Lesson 9 & Lesson 10

9. Making Selections 

In this lesson, we generally learn more about selections tools and layer mask. There are many selection tools in Photoshop. 

• Rectangular Marquee Tool: Draws square or rectangular selection borders.
• Elliptical Marquee Tool: Draws round or elliptical selection borders.
• Single Row and Column Marquee Tool: Select a single row or column of pixel in an image
• Lasso tool: Draws freehand selection borders, best for precision
• Polygonal Lasso tool: Draws multiple straight-edged segments of a selection border
• Magnetic Lasso tool: Draws a selection border that automatically snaps to edges when you drag over in the photo.
• Magic Wand tool: Selects pixels of similar color with one click. The amount of the image that Photoshop selects is determined by the Tolerance value. Tolerance is measured in luminance levels
• Quick Selection tool: Quickly and automatically makes selections based on color and texture when you click or click-drag an area.

To add to the selection, press and hold the shift key before creating the selection. To subtract from a selection, press and hold the alt key, or the option key on a MAC.  To find the intersection of the old selection outline and the new selection outline, press and hold the shift and alt keys/shift and option on a MAC.

To load a layer mask as a selection or load the outline of a layer itself as a selection, press the control key/the command key on the Mac and click on its thumbnail.

To improve the quality of the Magic Wand selection, use the Select and Mask workspace. 

• Grow and Similar 

The Grow and the Similar commands are close cousins to the Magic Wand tool, and to a lesser extent, the Quick Selection tool. The Grow command increases the size of the selection by including adjacent pixels that fall within the range of Tolerance. The Similar command is like Grow, only the pixels don’t have to be adjacent to be selected. The command searches throughout the image and picks up pixels within the Tolerance range, wherever they may fall.

Also got introduced to color overlay which literally lays a color over an existing image except it is non-destructive.

10. The Quick Mask Mode

The Quick Mask mode enables one to create and refine selections using the brush tool or the eraser tool.

To gauge the quality of the selection outline, use the Threshold command and to enhance the edges of the selection, use the Select and Mask workspace.

To save the selection fast, save it here inside the Channels panel, just by clicking on the second icon in, down here at the bottom of the panel, the one that reads "Save selection as a channel,". To name the channel while making it, "alt" or "opt" click that icon.

When making adjustments in quick mask mode, control + backspace or command + delete fills the selection with the background color and alt + backspace or option + delete on the Mac fills the selection with the foreground color.

The Blur Tool makes images obscure and softens an image making it look out of focus with a blur effect. The Sharpen Tool goes the other way and makes an image clearer, it sharpens around the edges of an image. Then we have the Smudge Tool which doesn’t blur or sharpen, instead what this tool does is smudge and bump pixels out of place. Thus, in order to add naturalistic motion blur in an image into a selection outline, one can use the smudge tool in the click mask mode.

When working in a mask, control or command + I inverts the selection. While when working with the selection outline, control + shift + I, or command + shift + I on a Mac inverse the selection. To show or hide the RGB composite, press the tilde key.

Press Control-Alt-J, or Command-Option-J on a Mac, to create a copy of a layer while naming the new copy at the same time.

 

To expand or contract a selection, use Modify. It will make the selection outline larger or smaller by a specific number of pixels.

Lesson 7 & Lesson 8

7. Brightness and Contrast

In this lesson, we are firstly introduced to the core concept of luminance inside of a digital image. A digital image is made out of multiple grayscale images. Every one of those gray scale images has luminance levels that go as dark as black and as bright as white and has different gray values in-between. The darkest of the luminance levels are known as the shadows while the brightest luminance levels are known as the highlights. Everything in-between is known as the mid tones. Gray scale images are known as channels and they contain 3 channels. The Red channel, Green channel and Blue channel. 

There are 3 auto commands. Auto Contrast simply darkens the darkest pixels to pure black, lightens the lightest pixels to pure white, and redistributes all the other tonal values in between. Auto Tone does the same same as Auto Contrast but it does on a channel-by-channel basis, meaning that the Red, Green and Blue channels each receive their own separate boost in contrast. Hence, Auto Tone changes the colors in the image. Auto Color is similar to Auto Tone. It also darkens the darkest pixels to black and lightens the lightest pixels to white on a channel-by-channel basis. But Auto Color goes a step further. Rather than simply redistributing all the other tonal values in between, it tries to correct any unwanted color cast by neutralizing the mid-tones in the image. I didn't know that the Brightness and Contrast setting also has an auto function.

I also learned that it's possible to apply a dynamic adjustment layer to an image. At such, instead of having permanent modifications to the image, temporary modifications are applied. Just have to go up to the layer menu and choose New Adjustment Layer. 

There are two blend modes that are generally more useful. One is Multiply, which will allow you to darken the image. The other one is Screen, which does the opposite of Multiply. The most useful one in the contrast mode is Overlay, which will increase the contrast of an image.

This lesson also taught us how to read the histogram and put in into use. A histogram of a good image should have a gradual incline in the Shadow region and then a bunch of mountainous activity in the Midtones, and then finally a gradual decline into White.

Lastly, I learned how to use the Shadows/Highlights command to correct an image that has too much contrast. It's also good to note that Shadows/Highlights is not available as an adjustment layer in Photoshop.

8. Balancing Colors

This lesson is pretty interesting. Firstly, we learned how to identify the color cast of an image by using the eyedropper tool. With the eyedropper tool, click on something that ought to be either white or gray color in the image then the identified color will be shown inside the color panel. Hue is the actual color. Saturation value is perhaps the best indicator of the color cast of an image. It tells us how intense is the color cast is. It's good if the neutral element inside the image has a very low saturation value of 3% or below. To adjust the color cast manually, one can use the Color balance adjustment layer and adjust accordingly to one's subjective decisions. Turning the Preserve Luminosity checkbox on will brighten the image up slightly. Another way of correcting color cast is by applying photo filter. 

The easiest method for color balancing images is by using the camera raw filter. First go up to the Filter menu and choose the Camera Raw Filter. Then use the eyedropper which is known as the White Balance Tool at the horizontal toolbar at the top of the screen to click on the neutral part of the image in order to correct the color cast. However, it's a permanent so-called destructive modification because Photoshop has rewritten all the pixels inside the image. While the adjustment layers, will still allow editing to the modifications.

When adjusting color intensity with the Vibrance adjustment layer, the saturation slider will increase the saturation of all the colors inside the image while the Vibrance slider saturate colors according to one's needs. Vibrance increases the intensity of the more muted colors and leaves the already well-saturated colors alone. 

For the Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, I didn't know about Targeted Adjustment tool. One can drag the Targeted Adjustment tool to change the saturation of a color selected. Press the Control key or the Command key on the Mac and drag to change the hues of the selected color. Hue/Saturation can create a sepia-tone effect just by turning the Colorize checkbox on and adjusting the hue and saturarion accordingly.

Lesson 5 and Lesson 6

5. Introducing Layers

In this lesson, I am introduced to layers, Firstly, the easier way to convert a flat background into an individual layer just my clicking on the lock icon on the right-hand side of the layers panel to turn it off. I found out that the layer above with affect all the layers below it and that it's possible to customize the checkerboard pattern by going to the edit menu, then drop down to Preference and choose Transparency and Gamut. One can use the Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer to temporarily turn an image black and white and use the Brightness Contrast Adjustment Layer to turn an image into near silhouette. 

At the brush tool and painting area, I learned about the Hardness value which changes how the edge of the brush stroke look (to look soft or sharp and crisp) and also the Spacing value which affects the continuity and smoothness of the brushstroke. I also learned a new trick of painting straight line by clicking at one point, and then shift + clicking at another. 

It's possible to distinguish black from non-black pixels in an image by using the threshold adjustment layer. Luminance levels are measured from 0 to 255. 0 is black, and then 255 is white and the threshold adjustment layer works in the way whereby anything brighter than a certain value is going to turn to white, and anything darker than a certain value is going to turn to black.

This lesson also demonstrates how to use the crop tool to expand the canvas to make room for a new canvas and fill in any unwanted areas of transparency with a new flat background. Next, was the clipping mask and the layer mask. The clipping mask allows one to clip an adjustment layer so that it affects just the crane layer rather than all layers below it. While the layer mask allows one to hide portions of a layer that are not selected and show the portions of the layer that are selected.

Lastly, to fill a selection with color while deleting the selection at the same time, press Alt+Backspace to fill the selection with the foreground color, press Control+Backspace to fill the selection with the background color and press Shift+Backspace to bring up the Fill dialog box. In order to add a non-adjacent layer to the selection, just click on one layer, then go to another layer, press the Control key and click on the empty portion of the layer but not the thumbnail. That's all for Lesson 5.

6. Saving Your Progress

Firstly, I didn't know that photoshop has an auto-saving setting which I can adjust to how often I want the program to save my work. It also a good thing to note that history is not saved together with the image file inside photoshop so one have to be extra careful and assured when abandoning unsaved changes. 

When saving as a PSD file, the As a Copy sign should be turned off and Alpha Channels, Layers, Notes, and Spot Colors should be turned on. When one turn on Maximize Compatibility, the file size will grow significantly as it is saving a flat version of the file along with a layer version. 

TIFF is is the most widely used file format for print images and that's because it's widely compatible and it features lossless compression. One can save a layered image as a TIFF file but it's recommended not to do so as it will increase the file size and most of the time people don't expect seeing layers in TIFF file. This is because when sending an image for a print, one generally wants the file size to be as small as possible.Thus when saving as a TIFF file, Alpha Channels and As a Copy can be turned on and Layers can be turned off. LZW, the lossless compression scheme can be turned on as it doesn't hurt the image unlike lossy compression as is associated with JPEG, is sometimes bad, but not always.

As for the PNG format, which is popular in the world of design, like TIFF, supports full-color images as well as lossless compression.However, it doesn't support layers but does support transparency. Thus, when saving as a PNG file As a Copy will definitely be turned on. Set the compression to smallest/slow and interlace to none otherwise, the file's going to load oddly inside of a web browser.

Lastly for JPEG format which is ideally suited to archiving continuous tone digital photographs. It neither supports layers nor transparency and always relies on lossy compression, meaning that it has to rewrite the colors of pixels when it saves its files. Hence, in return, we will get smaller file size. When saving as a JPEG format it's recommended to set the quality setting to the absolute maximum. For the format options, Baseline Optimized will be a better choice as it applies lossless compression, which generally helps to get the file size ever so slightly smaller, and these days everything that supports JPEGs supports Baseline Optimized.

Lesson 3 and Lesson 4

3. Image Size and Resolution

In this lesson, I am introduced to the basic building units of a raster graphic, the pixels. Pixels is the square unit of color. An image size is determined by the number of pixels in an image while the resolution of an image is determined by the number of pixels that are packed in a square inch when you print that image. It interesting to know that the resolution value applies to print only and it's actually meaningless on screen.I find out that "dpi" actually stands for "dots per inch ", a measurement of how much detailed color information a raster image contains.

I understand how image size is calculated and before this I actually did not know that to calculate an image size one have to take into account the RGB pixels. For printing, the image should at least have 300 dpi (CMYK) which is an industry standard for fine resolution images while for the web, 72 dpi (RGB) is enough. I can change the resolution value of an image by upsampling or downsampling it. However, if I do not want to change the number of pixels but only the resolution value I can turn off the resample image check box. However, at such I will change the width and height value of the image.When resampling an image, there will be interpolation whereby Photoshop rewrites every single pixel in the image. Thus, both upsampling and downsampling is technically a destructive modification. 

There are 6 interpolation settings. They are the nearest neighbour, bilinear, bicubic, bicubic smoother, bicubic sharper and preserve details respectively. The automatic setting when downsampling is the same as bicubic sharper while when upsampling, the automatic setting is the same as preserve details. After this lesson, I understand how to change the interpolation setting to the one that is the best to preserve the quality of an image when resampling an image.

4. Crop and Straighten

This lesson is pretty straightforward and easy. I know how to crop and straighten the image already. The lesson recommended us to use the ruler tool when straightening an image so that we can modify the line as much as we want before straightening. At such, the image will be straightened more accurately. I learned that when I rotate the image as I crop it, I will actually resample the image. I have not come across the perspective crop tool before hence it's vital to learn how it works.  I am amazed by the content-aware crop which can help to fill in missing background details while cropping an image.

Lesson 1 and Lesson 2

1. Opening an image

I do know how to open an image in photoshop from the Windows desktop and from directly inside photoshop. However, after watching this lesson, I realized that I can actually open an image file in photoshop every single time when I double-click on it from the Windows Desktop. All I have to do is to right-click on the image file, choose default program and then click on Photoshop CC 2015. I learned about Adobe Bridge which is Photoshop's companion file browser. Adobe Bridge will allow me to browse and organize my image files. After that, I learned about Camera Raw which is more interesting and relevant for me since I do take pictures in raw image file format using my DSLR but I never really know how and where to edit them. I am glad to find out about Camera Raw which can accommodate raw, jpeg and even tiff images. It is good to know that every modifications applied on the image in Camera Raw is non-destructive and it means I can easily clear out the Camera Raw settings and restore my original image file. It's even possible to open both the modified version and original version of the image in photoshop at the same time. After Lesson 1, I believe I can easily open an image file in photoshop without any hesitation.

2. Getting Around

This lesson is mostly on zooming in and out. I learned the importance of keyboard shortcuts. There are multiple keyboards shortcuts for zooming in and out. For example, ctrl + for zooming in, ctrl - for zooming out, ctrl-spacebar for the zoom in tool, ctrl-alt-spacebar for the zoom out tool, etc. It gets a bit confusing but knowing all the keyboards shortcuts will really allow us to play around in photoshop conveniently. I think the springloaded shortcuts feature that photoshop offers is really handy. It allows me to temporary switch keys/tools by pressing and holding on it and as soon as I release I will return to the previously selected key/tool. At the scrolling and panning part, I learned about the temporary hand tool(spacebar), flick panning, overscoll and how to scroll both images at once by pressing both the spacebar and the shift key before dragging the images. Last few things that I think is relatively more practical for me in this lesson is learning how to switch between open images (ctrl tab, ctrl~ and ctrl shift tab) and using of the navigator panel when the image is in full screen mode(press f twice).