Photoshop tutorial, Location Studio

The Method

1. Click to open the aircarft image (a) and car (b).
Once open in your browser, you can right click (Control) or drag
the images to your desktop or Photoshop icon to open.

2. If the layers panel is not visible, go; ‘WINDOW - Layers’ then
press 'V' to select the Move Tool.

3. Double click the Background image in the layers palette to
unlock it. Just click 'Okay' when the new layer dialogue appears.

Above: Left - locked. Right - unlocked. Note how the padlock has gone. It is now a free floating layer.

4. Click on the car image 'b' with your mouse and hold it down,
then drag the car over to the aircraft image 'a' (your Cursor will
change to a small box with a cross in it) and let go. In my original session I dragged the car over later, after I cut out the aircraft, so don't worry if your window looks a bit different than the one below.

You should now have two layers in your layers pallete?

5. Turn off the 'eye' icon of the car layer in your layer palette for
now, as we will be working on the aircraft for a bit.

6.Make sure that the aircraft layer is selected (just click on it, also check that you have 'Auto Select Layer' ticked at the top left of
your screen).

There are a number of ways of getting rid of the background, such as the Magic Wand etc, but for now we will use the Magnetic Lasso. Select the Magnetic Lasso Tool 'L' and start dragging it around the aircraft. It will make anchor points by itself. If not, find a start point, say near the tail. Hold down Alt/ Option and click with the mouse, now let the mouse go while still holding the Alt/Option key down. This selects the area ready for deleting, or cutting. But we need to move the pixels closer to the aircraft, before we remove the background.

7. Once you have the slection ready, go to 'Select - Modify - Expand (1 pixel)'. This removes the visible 'halo' or pixel residue around the aircraft shape.

This brings the selection closer to the aircraft by one pixel,
see above before, and below after.

8. Also go 'Select - Feather - 1 pixel'. This just softens the cut,
so there are no jagged pixels.

9. Now tyou can either press 'Co-delete/backspace', or 'Co-X'
this removes the selected area. Once the aircraft is cleared of the red hangar, we can now start on the car layer and do exactly the same.

10. Note how the Magnetic Lasso makes its own anchor points as it
goes around the car. You may need to do this by hand sometimes
to incorporate the darker areas under the car.

11. Once you have both layers cut out, we can start arranging the
studio composition. Go to 'Image - Canvas Size' and extend the
work area by 50cm x 35cm. Note the centre of the anchor block (below) is selected so that any change radiates out from the centre. Then just click okay, or hit enter/return on your keyboard.

12. So you should now have a window that looks like this (below)?

13. We are going to clean the two layers up a tad with Auto Levels.
Go 'Image - Adjustments - Auto Levels'.

Before Auto Levels

After Auto Levels. Do this to BOTH layers.

LOCATION STUDIO - Creating a digital reflective studio floor setting - on location Back to main Photoshop page Here is an interesting method of creating a studio environment for your subject. It just lifts the job and gives it a touch of class. The assignment here was to portray the Pilatus PC12 aircraft alongside a Porsche GT2 car. The day was very overcast, raining, with no chance of sunlight to provide that needed warmth for the shoot. I opted to get the shots as this was the only opportunity to do so, then optimize later and create the studio setting. I felt the very smart machinery would merit this approach! All images © Jon Davison 2005. Grateful thanks to Sebastian Lip CEO of Pilatus Australia, and Mike Moorehead from Romanza Pty Ltd.
Download the work files (a) aircraft. (b) Car Just click on the above two original images to download larger working versions, 40cms @ 72ppi. Task and outcome We are going to make a digital composite by placing the larger car (b) in front of the aircraft (a). Next we will create a reflective floor plus reflections, complete with a blue background glow. We will then use 'Auto Levels' to clean up the subjects by removing the grey colour cast.		Final image with all layers combined. This effect creates the llusion that we have shot the subjects in a large studio environment. Click for a larger version
	The Method 1. Click to open the aircarft image (a) and car (b). Once open in your browser, you can right click (Control) or drag the images to your desktop or Photoshop icon to open. 2. If the layers panel is not visible, go; ‘WINDOW - Layers’ then press 'V' to select the Move Tool. 3. Double click the Background image in the layers palette to unlock it. Just click 'Okay' when the new layer dialogue appears. Above: Left - locked. Right - unlocked. Note how the padlock has gone. It is now a free floating layer. 4. Click on the car image 'b' with your mouse and hold it down, then drag the car over to the aircraft image 'a' (your Cursor will change to a small box with a cross in it) and let go. In my original session I dragged the car over later, after I cut out the aircraft, so don't worry if your window looks a bit different than the one below. You should now have two layers in your layers pallete? 5. Turn off the 'eye' icon of the car layer in your layer palette for now, as we will be working on the aircraft for a bit. 6.Make sure that the aircraft layer is selected (just click on it, also check that you have 'Auto Select Layer' ticked at the top left of your screen). There are a number of ways of getting rid of the background, such as the Magic Wand etc, but for now we will use the Magnetic Lasso. Select the Magnetic Lasso Tool 'L' and start dragging it around the aircraft. It will make anchor points by itself. If not, find a start point, say near the tail. Hold down Alt/ Option and click with the mouse, now let the mouse go while still holding the Alt/Option key down. This selects the area ready for deleting, or cutting. But we need to move the pixels closer to the aircraft, before we remove the background. 7. Once you have the slection ready, go to 'Select - Modify - Expand (1 pixel)'. This removes the visible 'halo' or pixel residue around the aircraft shape. This brings the selection closer to the aircraft by one pixel, see above before, and below after. 8. Also go 'Select - Feather - 1 pixel'. This just softens the cut, so there are no jagged pixels. 9. Now tyou can either press 'Co-delete/backspace', or 'Co-X' this removes the selected area. Once the aircraft is cleared of the red hangar, we can now start on the car layer and do exactly the same. 10. Note how the Magnetic Lasso makes its own anchor points as it goes around the car. You may need to do this by hand sometimes to incorporate the darker areas under the car. 11. Once you have both layers cut out, we can start arranging the studio composition. Go to 'Image - Canvas Size' and extend the work area by 50cm x 35cm. Note the centre of the anchor block (below) is selected so that any change radiates out from the centre. Then just click okay, or hit enter/return on your keyboard. 12. So you should now have a window that looks like this (below)? 13. We are going to clean the two layers up a tad with Auto Levels. Go 'Image - Adjustments - Auto Levels'. Before Auto Levels After Auto Levels. Do this to BOTH layers.
			14. Next we will add contrast to the car as it is a bit grey. Go 'Image - Adjustments - Brightness Contrast' and use the following settings; Brightness +17 and Contrast +43. This just cleans the car up a bit and adds a bit of sparkle to it. 15. Now select the aircraft layer and go 'Edit - Transform - Flip Vertical' This flips the aircraft upside down. Drag the flipped aircraft down until the wheels of the two aircraft touch.Now change the opacity of this layer to say 40%. This gives the reflection (below). Now do the same with the car layer. 16. Click on the 'New Layer' icon, beside the trash icon at the bottom of your layers palette, then 'Co-{' a couple of times to drop this new layer down to the bottom of the layer stack (below). Make sure that you have Black selected (press 'D' to default your colours to B/W) the 'X' to toggle white to black etc. Then go 'Edit - Fill - Foreground colour', or 'Alt/Option - Delete/Backspace'. You should have 5 layers now. 17. We need to rub out the areas of the aircraft that are eclipsing the car (above). So click on the inverted aircraft layer and with your eraser tool 'E' rub this area out, so that we end up with this (below). 18. The blue background. Click on your colour swatch on the tool bar and type in 197dca as an example, though you can use any colour you like. 19. Make a new layer (next to trash icon on your layer palette). 20. Select you 'Eliptical Marquee tool' and with the Shift key held down, draw a circle about this big. Then fill this circle with blue (as in #18 above).Then 'Co-{' a couple of times to drop this new blue layer down to the bottom of the layer stack just above the black (below). 21. Under 'Filter - Blur - Gassian Blur' of 90 pixels. I used the Eraser tool 'E' and set the opacity to about 15% and rubbed out some of the blue in the foreground. That's really about it, apart from details you may wish to add, like a darker foreground, or a horizon/floor line (below). Good luck, email me with your results as I would love to see what other ideas you may have. Jon Same files used but with a portrait format rendering.