Tired of editing your photos the same way? Want to add some excitement and creativity to your routine? This video provides fresh techniques to make your images stand out with unique effects.
Coming to you from Mango Street, this creative video explores innovative ways to spice up your photo editing process. They kick off with a photo shoot in California, using natural light and a strobe to capture dynamic images. The model is dressed in a Shakespearean-inspired outfit, bringing a theatrical touch to the beach setting. This shoot is part of a pitch deck, showcasing how themed photo sessions can add depth and narrative to your work.
In the next segment, they dive into the "pixel stretch" technique. This method starts by selecting an area of the photo, stretching it, and then blending it seamlessly into the background. By using the rectangle marquee tool and transform controls in Photoshop, you can create unique visual effects that add motion and intrigue to your images. The video demonstrates how to refine this effect using layer masks and the warp tool, allowing you to manipulate the stretched pixels like fabric in the wind. Adding shadows and adjusting opacity further enhances the realism and impact of the final image.
Another technique covered is creating light streaks using the smudge tool in Photoshop. By setting the smudge tool to "lighten" mode and adjusting the brush strength, you can drag portions of the image to create glowing streaks that mimic light trails. This effect adds a magical, ethereal quality to your photos. The video emphasizes experimenting with brush sizes and strengths to achieve the desired look. Adding a layer mask helps blend the streaks naturally into the image, creating a seamless and professional effect.
The video also introduces the use of displacement maps. This advanced technique uses grayscale images to distort the photo, adding texture and depth. By creating a displacement map in a new document and applying it to the original image, you can manipulate specific areas for dramatic effects. This method allows for endless creative possibilities, from subtle shifts to bold, abstract distortions. Combining displacement maps with other techniques, like adding noise or Gaussian blur, can enhance the overall aesthetic and create visually compelling images. The focus is on experimentation and creativity, encouraging you to play with these tools to discover your unique style. Check out the video above for the full rundown.
The image editing in this video leaves me shaking my head. Okay it's a new Photoshop feature that must have some good reason for using it. But I can't imagine why any competent portrait photographer would apply these sort of special effects to their images. The base images out of Lightroom in each example were quite nice, without any reason whatsoever to stretch, add to, and distort as was done in Photoshop. Just because you can, is usually not a good reason for diving into computer generated special effects unless it's with the intent of converting a photo into digital art. But if you want wings on your subject, do it for real with fabric and a big fan so it looks natural. The edits performed here look like they were done with no particular purpose in mind other than demonstrate a Photoshop tool, but in the process made a mess out of some good photography.