Photoshop Compositing Secrets - Matt Kloskowski [23]
STEP EIGHT:
Press Z to get the Zoom tool and zoom in to the photo until you can see those dirt-like fringes around his shoulder (and anywhere else). Because the original background color was so dark and matched the edges of the motorcyclist so closely, we have this fringe that Refine Edge just couldn’t select out that well.
STEP NINE:
To get rid of it, in the Layers panel, click on the layer mask thumbnail to make it active. Press B to get the Brush tool and, in the Options Bar, choose a small, soft-edged brush and change the Mode to Overlay. With your Foreground color set to black, start painting along those edges. You’ll see the fringe disappear, but because you’re using the Overlay blend mode, Photoshop won’t let it affect the actual edge of the motorcyclist. Then, change your brush blend mode back to Normal and use the layer mask to paint out (using a black brush) or paint in (using a white brush) any edges (basically, any cleanup work) that didn’t get selected perfectly back in Refine Edge.
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Tip: Paint in White in Overlay Mode
The same works in reverse, too. If your selection ever cuts out part of the person along the edges, change your Foreground color to white and, while still using the brush in Overlay mode, paint along the edges on the layer mask. It’ll bring the edges back without bringing back the original background.
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STEP 10:
Okay, now that the motorcyclist is selected from the background, go to File>Save and save it as a PSD, so all of your changes are saved. Next, we’ll put it all together.
Creating the Composite
Now, it’s time to put this one together and everything actually comes together really well with this one. There’s not much that we have to do to fit the motorcyclist into the background other than place him there. Our main hurdle here, though, is to convey speed. Since neither the background image nor the motorcycle were really moving, we have to make it look like it isn’t just a photo of a guy sitting on a bike.
STEP ONE:
First, open the background image. Here, I’ve opened the background image where we left off in this chapter’s first tutorial. At this point, I don’t need all of the layers with this image anymore. I know I’m not going to change anything, and keeping them all just makes our Layers panel more complex. So, go to Layer>Flatten Image and now there’s just a Background layer.
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Tip: Duplicate Before Flattening
If you’re morally, or otherwise, opposed to flattening your layers, then try going to Image>Duplicate to make a copy of the image, then flatten the copy to make it easier to work with. If you ever need to go back, you still have your original with all of its layers.
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STEP TWO:
If you remember from the previous tutorial, the motorcyclist is aiming toward the left side of the image. But our background looks as though he would be heading to the right, so we have a problem here. We can’t flip the guy on the motorcycle, because the writing on his helmet and jacket would be backwards. So, we’ll flip the background image instead. Go to Image>Image Rotation>Flip Canvas Horizontal. Now the tunnel is angled in the same direction the motorcycle will be traveling.
STEP THREE:
Next, open the motorcycle image and position the images so you can see them both onscreen (or at least their tabs, if you’re using Photoshop’s tabbed interface). Using the Move tool (V), click on the motorcycle layer, then drag it over onto the background image, and position it up against the far left of the background.
STEP FOUR:
The first thing I noticed is that the motorcyclist has a warmer tone to him than the background does, and since the motorcyclist layer is a Smart Object, we can edit the white balance back in Camera Raw. Just double-click on