Well, maybe not quite, because otherwise I wouldn’t write about it. This „trick“ works on image material that shows neither total black nor total white. A studio model in front of a white background leads to horrible results, even. So be warned.

01. Preparations

First I opened a JPEG in Camera RAW, with Bridge > Right Mouse Button > Open in Camera Raw. If you hold the Shift key down, the “Open Image” button becomes “Open Object”. This way, the photo is opened as a smart object with a connection to Camera Raw in Photoshop. With a double click on the layer thumbnail you can call the RAW dialog up again. Very handy.

I’d like to copy the layer now. To make it independent of the original, and to not have the copy be influenced by changes in Camera Raw, I moved the mouse cursor over the layer name, pressed the right mouse button and chose “New Smart Object via Copy”. Both layers can now be handled separately, each in their own Raw dialog. This is how I desaturated the uppermost layer, with the Saturation slider.

02. Correction

I assigned a correction to the uppermost layer. In short: Invert, then click on Layer > Create Clipping Mask. You could also first click on Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Invert in the menu, then go the layer palette and move the mouse cursor over the border between the two layers. Hold the Alt key, then click on the edge to create a clipping mask this way.

03. Filter

After clicking on the background copy, I applied the Filter > Stylize > Glowing Edges and Filter > Blur > Surface Blur. You don’t need to pay special attention to the settings. Because they’re smart filters, we can go back and edit them any time. Still, the “Glowing Edges” filter should be applied more softly. Set the filter opacity to about 20%.

Note: This option is not set directly in the layer palette. In order to change the layer opacity or the blending mode of a smart filter, double click the filter blending mode options symbol right next to the filter name to open the blending mode window.

04. Pseudo HDR

I reduced the background copy’s opacity to about 60%, then set the blending mode from Normal to Vivid Light. At first I thought that this result could be more easily achieved via Shadows/Highlights, but that isn’t actually true. It’s better. And I can go on refining both layers in the RAW dialog. (move the cursor over the image to see a before/after effect)

 
The result isn’t bad. I got pretty good results by applying it to another image. But numerous more images were practically destroyed. Maybe this “technique” is just a dead end, but only this way can you discover new possibilities.

Generally, it’s a good exercise to learn about the interaction of Camera Raw, adjustment layers and smart filters.

I’d love to hear from my readers if this technique helped you to get good results for your images, or if maybe you know a far better pseudo HDR technique, one that gets the same result much easier.

I’d also like to know how many dead ends you’ve already ended up in while experimenting with Photoshop.

1. Basic shape

Create a new layer with Layer > New > Layer. Use the polygon lasso tool to select the basic shape of the face, then the shape of the neck. Fill the selection with the colors #ffbb77 (RGB 255, 187, 119) for the face and #aa6633 (RGB 170, 102, 51) for the neck.

For the hair in this example, the following palette was used. On another layer, use the brush tool to roughly draw some first hair with a small and soft brush preset.

2. Pull some hair

Use the smudge tool and an amount of 25% to smear the hair and roughly form a hairdo, then use the brush tool and the skin colors from the palette to gradually spray color onto the skin, so the image receives a little dimension.

3. Fine hair

This way, you’re slowly working your way towards the shape of head and hairdo. This isn’t easy and requires a little artistic talent. Changing between applying color with the brush tool and smearing it with the smudge tool gives good results. The same way, you can use a very small brush preset and different colors on a new layer to draw very fine hair, and then refine them by reducing the layer opacity.

4. Mouth

I created the lips and teeth in another document, reduced it to a single layer and inserted it into the „Head“ document. Use the selection tools for the shape and the palette shown above for your color selection.

5. Insert mouth

Insert the mouth layer and position it. You can still adjust the shape if you need to. Click on Edit > Transform in the menu and use the available options.

6. Eyes

The „Augenblick“ tutorial teaches you how to create an eye yourself. Just like the mouth before, I drew these eyes in another document, then inserted them here and positioned them.

7. Nose

The shape of a nose is very easily drawn. Use black color and a soft brush preset to draw a sloped and a bent line, then adjust them with the smudge tool.
Create the nostril with the color #884422 (RGB 136, 68, 34) and a small brush preset on a new layer. The actual shape of a nose results from a gradation of bright to dark colors, which also creates the 3D effect.

8. Ear

I only suggested the ear and drew hair above it on a new layer. This way you can save yourself the trouble of creating this complicated shape.

9. More contrast

Increase the contrast with Image > Adjustments > Brightness / Contrast and correct smaller mistakes. Here I corrected the hairline, darkened some spots, and brightened others until this artificial female became the preliminary result. You could go on to refine the hair and the left eye, but I didn’t want to set an unreachable example for you. :-) (or rather: I couldn’t get it any better)

Basis

For example, an article about „anxiety and panic attacks“ could be visually emphasized with the following image. This stresses the message even more. There are only very few necessary prerequisites to putting this effect into practice. The image element that dictates the text’s shape should be in front of a white background. If that’s not possible, you should extract the element and then fit it with a white background.

It’s also favorable to have a rather bright image element. Such an element doesn’t have to be a portrait, because with this technique the text can follow any shape you like.

Conversion to black & white

If you want to create a black & white image from a color photo, you could simply click on Image > Adjustments > Desaturate. But this makes the image flat and low in contrast. There’s a reason for that. Different colors with the same brightness are very similar as shades of gray, which is why you can’t differentiate the single tones anymore.

To counteract this, you can use the channel mixer (or black and white), which can also be found in the menu under Image > Adjustments. For our purposes we need to deactivate „Monochrome“ to the lower left, then work on each of the Source Channels Red, Green and Blue individually. There’s a „rule“ to achieve the best quality, which is that all channels combined should result in 100%. So if you increase the Green and Blue source channels each to 10%, the Red source channel should be decreased to 80%.

This way we get a low contrast image without color, which we duplicate with Ctrl+J or with Layer > New > Layer via Copy, then give it a layer mask via Layer > Layer Mask > Reveal All.

Mask work

Click on the layer thumbnail, then select the entire document with Select > All or Ctrl+A and finally copy it with Edit > Copy or Ctrl+C. Switch from the layer window to the channel palette, activate the bottom channel and make it visible, which is easily done by clicking on its name and toggling the „eye“. Press Ctrl+V and Ctrl+D to get the necessary mask.

After switching back to the layer view and activating the topmost layer by clicking on its thumbnail, fill the area with Edit > Fill and white color. Create another layer with Layer > New > Layer, fill it with white and drag & drop this completely white layer below the layer with the mask.

Shaping type

Now the trick is to position the text between the completely white layer and the layer with the mask. Select the text tool and draw a text area with the size of the image element. Here you can insert any content you wish. Choose a font family and size, line spacing and tracking that both keeps the text legible and that also traces the image element’s contour well – in this case the woman’s shape.

The example shows that this effect only works with large documents, since otherwise the type becomes illegible, or the letters become too big, so you can’t see the contour clearly anymore.

Clear words

But even if the font size and line spacing are correct, the effect is still too weak. You can easily and quickly accentuate the text by duplicating the text layer with Layer > New > Layer via Copy. In addition to that, you can fill the white layer below the text with Edit > Fill and #dbdbdb (RGB 219, 219, 219). This further strengthens the image element’s contour.

The shape is now more clear, but the general composition is still a little too busy. To counteract that, you could insert a high contrast copy of the original photo in black & white above all other layers. Reduce the layer opacity to about 15%. This way the photo shines through, which creates a bit of dimensionality and far more detail.

1. Small content area

Base

In the background, draw a linear gradient from #bbddff (RGB 187, 221, 255) to white. On top of that, make a new layer with Layer > New > Layer or Shift+Ctrl+N, then use the selection rectangle tool and fill an area using Edit > Fill with the foreground color #bb3322 (RGB 187, 51, 34). Below that, on another layer, make a second, bigger area and fill it with a linear gradient from white to #fafafa (RGB 250, 250, 250).

You could give both layers a stroke, so the shapes are more easily differentiated from the background. Here we used Layer Style > Stroke with Size: 1 pixel. For the upper layer we used a white color, for the lower layer the color #cfcfcf (RGB 207, 207, 207). If you want, you can enhance the smaller area with a gradient from #bb3322 (RGB 187, 51, 34) to #aa4433 (RGB 170, 68, 51) and adorn it with circles and lines.

Content and background

After inserting a logo and some content, you could continue adjusting the background a little. Since we used sky-blue, it would be appropriate to insert a cloud photo and set its blending mode to Screen. Using a layer mask you can define where the cloud structures should be visible. On another layer, I used the polygon lasso tool to select a shadow shape and filled it with #ddeeff (RGB 221, 238, 255).

Once you’ve deselected (Ctrl+D) it, apply Gaussian Blur to the shadow to take the sharpness out. And since we’re working with a cloudy sky in the background, we could also create a fitting storm of leaves on a new layer using the „maple leaves“ brush and the color #88cc44 (RGB 136, 204, 68).

2. Paper stack

Stacked background

Fill the background layer with the color #ffcc00 (RGB 255, 204, 0). Using the Rounded Rectangle tool with its options set to a radius of about 5 pixels, draw a white shape above. To separate it from the background a little, apply a Layer Style > Drop Shadow with Opacity: 10%, Angle: 120 degrees, Distance: 1 pixel and Size: 6 pixels, then apply Layer Style > Inner Glow with Opacity: 20%, Distance: 0 and Size: 2 pixels.

Duplicate the layer several times using Layer > New > Layer via Copy or Ctrl+J and use Edit > Transform > Rotate to position each copy a little differently in order to create the illusion of a stack of images. Above that you can present content like text, images and a logo.

3. Content area

Small space

After filling the background with #a2b2b2 (RGB 162, 178, 178), use the rectangle selection tool to select an area on a new layer and fill that with the foreground color #bbf8f8 (RGB 187, 248, 248). Use the pencil tool, the color #88cccc (RGB 136, 204, 204) and a 1 pixel diameter to draw a line of pixels on another layer, then copy it multiple times, reduce it down to a single layer, and you’re ready to use it as a pattern for the area we just created.

To quickly adjust this pattern to the shape of the layer below, click on Layer > Create Clipping Mask in the menu. You could also draw a hard „shadow“ in another layer using #999999 (RGB 153, 153, 153).

Large content

Make a selection on a new layer and fill it with a gradient from #44aa99 (RGB 68, 170, 153) to #88ddcc (RGB 136, 221, 204). Above that, use the Elliptical Marquee tool and hold the Shift key to select several overlapping circles, then fill them on a new layer using #66cccc (RGB 102, 204, 204). Set this layer’s blending mode to „Screen“ and the opacity to about 40%. If you like, you can insert further graphical elements or some text.

This newly created gradient layer gets treated with a Layer Style > Inner Glow with the options Choke: 50% and Size: 8 pixels. On a new layer, use the polygon lasso to select a triangular area and fill it with the color #e4fcfd (RGB 228, 252, 253) to make it seem like a speech balloon (see screenshot). Below that you could add icons and a logo.

4. Content & menu

Two areas

Two separate areas for the content are a nice and easy way to arrange things, so – like in this example – you could present the menu on a narrower area, and the actual content on a slightly wider one. Both areas were created with the Rounded Rectangle tool, using the foreground color #373737 (RGB 55, 55, 55) for one side and #eaeafa (RGB 234, 234, 250) for the other. Both layers receive a „Drop Shadow“ with Opacity: 35%, Angle: 120 degrees, Distance: 0 and Size: 5 pixels, „Inner Shadow“ with Opacity: 10%, Distance: 0 and Size: 3 pixels as well as „Stroke“ with Size: 1 pixel and the color #b7b7b7 (RGB 183, 183, 183).

The area to the left got an additional „Gradient Overlay“ with a gradient from #333333 (RGB 51, 51, 51) to #444444 (RGB 68, 68, 68). Again, this area can present some content. By the way, the FRESH text is right on top of the menu layer, and its shape has been adjusted to the layer below using Layer > Create Clipping Mask.

5. Smallest website

Minimalist

There’s almost always a way to make things smaller, but at some point it becomes hard to read or even place content. But as a little „selection field“ for more content, such a shape has its own appeal. You could use the rectangle selection to pick an area, then fill it with #fafafa (RGB 250, 250, 250) on a new layer. Applying a Layer Style > Drop Shadow with Opacity: 20%, Distance: 1 pixel and Size: 5 pixels makes the shape pop out of the background a bit.

Above that on another layer, use the color #f6f6f6 (RGB 246, 246, 246) and the brush tool to spray a little color at the upper and lower edge, then adjust the layer to the shape below using a clipping mask. Finally insert the content.

Screen resolutions are no concern for these layouts. All content gets fully displayed even on the smallest monitor. And using this technique, it takes little time to whip up something like that.

From the color version to black & white

If you want to create a black & white image from a color photo, a simple click on Image > Adjustments > Desaturate is enough. But this function makes the result very flat, expressionless and low contrast. There’s a reason for that, of course. Different colors with about the same brightness are very similar as shades of gray.

Original photo: Gerti G.

Reduce saturation

So turning a photo into black & white at the push of a button results in an image with very little depth and dimensionality. These three color blocks show very clearly which effect this can have on the image as a whole. The color ranges that were clear-cut before are unrecognizable now. What remains is a long, gray bar.

The Channel Mixer

Up until Photoshop CS2 the Channel Mixer was the ideal tool to create „crisp“ black & white images. You’ll find it in the menu under Image > Adjustments. After checking „Monochrome“ to the lower left, you can increase or decrease every channel individually. A typical approach would be to decrease the „Red“ channel to about 70%, then increase the „Blue“ and „Green“ channels in an amount that results in an overall 100%. That isn’t necessary, but it makes for a more balanced image.

High contrast result

Using the channel mixer as opposed to a simple „Desaturate“ gives us far more contrast in a photo, which you can clearly see in the color bars in the example. The new mixture of source channels emphasizes each individual area better.

Black & white conversion

Photoshop CS3 offers a new tool to convert color photos to black & white images, and it can be used as an adjustment layer with all their benefits. You can choose one of numerous integrated black & white presets from the „Preset“ dropdown, or create your own and save it for later use. Image contrast can be adjusted very intuitively directly in the image instead of only using sliders.

Being forced to click Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation and activate „Colorize“ before to leave a bit of color to an image, you can now take this step right in the black & white options window by checking off „Tint“ and adjusting the Hue and Saturation sliders according to taste.

Gradient Map

A gradient map, which can also be found under Image > Adjustments, lays the colors of a gradient over an image and assigns them to the shadows and highlights, with the increments in-between forming the middle values. Numerous effects such as the background of a flyer can be achieved this way. Here I want to show a technique to quickly create a neat black & white photo.

I selected a gradient from foreground to background color, with the colors set to black and white, respectively. This is easily done with the keyboard shortcut „D“ that sets the foreground and background colors to their standard values. Now a click on Image > Adjustments > Gradient Overlay and confirming with „OK“ is all it needs to get a good black & white image. By the way, you can add a little noise with „Dither“ to smooth the gradient and minimize any unwanted banding.

Original photo: mmuens

Further alternatives

You could also dismiss all colors with Image > Mode > Grayscale or by deleting two of the three channels in RGB mode. Like so often, Photoshop offers numerous options to achieve the same goal. If you want to impose a very unobtrusive color mood on a black & white photo, you can use Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation. First reduce the Saturation to about 90, increase the Lab brightness 5 points and finally set the Hue to about 180.

This makes the image seem like a black & white shot, but the mood can be further adjusted by setting the first slider according to taste and giving the image a hint of color.

Original photo: tora

Black & white photos can also be upgraded through high contrast and a little grain. So here’s a tip to conclude this article: Pull up Curves, set a point smack in the
middle and set another one to form a slight S curve. Grain can be added by using Filter > Noise > Add Noise, using an Amount of 1 to 2%.

Middle part

1. Basis

First off, use white color to write these two big words. The middle is meant to hold a smaller word, which is why you should leave enough space. The S of Speed lends itself to being elongated, so on the one hand you’ll get a basis for the short word and on the other hand a link is created between the two big words.

Rasterize the text with Layer > Rasterize > Type and select a part of the S, then duplicate it with Layer > New > Layer via Copy, and elongate it with Layer > Transform > Scale.

2. Stroke

Write the small word in the middle and reduce all text layers to a collective layer. To do that, hold the Ctrl key and click the layers in the layer palette, but not the thumbnail icons, because that would load a selection. Use Layer > Merge Layers to reduce them to a single text layer, then give it the Layer Style > Stroke with the options Size 4 pixels and color Black.

3. Fill

On a new layer below the one with the type, fill the gaps with Black using the pencil tool.

Block of text

1. Basis

Use white color to write three words, one below the other. Window > Character allows you to adjust the size, line spacing, font and tracking of the text. Take care to have the words close to each other, and activate Layer Style > Stroke with the settings Size 10 pixels and black color.

2. Corrections

On a layer below the text layer, fill the gaps with Black. Put another layer above the text layer, and use the pencil tool in the smallest setting and black and white color to create a connection between single letters.

3. More style

As described in the first example, reduce all text layers down to a single layer and activate Layer Style > Drop Shadow with the standard settings, and Bevel and Emboss with the options Depth 100%, Size 250 and Soften 16 pixels.

28 Hours

1. Custom Font

You could just as well use a fitting font in this case, but it’s relatively simple to create the bar for the digital display on a layer of its own in order to assemble the digits by hand. To do that, click on Layer > New > Layer and select the shape with the polygon lasso, then fill it with #dd6611 (RGB 221, 102, 17).

Make some copies of the shape, then position them appropriately and rotate them via Edit > Transform.

2. Glow

Hide the background layer and reduce all visible layers down to a single layer. Duplicate the new layer and activate the Layer Style > Inner Shadow with the options Blend Mode Normal, Angle 0 degrees, Distance 0, Choke 50% and Size 2.

Add Layer Style > Inner Glow with the options Blend Mode Normal, color #ffff99 (RGB 255, 255, 153), Choke 40% and Size 4.

3. Motion

Activate the layer below by double-clicking it in the layer palette, then duplicate this style-less layer twice. Treat the text layers without layer style with Filter > Blur > Motion Blur and the options Angle 80 degrees and Distance 30 pixels.

You can easily modify these values for each layer. The general appearance can be changed with the layer opacity or a Gaussian Blur.

A little writing with Layer Style > Outer Glow and the options Blend Mode Screen, color #ff9922 (RGB 255, 153, 34) and Size 5, combined with a duplicate that’s treated with Blur > Motion Blur, enhances the text effect further.

Pray 3

1. Fat text

Take a colorful background and write some round-bellied text with a fitting font. Use Layer Style > Stroke with Size 7 to 14 (depending on the text size) and color #114477 (RGB 17, 68, 119) to separate it clearly from the background.

The number in this example gets a Layer Style > Inner Shadow with Blend Mode Normal, Angle -50 degrees, Distance 2, Choke 17 and – fitting for the green – the color #448811 (RGB 68, 136, 17).

2. Fill

If you want, you can combine further elements with the text, such as a Play button over the letter P. You can also fill the gaps inside the number Three using the color of the stroke. Hide the background layer and reduce the visible layers down to a single layer.

3. Transform

With Edit > Transform > Perspective you can shape the text according to your taste. To get a bit of a 3D effect, I duplicated the text with Layer > New > Layer via Copy, lightened it and nudged it a little to the right and down.

4. Reflections

Now we’ll give it a finish with light, reflections and little stars. For the reflections, create a new layer with Layer > New > Layer and use the Elliptical Marquee tool to select a few areas, then spray along them using the brush tool with a very big size preset and White. Adjust the visibility with the layer opacity.

Stars can be easily applied to a layer of their own with a fitting brush preset. The shape of a window that is reflected in the number also greatly enhances the sense of space. For that I distorted the shape on its own layer, selected it with the lasso tool, filled it with White and set the blending mode to Overlay. Set the intensity with the layer opacity again.

Crime

1. Glow

You can achieve the mysterious text glow over the previously created background with Layer Style > Outer Glow and the options Opacity 100%, color #778822 (RGB 119, 136, 34), Choke 3 and Size 15 pixels.

2. More Text

If you want, you can insert a second text layer. I would fill the text with a green texture and set the blending mode to Overlay. This way the layer is nicely blended with the background.

3. Spooky

You’ll get an even scarier text effect if you put a dirty texture above the text layers and set its blending mode to Overlay. If you put a copy of that texture over it and set the blending mode to Screen, that will give you a lighter result.

Surface

1. Stone texture

Open up a stone texture that’s at least 1500 x 1500 pixels large, and it should have a rough structure that vaguely resembles continents, clouds and oceans. Create a new layer via Layer > New > Layer, then set the blending mode to Overlay. Use the brush tool, White and a soft preset to spray over dark shadows. Control the intensity with the layer opacity.

2. Neutral texture

Our goal is to create a neutral texture that has neither too bright nor too dark areas. Reduce all layers to the background layer, then click on Layer > New > Layer via Copy in the menu, and finally select Edit > Transform > Rotate 180°. Reduce the layer opacity to 50%.

Reduce all layers to the background layer, then click on Edit > Define Pattern in the menu. Choose a fitting name. This saves the texture as a pattern.

Having a ball

1. Fill selection

Open a new document with 2000 x 2000 pixels, fill the background with Black using Edit > Fill, then use the Elliptical Marquee tool and hold the Shift key to select a perfect circle. Fill the circle with the pattern we created. To do that, click on Edit > Fill, choose Pattern and select the texture.

2. Spherical

Apply Filter > Distort > Spherize with an Amount of 100%.

Strange worlds

1. Basis

Open a new document with 1200 x 1200 pixels and create a new layer. Use the Elliptical Marquee tool to select a perfect circle and select #336677 (RGB 51, 102, 119) as foreground color. Fill the selection, then create another layer. On this layer, fill the selection with Black. Activate Layer Style > Inner Shadow with the blending mode Screen, Distance 50 and Size 150. For the color select #66bbff (RGB 102, 187, 255) this time.

Activate Layer Style > Outer Glow with Blending Mode Normal, Opacity 100% and a Size of 45 pixels. Use the color #22aaee (RGB 34, 170, 238). For the inner glow, use the color #99ddff (RGB 153, 221, 255) and set Blending Mode to Screen, Opacity to 40% and Size to 40 pixels.

2. Shadow

Set the layer’s blending mode in the layer palette to Screen, and create a new layer above. Hold Ctrl and click on the basic shape‘s thumbnail icon, then fill the selection with Black. Deselect, then use Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur with a 50 pixel Radius. Nudge the shadow a little to the lower right.

3. A planet

Between the first blue layer and the layer with the styles, create another layer and insert the spherical texture we created last time. Open the appropriate document and drag & drop the layer over. If you want, you can fill yet another layer with the Clouds filter, increase contrast and reduce layer opacity.

Finally, reduce all layers to the background layer, increase contrast, and adjust colors and saturation, which you can do with the options under Image > Adjustments.

Magical worlds

1. Gradient with the moon

Make a linear gradient from #113366 (RGB 17, 51, 102) to #4477aa (RGB 68, 119, 170) and insert the result (see above) into its own layer. Click on Image > Adjustments > Desaturate in the menu.

2. Moonlight

Use Edit > Transform > Scale to adjust the size, then copy the moon with Layer > New > Layer via Copy and scale the moon copy down, also with Transform > Scale. You can repeat this step and rotate several copies in the direction of an invisible light source.

3. Clouds

In the Brushes section (Brusheezy) you’ll find the right brush presets for the clouds, which you create on a layer of their own and with the foreground color White. You can load brush presets as follows: Activate the brush tool, then next to the selection of brush presets click on the little black arrow, and click on on yet another arrow to the right. Here you can load and select brushes.

4. Sunshine

Create a new layer and fill it with Black. Click on Filter > Render > Lens Flare and choose 105 mm for the Lens Type. Set this layer’s blending mode to Screen.

EZ Mask

After starting it up, EZ Mask presents itself in a very well-arranged window. Take note of the three pen tools in the toolbar to the left, which serve as a selection help: The first pen lets you mark the areas you want to extract, the second one lets you define those sections you want to discard, and the third one lets you paint over unclear spots such as smoke, glass, or reflections.

Alternatively, you could use the pens to circle areas and fill them with the paint bucket. With a click on the Process button you can witness the impressive live creation of the mask, before you can examine the result. If you’re not satisfied with how the image element has been selected, you can always go back, refine the selection with the marker pens, and examine your progress once more.

The preview quality can be adjusted as well. The higher the quality setting, the slower the preview refresh rate will be. A couple of zoom and positioning tools help you to navigate the image’s details in order to place your selections more precisely. When you’ve achieved your desired result, confirm the process with a click on the Done button.

Ultimatte AdvantEdge

The AdvantEdge software is not an extraction specialist per se, but a professional plugin for the so-called keying technique, where a person is shot in front of a homogeneous, single-colored background like a bluescreen or greenscreen, and then extracted from the image. This means that unsettled backgrounds can cause problems for this program. But if it’s about cleanly separating a background color including shadows from the main image object, you will achieve high quality results.

First off, define the background color, then use the color tolerance sliders to select any related colors that should be invisible as well, since no studio background conforms to a single RGB value. Filters can aid you in cleaning the material. Colored reflections on the object are neutralized as well. In addition, the edge of the mask can be reduced or blurred.

This makes AdvantEdge a specialist which is mainly focused on film creators, so it’s not only offered as a Photoshop version, but also as a universal plugin for Adobe, Apple, Avid, Eyeon and Autodesk. This all-inclusive package comes at three times the cost of the single Photoshop plugin, though.

Power Mask

Power Mask is from a company called Digital Film Tools, just like EZ Mask. The editing window is a lot larger here, though, and the number of available tools for image separation easily trumps that of its little brother EZ Mask. You can still discover its three marker pens and the paint bucket here.

What’s more, Power Mask comes with additional functions, such as a tool called Auto Paint that detects the outer and inner area when you trace contours. Simply put, this is a combination of the first two tools which allow you to paint over the foreground and background.

It’s very helpful that the mask, which the program calculates from your input, is instantly displayed. The paint bucket equivalent is called Auto Fill here, and this allows an intelligent fill after selecting. The preview options like foreground, background, mask, combination or a function called Trimap with painted-in colors give you a good guess of whether the masking process has already been successful or if it still needs a little improvement. Usually though the edges are recognized very well on the first run – even in extreme cases like fine fuzz.

Eraser Genuine

Eraser Genuine is free. Of course this is not the only advantage of this plugin, but you’ll have to cut back in some areas in comparison to the competition. First you define two colors. The first color means something can be erased, the second marks elements that need to be kept. The plugin takes these two values, scans the document, and replaces erasable areas with transparencies.

Fine adjustment can be achieved with the opacity sliders, whose minimum and maximum control the softness and size of the transparent areas. So this software delivers good results especially for image files with few colors or hard transitions from the main image element to the background. In more complicated cases we’d advise against this program, since the post processing for complex objects takes at least as much time as extracting them without a plugin.

Mask Pro

Mask Pro’s interface presents itself almost like a little Photoshop, specialized on extraction. The left side has the toolbar, which contains the two extraction options that make this add-on so powerful: First, there’s the color pickers that let you include or exclude colors. Second, there are the masking pens which can be compared to Photoshop’s Extract function (which by the way is not integrated into Photoshop CS4 by default anymore, but it can be reinstalled as a plugin).

In addition to the most important tools you’ll get a magic wand, a path tool and a chisel. The name of the last tool alludes to chiseling the last pixels from the edge of an extracted object, which allows you to refine the transitions. Making for a convenient introduction, onOne offers a little video for each of these functions, as well as an appropriate list of keyboard shortcuts.

A dedicated palette on the right side lets you select the tool size and softness. Below that it shows the colors you chose with the color pickers to mark them as worth keeping or erasable, respectively. The clean interface will make you feel right at home due to its closeness to Photoshop. The color decontamination technology gives you great results in your montage, as it matches the extracted element to the new background.

SmartMask

SmartMask is divided into the modes Sharp, Soft, and Complex and presents the respective necessary tools. As the name suggests, Sharp mode is suited for extracting elements with a lot of contrast and hard edges that separate them from the background. Softer edges like hair or fur call for the Soft mode, and the Complex mode takes care of extreme cases such as glass or soap bubbles.

Using the application is a breeze: Take the keeping pen and roughly trace the contours of the object you want to select. The erasing pen tells the program which area to discard after the treatment. Ideally, you should follow the form of the image element that should be kept. Then, click on the Start button at the top right. The red areas are erased, the blue ones are kept, and the green color shows the transition at the edges.

The option panel allows you to preview the image element on top of a new background, and you can hide the colored areas and selections. If you’re not satisfied with the selection of the object, you can test several modes in combination. This way, even more difficult areas like hair can be very finely treated. For example, you could use the green pen to mark any area that is hard to define, use the eyedropper to select colors that should be kept, and use the magic brush on the background to keep or drop colors, respectively.

Primatte

Primatte is not an extraction tool for every case, and the developers themselves stress this point on their website. Much like AdvantEdge, this add-on is happy to work with single-colored backgrounds. Separating a person from a flower pattern wallpaper is probably going to be problematic for Primatte. But the software is a great solution for photographers who mostly shoot in a studio in front of a single-colored background, which can be cleanly separated even from fine hair or the flame of a candle.

The interface is rather unconventional: Diverse buttons are spread out over the entire screen around the document. The mask can be created either automatically or in three steps, by making a selection and then cleaning the foreground and background. In order to adapt the lighting conditions of the extracted image to those of the new background, Primatte gives you the Light Wrap Controls.

The Tune Controls and the functions under Fix Detail take care of clean transitions. Different views like a mask or the view of a foreground after processing allow you to examine the result in-program. Another very useful feature is the Remove Noise button which helps you reduce image noise.

Fluid Mask

Much like Mask Pro, Fluid Mask appears like a little Photoshop for extraction work: On the left side you’ll find a toolbar, the right side has the palettes and above the image window there’s an option panel for the tools. Beneath the standard tools there are sometimes further tool variations. Most notably the add-on surprises with an automatic enhancement of the hardest edges in the image. You can influence these lines with the Edge palette by adjusting the number of edges and a threshold. Unfortunately, this doesn’t work in real time, and needs to be confirmed with the Apply button after every single change.

Then you select all the areas in the image that you want to keep or drop. You have three tools for that, each in two variations, that allow you to edit the document from very finely to very roughly. First you should use the Keep Exact brush to trace fine details like the fingers of a hand, followed by the Keep Local brush that is used to select the body. Large surrounding areas call for the Delete Global brush, which allows you to very quickly fill in areas that have already been defined by the edges.

Additional tools help you to define areas more exactly. You can edit transitional edges with the Eraser. The tools for rectangular or multiangular correction areas and for a forced edge help in selecting very difficult spots. The color changer selects similar colored areas, the detail preview is especially interesting for large documents, and the cleaning tool fills gaps in larger mask areas – all in all a good range of diverse specialists that greatly speed up your extraction jobs.

01. Clouds

Select File > New to open a new document with about 1100 x 800 pixels in RGB mode and a transparent background. Select Filter > Convert for Smart Filters and confirm the dialog with OK in order to prepare the layer. After pressing the D key on your keyboard to select Photoshop’s standard colors, apply Filter > Render > Clouds. Name this layer STONE TEXTURE.

02. The channel

Switch from the layer view to the channels palette and click the New Channel button at the bottom right. This creates the channel ALPHA 1. Change the name to DIFFERENCE CLOUDS by double-clicking ALPHA 1 and typing in the new name. To make the name fit the content, apply Filter > Render > Difference Clouds three times. Repeating this filter turns the black into a marble-like surface.

03. Render filter

Switch back to the layer palette, then activate the STONE TEXTURE layer by clicking on the layer name so it’s highlighted in blue. Use Filter > Render > Lighting Effects with Intensity: 35, Focus: 100, Gloss: -100, Material: 100, Exposure: 0 and Ambience: 0 as well as the Texture Channel DIFFERENCE CLOUDS with a Height of 100 to create a stone texture from nothing.

Ideally, the light should brighten the entire document. If you want to re-adjust the Lighting Effects, all you need to do is double-click on the filter name to open the dialog window again.

04. Texture

Adjustments cannot be applied directly to a smart object. Most of them are available as adjustment layers, though. To modestly color the stone texture, click on Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Hue/Saturation and confirm with OK. Activate the Colorize option, then set the Hue to about 35 and Saturation to 8. Use a Curves adjustment layer and the Medium Contrast preset to get a crisper result.

If you want, you can additionally use the smart filter Sharpen > Unsharp Mask (Amount: 250%, Radius: 0.3 px).