Posts Tagged ‘photography’

Tutorial: Tilt Shift Photography

Friday, June 10th, 2011

I have an obsession with small things. Starting at a young age, I can remember building tiny cities and farms with my brother with wood blocks and small plastic figurine pigs. I continuously checked out the same book on making my own miniature doll furniture, and was way obsessed with decorating Barbie’s dream house with all of her miniature accessories. Even a bit more grown up, I still find myself in love with small things, from miniature brass figurines to tiny tiny lamps and, as most here know, dogs with short legs.

Tiny is just too cute, and so I love the emergence of Tilt Shift Photography. I can now make everything appear at a smaller scale. Tilt shift photography gives the appearance of a scaled model, with a shallow focus, high-contrast, and vibrant colors. Today, I’m sharing a fun way to create this look in Photoshop, so you too can start shrinking your world.

1. Select a Photo. Generally a model is seen from above, so make sure you’re choosing a shot from a high and wide angle, this will give you the best results. For this tutorial, I choose a photo taken out of my upstairs window of the street below.

2. Enter Quick Mask Mode. Open the image in Photoshop and enter Quick Mask Mode. You can do this by pressing Q on the keyboard, or select the Quick Mask icon at the bottom of your tools palette.

3. Draw a Gradient. Select the gradient from the menu by pressing G. Choose the reflected gradient. Draw a line where you want your main focus to be on the image. In this picture I choose the car to be the most in-focus element. If you look closely, I drew a line from the bottom of the car wheel to the top of the car. Keep using the gradient until you get the placement you’d like.

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2011 Web Trend: Full Image Backgrounds

Wednesday, January 26th, 2011

Want a show-stopper? Then hop on trend with full image backgrounds. A large scale illustration or photo background instantly grabs your viewer’s attention, adding life and creating a more dynamic and engaging look and feel. These over-sized backgrounds are great, but should be used in the right setting. Sites that already have image galleries make great candidates, think photography studio, design agency, fashion designer, illustrator, or even a picturesque resort. Beware, the most common issue with large backgrounds it that they have to conform to many different screen resolutions, so make sure you test, test, test and use an image large enough to fit the width for the most commonly used screen resolutions. Check out these images below for this new trend in action.


Ikea Cook Book

Friday, November 19th, 2010

Ikea is putting out a cookbook, but no, you don’t need an Allen wrench to build your favorite Swedish dish. The book, however, is cleverly done with beautiful, witty, and functional imagery that makes even me want to cook. It’s called “Hembakat ar Bast” (Homemade is Best) and its’ best feature is the stark, geometric photography by Carl Kleiner. All of the ingredients are broken down into a still life image containing small piles and pieces. It definitely has the streamlined, modern appeal that keeps Ikea in business. The book is 140 pages, with 30 classic Swedish recipes. Fortunately, this book is free! Unfortunately it’s only in Swedish, and can only be found in Sweden. But wait, they have an app too! The app is called Kondis and contains the same recipes from the book. Not only that, but it will also tell you how much exercise you have to do to work off the dish! Now you can enjoy your Swedish fancies without a guilty conscience!



A New Way to Search Images: Google Swirl

Tuesday, November 17th, 2009

12643~Dog-Labrador-PostersHow did I find the photo of the Labrador puppy to the left? I tried out the new Google Lab project called Google Swirl.

What are Google Labs? Believe it or not, they are are not pet dogs of Google employees. Google Labs is a website demonstrating new Google projects “that aren’t quite ready for prime time”. It serves as a testing ground for new services being developed. Gmail and Google Calendar were once Google Lab projects.

Google Swirl is another Google Lab project for searching images. It builds on new computer vision research to cluster similar images into representative groups in a fun, exploratory interface. For example, if you search on Image Swirl for labrador, you’ll see 12 image thumbnails including labs on white backgrounds, yellow labs, lab puppies, etc.

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Going Vintage

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

Lately, I’ve been inspired by vintage photography. I love its naturally faded colors, vignettes, and soothing tones. I’ve been on the lookout for Photoshop tutorials that will add bit of that historical and airy elegance to my own projects. On my search I found two tutorials, one focusing on a vintage feel, and another recreating a Lomographic style that gives a blurry and colorful look that you often find in the original analog photography. Below are two examples using both tutorial techniques, one features a muted pink tone, while the other focuses on a more contrasting, blurred effect. If you would like to share any additional ways to achieve a vintage style, I’d love to hear it.

Vintage_Tutorial


fffflippin’ ffffantastic ffffind!

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

found_01.r2419If you haven’t found ffffound, you’re surely missing out. The ffffound web site lets you post (if you’re invited) and share images that others have discovered on the web. I’m not allowed to post, but I’d love to figure out how to get in! Though posting would be awesome, I really use ffffound as an inspiration tool for my own designs. Each time I visit the site, there are a variety of new images posted to the home page that include, but are not limited to, graphic design, typography, inspirational photography, illustration, fashion and interior design. I generally scroll until I find something that really grabs my attention, and this is truly where the fun begins. Ffffound dynamically recommends other photos based on your own tastes and interests, so when you click on that first image, ffffound suggests 10 other images that you might like. I can, for example, click on a photo of an interesting package design, and ffffound may show me more packaging from the same collection, different packaging from the same site that the original image was found on, and other images with a similar theme, color scheme, or feel. You can click on a new image from that suggested batch and receive a whole new suggestion list of wonderful (and sometimes odd) images. It’s addictive, trust me. Get ready for a trip, because you can definitely get lost in ffffound.