers panel, change it to Lighten. Changing the layer blending mode hides black.

Now we want to make the logo wrap to fit all the contours and wrinkles.

We will make a Displacement Map

Hide the Top layer

Choose the Channels Panel

Click on the Blue channel (Has the most contrast)

Right-Click and choose Duplicate Channel

Under Destination>Document choose new

This will copy the channel to a brand new document

Click ok

We now have a new document.

Save it as a .psd to your desktop. File>Save as

I called it dmap.psd

Clse the document, you no longer need to edit it.

Choose your original document with the bag.Click on RGB in the channels Panel to show all the channels again

Return to the layers panel and turn on the logo layer again.

Make sure the logo layer is selected

Choose Filter>Distort>Displace

Keep the default settings and click ok

You will now see the finder.

Navigate to your dmap.psd file and click ok

You will notice the log warps to match the contours on the bag. (Or whatever object you are working with).

Make the logo look worn

Let’s add some milage to the logo, so it doesn’t look brand new.

In the Layers Panel, click on the fx button and choose Blending Options

Choose the left black slider on Underlying Layer

Hold Alt/Option to split the triangle and drag to the right.

This will fade the logo in the shadow and midtone areas.

If you drag the left part of the triangle it will break up the type and make it look distressed.

Here is the final result.

Its a few steps, but look how realistic it looks compared to just dropping the logo and changing a blend mode.

Thanks for checking this out. Drop a comment and let me know what tutorials you would like me to create in the future.

Thanks

Colin

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This tutorial shows you how to paint on adjustments with pen pressure to add depth and drama to a photo in Photoshop 2024. For tips on using a Wacom tablet, check out these tips. 

This works like the Adjustment brush, but it’s a more advanced way to create this effect and gives us more control and power.

Lets start with this picture I shot, it is an interesting subject with a great sky. Its just a little flat. Lets fix it now.

How this works

We will make some adjustments to the image. These adjustments will be our “paint”.

We will hide all the Adjustments with a black mask.

Finally, we will paint with a white brush to add the adjustments exactly where we want them. By using Pen pressure, we can shade and blend the adjustment like we would with a pencil. This is my favorite way of working,

Choose new adjustment layer in the layers panel.

Grab a curves adjustment.

Increase the midtones and brights, we are looking to set the new maximum highlights.

See how the land is looking better. Yes, the sky is blown out, but don’t worry. We won’t be applying this adjustment to the entire image, just certain area.

Add a second adjustment layer. This time, Vibrance.

Add a third, levels adjustment.

(Despite what some people say, Levels has a very valid use alongside curves, it gives a linear midtone /highlight boost, that’s hard to accomplish with curves without introducing banding).

Now we have several adjustments, lets combine then together into a “super adjustment” that we can paint onto our image.

Click, Ctrl+Click on each layer to select all three.

Press Ctrl/Cmd+G to group the Adjustments together.

Click the layer mask icon to add a layer mask to the group.

Click the mask to select it. Press Cmd/Ctrl+I to invert your mask.

(If you hold down the alt/Option key as you create the mask, it will make a black mask).

The Adjustment will now be hidden because of the black mask. The image should look like the original again.

Choose the brush tool and a soft edged brush. Set foreground color to white.

Click the brush options

Under transfer, choose Pen Pressure for opacity jitter. This will only be available if you are using a pressure sensitive pen and tablet, such as a Wacom, Xence, Microsoft Surface etc. When you press harder, the effect will be stronger than when you brush lightly.

You can still adjust your images without a tablet, just use a lower opacity, you obviously won’t be able to use pen pressure.

Optional: You can use selection tools such as object selection to isolate regions that you will paint.

In this case, I selected the rock, because I want to constrain the brush strokes to the structure and not on the water. We will use different strokes on the water.

Paint the areas that will be facing the sun to accentuate the highlights and add depth to the image. It’s like painting with light.  See the video at the top to see this in action.

Add more highlights on the ocean by gently brushing with the pen.

If you want to increase the effect, duplicate the adjustment group by clicking it in the layers panel and pressing Ctrl/Cmd+J.

Here we have painted on highlights. Lets also do some shadow.

To set up a shadow adjustment.

Click the New Layer icon while holding down alt/Option.

This gives us a dialog box, change it to overlay mode.  This will hide gray.

Here is our new adjustment, notice its overlay blend mode. Understand Layer Blend modes in Photoshop here.

This time, choose a brush and set foreground color to black.

Paint on the shadows to chisel some depth into the image. If you like this look and want a deeper walkthrough step-by-step, check out my course on dodge and burn in Photoshop, it will transform your images!

The tablet used in this video, Wacom Intuos Pro Medium

I hope you found this tutorial useful! Check out our other tutorials here at the CAFE, there are over 800 free Photoshop tutorials here.

Colin

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Just in time for the April 8th 2024 American Total Solar Eclipse. You have captured your eclipse photos, now what? Here is how you can assemble them into a cool eclipse sequence using Photoshop. How to Photograph a solar eclipse. 

This tutorial works for Solar eclipses and lunar eclipses.

Assemble your eclipse photos

Ill show how to import photos to Photoshop from Lightroom Classic, and without Lightroom (after the few lightroom steps here).

You will most possibly have hundreds of eclipse photos when you are done. Choose the best totality image and the best 6 sequences on either side of totality, 13 in total. (You can obviously do more, or less, I used 13 for this tutorial.)

I made a collection in Lightroom to separate the images.

If you aren’t using Lightroom, put your images into a different folder on your computer.

Select all the images from the Filmstrip at the bottom of Lightroom

Right-Click on the filmstrip and choose Edit In>

If you have RAW images and want to retain that format choose Edit in>Open as Smart Object Layers in Photoshop

Jpg or other formats choose Edit in> Open as Layers in Photoshop

Photoshop will launch and all the selected images will be loaded into separate layers automatically.

If you don’t use Lightroom

If you used Lightroom, skip the next 4 steps.

If you aren’t using Lightroom go to Photoshop

Choose File>Scripts>Load Files into Stack

Your finder will open.

Locate the folder where you have put the individual images you want to combine into a sequence. (You can use RAW files, but they will be converted on import using this method. To keep them RAW, use Lightroom Classic or Bridge).

Select all the images and click ok

You will see the images in the dialog box.

Click OK

You will now see them load in as a layers in Photoshop, similar to the Lightroom result.

Building the Eclipse Sequence in Photoshop

It doesn’t matter how you imported the images to Layers in Photoshop, directly or through Lightroom, the steps are identical from here out.

Currently, you will each image in its own layer and only the top layer will be visible. We want to reveal the eclipse phots for ALL the layers at the same time, so we don’t have to cut anything out or do any masking

Select all the layers in the layers panel (Press Ctrl/Cmd+A to select all). Or Ctrl/Cmd+Click on each layer. Or click on the top, hold Shift and Click the bottom layer. (Lot’s of ways to do this).

Click Where it says Normal at the top of the Layers Panel, choose Lighten from the menu.

You should now see all the eclipses from all the layers. You have changed the blending mode on all the Layers to Lighten, which hides black. How to use Layer Blending Modes in Photoshop

Arranging the Eclipse Sequence, measuring the gaps

How we need to resize the canvas to fit the final eclipse sequence which will be much wider than the current document dimensions.

Here is a trick to determine the width we will need.

Choose the Rectangular Marquee tool

Start the box on the left side of totality, or a full sun image.  Tips: Hold Spacebar to move selection as you are creating it.

Drag to the right, decide how much space you want between each disk in the final composite.

You will see an overlay that shows the width of the selection. Here, we see about 1200 pixels (rounded) will be about right for each disk, if we want the spacing in the image.

To determine the needed width of the canvas, we will need 1200px for each disk. There are 13 disks aka eclipses or partial eclipses (layers)

Open your calculator and multiple 1200 by 13.

I see that 15,600 is what we will need. We need to expand the width of our overall image (canvas) to 15,600 pixels to fit the final sequence.

You can use the crop tool method shown in the video for a more visual way of resizing, or do this.

Change the Background color to black.

Choose Image>Canvas size.

Change to Pixels

We aren’t changing the height of the image so we only need to input the new width, this will be 15600

Click ok

You will now see the width has changed, the background should be black. If not..

If you see a transparent checkerboard, choose a solid color adjustment layer

Choose black and ok

Drag the solid black layer to the bottom of the layer stack

Creating the placement guide

This is a key step. If we make a guide, it will be easier to position each layer.

Photoshop can automatically make this guide.

Choose View>Guides>New Guide Layout

Turn on Columns and choose 14. This will give 13 guides, if you are using more, or less images than this, make the appropriate adjustment. (Don’t ask why it uses columns and not guides).

For Rows, choose 2. This will create a horizontal center.

Click ok

Choose the layer that contains the image of totality.

Grab the move tool (v key)

Drag totality to the center.

If you don’t see rulers, press Ctrl/Cmd+R to open them

Drag a horizontal guide out of the ruler and position it at the bottom of the totality disk. Drag another guide and place it at the top of the disk.

We now have a perfect grid for positioning.

Choose each layer in the layers panel and drag the disk to its position on the grid

Make sure the images in the right are aligned with the top of the grid

Align all the images on the left with the bottom of the grid.

And here is our final sequence.

I hope you have fun, and best of luck shooting your eclipses. Don’t forget to step away from the camera for a moment and just experience the moment of totality, the memory will be worth it. If you are having technical issues, with your camera during totality, don’t fiddle and waste away the eclipse, step away and just experience the moment, it could be a once in a lifetime experience and there will be plenty of very similar photos all over the internet for you to enjoy later. Trust me, from someone who has experienced a total solar eclipse, the experience and memory is more valuable.

Thanks

Colin

PS Don’t forget to follow us on Social Media for more tips..

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How to Use Clipping Groups in Photoshop

The first part is a quick primer on how Clipping Groups work, then we will do the lighting effects,

We are going to select the shirt on the photo.

Choose the Object Selection tool.

Make sure the mode is set to Lasso at the top.

Make a rough selection around the shirt. With this AI tool, you aren’t really making the selection, you are telling Photoshop what you want selected.

Photoshop will make the selection for you. (You can use the lasso or other selection tools to improve the selection if needed).

Press Ctrl/Cmd+J to copy the selected shirt to a new layer. (Normally I’d use a mask, but I’m just demonstrating clipping groups here and want to keep it simple, we will use a mask in a moment).

Here I added a graphic to put on the shirt. (I dragged it from the Library, you can see on the video).

If I hide the background, you can see just the shirt and the graphic.

I want the graphic to fit INSIDE the shirt, and not show outside.

Move you curser between the 2 layers in the Layers panel.

Hold down Alt/Option and you will see a square arrow.

Click to add a clipping group.

Notice the top layer displays as indented

Notice the graphic is now contained within the shape of the shirt.

A clipping group constrains the visibility of the top layer to the pixels (or shape) of the layer underneath.

If I turn the background back on.

You can drag the top layer around and reposition, or resize it and it will stay constrained to the shape. (Alt/Option Click to ungroup it again).

I changed the color of the graphic and changed the blend more to make it look better. Learn About Blending Modes here. | Add a displacement Map to wrap to the wrinkles

Ok, onto the tutorial

Making Clipping Masks in Photoshop

In this image, we are going to make a clipping mask in the shape of our singer in the photo, so we can add some nice lighting to her.

Start by duplicating the layer. Cmd/Ctrl+J

Choose the Object selection tool

Click the options arrow in Select Subject

Choose Cloud as the option, if you are connected to the internet. (This makes a better quality selection than Device)

Click select subject and you will get a selection around the woman

Click the add mask button in the layers panel. (We are doing this instead of cutting out our subject. A mask allows modifications to the edges and is non destructive).

In this screen grab I hid the background, so you can see the transparency. (You don’t need to hide the background.)

Click on the foreground picker at the bottom of the tool bar.

Choose a golden color

Grab the gradient tool

Choose foreground to transparent option (in Basics)

Choose linear Gradient

Apply the gradient to the image by dragging.

Notice the gradient covers the background and the person. We just want it on the person

Just like we did with the shirt example, lets make a clipping group.

Hold your pointer on the line between the masked layer and the gradient layer in the layers panel.

Hold Alt/Option, wait for the square arrow, click

You can move the gradient around and notice it stays constrained to our person. This is our clipping Mask.

Change the blending mode of the gradient to Soft Light and reposition it to add a more subtle effect on the edge.

You can also adjust the gradient layer opacity if you like.

Here we repeat on the left side, but with a blue gradient

Hold the Alt/Option key and move it between the 2 gradient lAyers and click.

Notice we can stack layers above each other and they can all share the same mask as long as they are clipped. See the indentation and arrows to indicate they are in a clipping group.

This time I used an Overlay blending mode. Just use the Blending mode that looks the best for each color, there is no rule, but I find I use Overlay, Screen and Soft light a lot when Lighting.

Using Adjustment Layers with Clipping Groups

Ok, let’s do some custom lighting now.

Choose the New Adjustment Layer in the Layers panel

Grab Curves

Let’s increase the brightness by dragging up in the Curve in the Properties panel.

We are going to change the color too. Choose Red in the top of the Curves

Drag up to add Red

I want Orange, Red+Yellow= Orange

We now need yellow. You will find Yellow by dragging down the the Blue channel. How to use Curves for Color in Photoshop (Curves are super powerful and can do a LOT. I made a course on Photoshop Curves here)

We have our colored light, but it’s everywhere. Lets contain it.

As before, move your cursor between the 2 layers and hold Alt/Option and click to make a clipping mask.

Now the curves can only appear within our person.

But we want to hide the lights and only paint them where we want them.

Click on the mask on the Curves layer (White rectangle)

Press Ctrl/Cmd+I to invert our mask.

It now shows as Black and the effect is hidden.

Grab a Brush (B key)

Set the foreground color to White

Drag on the right edge of our person. Notice it now lights up with the orange light.

The beautiful thing about the Clipping Mask, it’s impossible to paint outside the shape of our person.

This makes it easy to add a Rim light, or paint on the edges.

Here I added a Blue light on the other side, following the same steps.

Here you can see the before and after of this effect

I hope this tutorial was helpful for you! Let us know in the comment.

Great to see you here at the CAFE

Colin

Browse the other free photoshop tutorials here at the cafe

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Previously I made a very popular tutorial on how to use Lighting effects to relight photos in Photoshop. I had many people tell me they weren’t aware this tool ever existed and were really happy with the results. It’s a tool I have loved and used for many years, but sadly, due to Adobe moving away from certain technology. mainly Open GL, they are retiring the 3D tools in Photoshop, and this includes our beloved Lighting Effects (even though it was a precursor to 3D in Photoshop). (see this tut on how to keep using these features as long as possible)

I used Lighting effects are far back as the 90’s to create a series of photo realistic illustrations entirely in Photoshop (it made PhotoshopCAFE very famous in the 2000s) , such as the guitar here. See more of my illustrations here

At one point, Adobe updated the Lighting effects to use 16-bit channels, but it never worked right, and they went back to 8-bit, but with the newer interface. I wish someone would patch the original lighting effects (8-bit application which no longer works) which didn’t use GPU and get it working. Anyway, it’s an end of an era. So I have taken the new tools and adapted them to use for lighting photos. (It won’t Create the bump on a channel for me to make illustrations though).

2.0 version of Colin’s Lighting photos in Photoshop Tutorial.

Ok, here goes.. it doesn’t give you as much control as we used to have, but I have figured out how to make the new tools produce a similar result.

Pay special attention to the 2nd part of the tutorial. which is adding edge texture. I don’t know of anyone else who does this in Photoshop, but it sure makes a difference.

This is the starting image. The same one I used in the original tutorial on this, a few years back.

Let’s set the ambient light, making everything darker.

Click the new Adjustment Layer icon

Choose exposure (Curves or LUTs work too, but this is easiest for tutorial purposes).

Move exposure down the darken the image

Every adjustment layer comes with a mask. Click on the mask.

If we add black to the mask, it will hide the adjustment and allow the original to show through, giving the impression of light.

Press the D key to reset foreground and background colors. *(Black as foreground)

Choose Gradient, grab foreground to background.

Choose radial as the gradient type.

Drag on the image to create a spot light. (If it doesn’t work, try turning on reverse for the gradient options).

You will see a new addition in the form of a point on the outer circle. Depending on when you read this, it’s currently only in the Beta version of Photoshop. How to get the beta. 

Drag the point to change the circle to an oval

See the diamond on the line? Drag it to the outside to reduce the fall off.

Move it closer to the center to increase the light fall off, for a more natural feather of the lights edge.

As you se, it produces a nice light effect.

Texture Boost

These is something missing though. When you light an object from the side it increases the appearance of the textures.

If you front light, it’s usually flat and conceals details, which is why a lot of glamour and beauty photography utilizes flat, front lighting. We want the texture boost.

Choose the Channels panel

Click on the Red channel. (Because red is the dominant color. in this image).

Hold Cmd/Ctrl and click on the thumbnail.

This will load the luminance (brightness) from the red channel as a selection.

Click on the words RGB to restore the channels. (Not the thumbnail)

Make sure your panel looks like this before proceeding.

All the channels are active and all are selected in light gray. (This is the default value).

Choose the background layer.

Press Cmd/Ctrl+J to copy the selection to a new layer.

Change the blending mode to Overlay

Don’t worry if the colors look over saturated suddenly, that will be fixed in the next step.

Lets make the texture pop

Choose Filter>Other>High Pass

As you increase the Radius, you should see the texture become more pronounced.

Choose an ampunt that you like, usually between 1-4 depending on the resolution of your image.

Here is our final result. I hope you like it!

Thanks for checking out this tutorial. See you next week with a new one!

Colin

Drop a comment and let me know if this was helpful.

Browse the other free photoshop tutorials here at the cafe

Download 100s of dollars worth of Photoshop adds on for free here at the Vault.

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Colin

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The new gradient tool makes it really easy to do things that were difficult before. I figured a rainbow is a good way to explore these features and I have a few tips to throw in too.

Adding more hidden gradients

We will be using Legacy gradients. These are additional Libraries that are in Photoshop but hidden. Lets load them now.

Choose Window>Gradients to open the Gradients panel.

Choose the top Right menu and select Legacy Gradients. This will load the gradients.

Making the Rainbow

First of all, select the Gradient tool and choose radial.

Drag on your image to create a circle.

Click the arrow by the Gradients to choose a new gradient.

Go under Legacy and select the spectrum preset.

You will see colored concentric circles.

Choose the Properties panel and drag the colors closer together on the left side of the Slider.

We want to make then even closer, but notice how bunched up they stops are. We need more space to work.

Grab the tab of the Properties panel and tear it off.

Drag out the panel until it stretches the bars. Look at that! Way better.

You will see a transparency bar.

Drag the points sway from the bar to remove them.

Get rid of all of them except the 2 end white ones and the 2 black ones on the left

Drag the Right-white slider to the left. As you slide it, notice in expands a transparent area over the center.

Remove the gray slider, so we just have 2 white ones and a black on in between.

Adjust until you have a narrow band around the circle’s edge

Move the colored sliders until you are happy with the spacing.

Dock the properties panel.

Adjust the size to resize your rainbow

Drag the center point to reposition

We need to fade the edge into the horizon.

In the layers panel, Click the layer mask on the gradient layer

Choose a black to white linear gradient

Click and drag on the end of the rainbow  to face the end (no pot of gold here).

If you want to make it more subtle, change the Layer blending mode to Screen

If you want to soften the rainbow you can add a blur.

Right-Click on the layer name and choose Convert to Smart Object

Choose Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur and set the amount that you like

I hope you found this tutorial useful. I actually made this a 2 part tutorial on the new Gradient tool. Check out the addition tutorial on creating the floating head effect used on movie posters

Drop a comment and let me know if this was helpful.

Browse the other free photoshop tutorials here at the cafe

Download 100s of dollars worth of Photoshop adds on for free here at the Vault.

Also follow me on Instagram, Tik Tik, Threads and Twitter.  for shorts and reels.

See you next time!

Colin

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We have all seen the floating heads effect on posters, magazine and album covers, you name it. We combine different pictures and seamlessly blend them into the background.

While experimenting with the updated gradients tool in Photoshop, it occurred to me, this might work well on faces and heads. So I tried it and immediately, I knew I had stumbled on the perfect use for this tool. I’m excited to share this discovery with you now.

The first thing we need to do, is get all the images into Photoshop, but in layers in a single document.

Choose File>Scripts>Load Files Into Stack

Click Browse and choose your images. Tip: If you have already opened the images in Photoshop, choose Add Open Files, and they will be stacked together.

Click ok

All the images will be added to layers in a single document.

Turn off the layers except the background by clicking the eyeballs in the Layers panel

One at a time, resize and position the images of the faces. Press Ctrl/Cmd+T for free transform. Drag to position. Drag the corners to resize.

We will do the following steps for each image.

Choose the layer and make it visible. (eye icon)

Click the new Layer mask to add a mask

Choose the Gradients tool (G Key)

Choose Radial and Foreground to transparent

Make sure the forgeround color is black,

Make sure REVERSE is checked it the top bar. Alternatively use a black to white gradient. (The Transparency option allows to use multiple gradients on 1 mask). 

Making sure the mask is selected in the layer, not the image..

Drag out from the center. Notice it creates a beautiful vignette effect and blends the image into the background.

In the Properties panel, drag the center point under opacity control. This will change how the edges feather. (You should be able to do this with the diamond on the overlay, but that appears to be broken at this time).

If you want to do manual touchup on the mask it’s easy.

Grab a brush. Paint with black to hide areas and white to show them. Be strategic with the manual painting as you can easily ruin the smooth blend if you aren’t careful.

I hope you found this tutorial useful. I actually mad this a 2 part tutorial on the new Gradient tool. Check out the addition tutorial on making a rainbow to master some of the other features, as well as a killer tip I came up with.

Drop a comment and let me know if this was helpful.

Browse the other free photoshop tutorials here at the cafe

Download 100s of dollars worth of Photoshop adds on for free here at the Vault.

Also follow me on Instagram, Tik Tik, Threads and Twitter.  for shorts and reels.

See you next time!

Colin

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The post How to Seamlessly Blend faces into background in Photoshop using new radial gradients appeared first on PhotoshopCAFE.

Hey, everyone. I’m excited to show you Adobe’s new AI application, Firefly.

Let’s explore what it can do, discuss it, and see where Adobe is headed with it in the future. On the homepage, there are several things coming up, but we will  focus on the two live features: text to image and text to effects.

Text to image is image-based generation. By simply typing in a phrase like “close-up of a bee on a flower,” Firefly generates images based on the text you provide.

One of the biggest criticisms about AI image generation is the use of copyrighted material, but Adobe sources all its images from within Adobe Stock to train its ai. Its doesn’t reproduce the images, but rather learns fro all the different images and then creates art based on what it has been trained on, like a machine version of inspiration. Adobe is also discussing a form of compensation for Adobe Stock contributors.

It’s much easier to use than other similar programs like mid journey since we can simply click on things. We can choose the content type of graphic art or photo, and set different parameters like style, movement, theme, and technique to get the desired result. We can even choose materials, color and tone, lighting, and composition to create unique and realistic images.

Once we find the image we like, we can download it. But, it will have a watermark on it and content credentials saying that it was created by AI. At this point, the images are only for testing and not for commercial use. However, when the program is officially released, we will be able to use it commercially in different ways.

Overall, Firefly is a new AI application that has a lot of potential for generating unique and high-quality images and it will be incorporated into Adobe products in different ways..

How to Get Firefly

You can sign up and join the wait list, they will contact you when its your turn to get in.

There is nothing to download as its web based.

Learn all about it in my video

Firefly is here

See what I think about all this ai stuff (Will artists and photographers be replaced by ai?)

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Download Source Files Here. 

In a Nutshell. (This is a new thing I’m trying. Adding a quick reference at the top. Let me know in a comment if this is useful or not).

• Step 1. Cut out screen
• Step 2. cut out  and mask photo
• Step 3. Combine images
• Step 4. Put the Original image at the bottom of the layer stack and extracted image on top (sandwich the screen layer)
• Final: Reposition and add a shadow

How to Create the 3D pop out effect in Photoshop: AKA Out Of Bounds Effect

Step 1, cut out the screen

Choose the Polygon Lasso tool

Click on each of the 4 corners of the screen. On the last corner, you will see a circle indicating this is the start/finish point.

When you click, the selection will be complete

You will see the marching ants selection is active,

Notice, the hand is overlapping. We need to fix it.

Choose the Quick Selection tool

Hold down Alt/Option to turn it into minus or subtract mode. You will see the + turns into a – in the center of the cursor.

Drag on the area to remove.

After you have applied the tool, it will make the selection.

To cut out the selection, we will add a layer mask, but wait.

We want to hide the selected area, so hold down Alt/Option as you click on the layer mask button.

We have transparency on the screen. Perfect!

In the next step, we will prepare the subject that will jump through the screen.

Step 2: Cut out the Subject from the background

Combine the 2 Images into the same document.

The key to the image choice, that will be extruded, is having an area that will stick out beyond the screen once we have removed the background 

Choose File>Open

With the move tool (v) drag the image into the tab of the image that contains the screen. (how to combine images in Photoshop)

Don’t let go yet, the second image will pop open. Drag your cursor into the center of the image and then release your mouse button (or lift your pen if using a tablet).

You will see the 2 layers on the same document.

Let’s remove the background from the dog.

Choose the Quick Selection tool

At the top (if you have the option) by select subject, choose Cloud. If you don’t see this option, this will still work, just not quite as well.

Click Select Subject

You will see a selection around the subject (the dog).

Let’s make the fur selection edges look better,

Choose Select and Mask

Grab the Refine Edge Brush (it will be selected by default).

Drag the brush around the edges of the fur. Make sure the brush is positioned 3/4 outside the subject for the best results as you paint (at least this 3/4 seems to work best for me)..

On the bar on the right of Select and Mask, click Decontaminate colors. This will reduce the colored fringes.

Choose New Layer with Layer mask as output.

Click ok

Step 3: Arrange and Position the cutout

You will see something like this. Do NOT reposition or scale anything yet!

Make sure all layers are visible, by clicking the eyeball.

Drag the Original dog layer to the bottom.

You screen should now be sandwiched between the extracted dog layer and the original dog layer.  The original layer will show through the hole in the screen, but the extracted layer is on top, so it can overlap.

The key is to make sure the 2 dog layers are always selected together.

Hold down the Ctrl/Cmd key and Click on the name of the other dog layer in the layers panel

Both Dog layers should be selected as shown. (I added the blue boxes to show the layers).

Press Ctrl/Cmd+T (Ctrl+T Windows / Cmd+T Mac).

You can now drag to reposition the layer, or grab the handles to resize or rotate the layer.

The next step is optional depending on the image. But usually, this will make it look better.

Step 4: Add a shadow

Choose the top layer

Choose fx in the layers panel

Select Drop Shadow

A shadow will appear

Change the size to soften the shadow and opacity

Drag on the shadow in the image to reposition it

Click ok to apply

The shdow work on the screen because it makes it appear to come off the screen. But we need to remove it outside of the iPad boundaries. Shadows don’t float in the air.

Click on the word effects in the layers panel

Right-click

Choose Create Layer

You will see the shadow has been converted to a regular layer and is no longer an effect,

Click on the mask button to add a layer mask to the shadow layer. We will use this mask to paint away the shadow where we don’t want it.

We can use a previous selection as a stencil to help us with our masking.

With the Shadow mask still the active layer; hover over the thumbnail for the iPad screen mask. You will see a dotted square.

Click to load the selection.

See the selection on the image.

Choose a brush (B key)

Set the foreground color to Black.

Set opacity and flow to 100% at the top of the screen.

Paint on the top of the image to remove the shadow from the top of the dog.

(If nothing is happening, try inverting the selection. Select>Inverse)

And here is out 3D pop out effect.

For the thumbnail, I added some water splashes. For this I just used a brush. See other tutorials on Custom brushes. 

Thanks for joining me on this tutorial. I hope it was easy to follow (watch the video at the top) and that you had fun!

Share your creations with us on our Facebook community. 

Drop a comment and let me know.

Welcome to the CAFE

Colin

I also have some free Photoshop extras ($250 value) to give you as part of the Photoshop Vault. (If you are on our mailing list, you already have access and don’t need to sign up again look near the bottom of each newsletter for a direct link to download all the goodies)

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