Editing Photos (Simplified)

On a personal note, I'd like to thank Nicole Pfeiffer for teaching me that I was editing my photographs the hard way, indeed! I've simplified this editing process so that you can create beautiful black and white photos with a splash of colour that much faster.

Back to business...

As an artist, I tend to be a perfectionist. This, of course is one of my worst habits. Usually, artists thrive on the imperfect because it is what makes their art different from another, but to me that is only something non-artists think. (And possibly just me.) We make our imperfections on purpose, and in essence... perfectly imperfect!

That being said, I took a photography course in college, and I failed. I failed miserably! I hated photography after taking that course, but that didn't last long. I realized I had a pretty cool camera from the course and knew the basics of how to use it. Just an FYI, if you are looking to take a course in photography and know nothing about how to use a manual camera, do not take biomedical photography, this will detour you from your passion to take moments in life and freeze them in a photo. Take photography 101 so you can learn the in's and out's of your camera and learn to enjoy the art of photography.

The one thing that course taught me that I'm beyond thankful for was Adobe Photoshop. I have long been a fan of Adobe Photoshop. It has been a tool I use for making my pictures brighter, darker, black & white, taking out an unnecessary car from my otherwise immaculate landscape, etc. Photoshop has also served as a comic relief tool for me by creating extreme one of a kind shots of friends and family members. We called those photos sharpie art. But my favourite has been taking a colour photo and making it black and white, while leaving some of the photo in colour.

My sister and my nephews are in the photo below and I did several things with this photograph, but most notably I changed the colour mode to black and white, while leaving their shirts in colour. (I also took out a neighbor's playhouse and boat, if you look close enough, you'll notice a little bit of my editing. This was a difficult picture to work with.)

I've been asked by friends, family, fellow Etsy-ians and strangers how I make these beautiful photographs in Photoshop. And my answer to me, is simple. Now of course, I have no idea if I'm doing my editing the "correct" way, but what I'm about to show you works for me. And, with practice, I hope it works for you too!

Keep in mind that I am using Adobe Photoshop 7, so your program may be different than mine. In regards to Photoshop, most of the programs have similar layer features, colour mode, and cropping tools. As well as editing commands using the Ctrl key.

1. First you need to select the photograph you'd like to use for this picture. It works best with a photo that has a bold or bright colour that you're going to highlight. Here is the photo I used:

There are two main things to keep in mind when you want to take a colour photo and make it black and white with a splash of colour, the first being: Crop your photo to desired size PRIOR to any of the steps below. This saves you from figuring out exact crop points later on. The second is choosing what pieces you want to keep in colour. After you do both of those things, proceed to the next step.

2. The very first thing you're going to do is select your Lasso Tool, also known as the cropping tool. You are going to want to select the Polygonal Lasso Tool. As this allows you to crop by clicking around an object instead of having to freehand crop, which is much more difficult. You change which Lasso Tool you are using by right clicking the mouse to get the drop down menu. For practice, click around on the photo until you're comfortable with how the polygonal lasso tool works.

3. Once you have this tool selected, I want you to highlight the object you want to KEEP in colour. After you have selected this object, I want you to copy it. You can do this by holding Ctrl C or by going to Edit > Copy.

4. The next thing you are going to do is convert the colour mode to grayscale. You do this by clicking  Image > Mode > Grayscale.

 

5. After you have changed the photo into grayscale mode, you are going to go back and change it into RGB mode. This will keep the photo in a grayscale colour while being in a RGB colour mode, thus allowing you to paste your coloured object, which you already copied, back onto the grayscale photo but in colour. You change the colour mode just the same as you did when you changed it to grayscale, but this time select RGB mode.

 

6. After you change the colour mode back to RGB colour, you can paste your copied colour object into the grayscale photograph. You do this by holding Ctrl V, or Edit > Paste. Then select the Move Tool and move your copied colour object until it is directly over the area it lays in the grayscale photo. After you have positioned your colour object to its original spot, click Ctrl E, this Merges the layers together so that when you save the photo as a JPEG, it will save all of your hard work. You can also merge by clicking Layer > Merge Layers.

7. Lastly, ENJOY your beautifully edited photo!!

I hope you enjoyed this quick tutorial of Photoshop. With many trials, you will learn your errors and better, faster ways of doing things. I did just that with this latest blog and I'm able to share it with you. Thanks again, Nicole.

Happy Photoshoping!

Love,

Katie.

"Love will immediately enter into any mind that truly wants it." -A Course In Miracles.

Failure

The Burning Iron...

I have this one particular fabric that I absolutely love. It has a beautiful colour, shine and feel to it. It can be classy, it can be elegant, but it cannot withstand high heat from an iron. I know this, of course I know this, but when I finish a particular project I get really excited. The kind of excited that little kids get when they know they're going to McDonald's, you know the happy dance? That's the kind of excited I get.

So, I'm making a custom designed purse for a friend to take when she goes on walks with her dog. There are two front pockets that are easily accessible for doggie poop bags, treats, and on the inside I am putting several pockets for a cell phone, water bottle holder, and whatever else she decides to bring with her.

Again, being excited about the fabric that I love, I use it, which is the wrong fabric for this purse. So I decide this will be a sample purse and my friend can decide if she likes it or not, and I could just sell it to whomever loved it. So, everything is coming together perfectly and the pattern I designed was flawless. It was almost TOO easy. Then I got to the straps... and then I was stuck on the straps. I wasn't sure if I liked them, so I folded them in half for added strength and support, and I was happy. I sewed the interior in and was getting ready to iron it flat so I could make a stitch around the outside.

And that's where the deadly burn occurred, and the story ends!

Not Really A Pocket, Pocket!

I recently started making wallets, as I have an itch to make everything in sight, and I just had to try out a tri-fold wallet. I have my own wallet that I studied, I researched online how they're made, and I decided I would wing it. The first wallet I made was beautiful and relatively easy. Since I've quilted a little before, the binding on the edges weren't too difficult and I reused a magnetic snap to keep the wallet closed.

My second wallet is a WHOLE different story. The fabric I used is from the huge batch of designer fabric I was given, and it was one of my favourites. I saw it and immediately knew I wanted to make a wallet out of it. I held off for a bit, waited until I did a trail and error test on the first wallet, and was confident going into the creation of the second. The construction of the wallet was easy, I love making the credit-card pockets. Though, when I was making the change pocket portion, I started to run into trouble.

First of all, the reused zipper I had chosen was a pain in the butt! It took me twenty minutes to get it out of the previous purse it was embedded in. Obviously, this zipper did not want to part with its original creation. Once I pried it from the purse, I started to sew it to some muslin that I put interfacing on. I figured hell, it'll be easier to fold the pieces in when I put the zipper on, WRONG! The zipper moved, it was fussy, and basically was giving me sign number two that it did not want to be put in my lovely wallet!

Now, I'm not sure if you've already figured out that I shouldn't be able to put my hand THROUGH the zipper like that, but you're not!

There is supposed to be a backing that would hold the change in and where my pretty pale fingers are sticking out, which is where you would put your hard earned dollar bills. I hadn't even realized I did this and had put the wallet in a pile to be photographed with the small stack of iPod cases I had just finished. It was when my boyfriend's mom, Maggie, picked up the case and started examining my work. The two of us had been brainstorming ways to make the binding less bulky, which I've since figured out how to do... duh, add a quarter inch all around so you're not trying to squeeze 1' of fabric in less than 1' of space!

She held up the wallet, with her hand through the zipper like mine in the photo and said, "Isn't there supposed to be a pocket, in the pocket?" I started cracking up and was thankful that I hadn't put it up on Etsy to sell! How embarrassing that would have been!!

But alas, I've learned trial and error only makes you a better designer and sewer. I've since taken apart my purse and put in a new strap. (Burn Free!) And unfortunately, I've been staring at my wallet, with my favourite fabric holding it together, already regretting the time it took to make it, to have to take it apart and fix it! But I will.

"If You don't like how things are, change it! You're not a tree."

Love,

Katie.