Author: Bob Lin

1. Open an image and duplicate the layer.

2. Select the object.

3. Open Select and mask from Select menu. Make any change on the selection. Then Output to layer mask.

4. Click on the right of the layer, select Create Layer.

5. Right the layer and select Blending Options.

6. In the Layer Style, check Drop Shadow. You have options to adjust Opacity, Angle, Distance, Quality.

7. After creating the shadow, hold Ctrl+T to select the shadow.

7. Right click on the the shadow selection, you have options to choose Scale, Rotate, …

8. This the final result.

1. Open a selected image. Please refer to

2. Go to Layer>New Fill Layer>Solid Color.

3. Now, you should have original layer and Color Fill Layer. In Color Picker, select the color you want.

4. Move the picked color layer move into original Layer

5. To change the background color, double click on the solid color you select. The Color Piker show up. Change to different color.

6. For example.

Levels is the simple method for making tonal and colorful adjustment.
Or it corrects the tonal range and it corrects the color balance
in an image. It works with histogram.

1. With the image open, go to Levels Properties.

You can do it from Create new fill or adjustment layer in Layer panel.

Or from Windows>Adjustment. Then select Levels icon.

2. There are three sliders under the Levels graph. The shadow slider on the left determines how dark the image becomes. The highlight slider on the right establishes the highlights. The Gamma slider in the center lightens or darkens the midtones and is important in establishing the overall mood of the image.

3. The graph represents the darkest part of the image through to the lightest on a scale of 0-255. For maximum contrast, the graph should span the entire tonal range from 0 to 255. To adjust the contrast, make sure it is in RGB channel. Move the white slider in from the right to the edge of the histogram. Do the same for the black slider, adjusting it in to the edge of the histogram on the left. The important tip here is to make sure that you don’t overexpose the highlights and underexpose the shadows.  Once you have those two sliders adjusted, you can adjust the mid tone slider to add some contrast to the scene.

Note: To make sure you aren’t losing detail in the shadows and the highlights, you can hold Alt key when you move slide.

4. You can also adjust color channels.

Noise can reduce the quality of the image, especially when you print it. With Photoshop, you may be able to reduce the noise. Here is how.

1. Open an image and zoom in until the noise becomes more apparent.

2. Open Noise filter by going to Filter>Noise>Reduce Noise.

3. There are two options, Basic and Advanced. In The Basic, you have these options:

Strength: this option reduces the appearance of noise. However, it also makes the softer of image. You need to balance it.

Preserve Details: use it with Strength to preserve the details.

Reduce Color Noise: This is used to reduce color noise.

Sharpen Details: this is the method to prevent softening the image.

4. Advanced gives you an option to color noise per channel.

5. Compare.

This is before.

This is after.

This is a simple tip to use Curve Adjustment Layer to popup an image.

This is before.

This is after.

1. Open the image and Curve adjustment layer.

You can do it from Create new fill or adjustment layer in Layer panel.

Or from Windows>Adjustment. Then select Curve icon.

2. With the Properties of Curve open, you can see the left and right of Curve doesn’t have any ix or less pix. Hold Alt key and move the right course to left until you see the edge of the image.

Do the same by holding the Alt key and move the course from left to right until you see the edge.

3. Click the eye icon to compare before and after.

In this example, we will work on Curve Layer Adjustment. This is before

This is after.

1. Open and edit the image.

2. Create Curve layer. You can do it from Create new fill or adjustment layer in Layer panel.

Or from Windows>Adjustment. Then select Curve icon.

3. Our goal is highlighting the dark background. So adjust the Curve as shown this screenshot.

4. To highlight the dark background and keep other areas are the same as the original, you will use Brush Tool.

Make sure the the Front background is black, then use the brush to pain the areas you want to adjust.

5. You can check the paining area by hold Alt and click on Curve layer.

In the Properties (if you don’t have the Properties open, you can open it from Windows), you can continue to pain and adjust Density and other refine. Here is the result.

6. This is the result.

1. With the image open, duplicate the layer, duplicate the Background layer by hitting CMD or CTRL + J on the keyboard or by clicking and dragging the Background layer to the New Layer symbol at that bottom of the Layers Panel.
2. Open Spot Healing Brush Tool.

3. Remove small blemishes.

4. With background copy active, go to Filter>Convert for smart filter.

4. Open Surface Blur from Filter>Blur.

5. Adjust Radius and Thresholds, in our example, Radius=15, Thresholds=20. Check the preview to compare.

7.

• Portrait Photoshop 1: use Blur Filters to soften backgrounds and skin tones

• Portrait Photoshop 2: Use Refine Edge in Photoshop to select scattered hair
• Portrait Photoshop 4: How to change background using the Lasso Mode of Object Select Tool
• Portrait Photoshop 5: How to use Object Selection Tool in Photoshop 2020
• Portrait Photoshop 6: How to convert a selected background to black and white in Photoshop 2020

• Portrait Photoshop 7: Blur background

Blur a background can draw attention to a focal point.
As always, the best way to do this is in-camera with a wide maximum aperture , F2.8 or low number. If you didn’t have the right lens with wide open aperture, Photoshop can help. In this example, we will use Gaussian Blur to blur the background.

Before

1. With the image open, duplicate the Background layer by hitting CMD or CTRL + J on the keyboard or by clicking and dragging the Background layer to the New Layer symbol at that bottom of the Layers Panel.
2. Use the select object tool to select subject. Please refer this post:

• Portrait Photoshop 5: How to use Object Selection Tool in Photoshop 2020

3. Located the Radius and

5. Go to Select>Deselect.

Making selections of scattered hair in Photoshop is not easy. with a uniform background are perfect to start with. Here is how.

1. Use a select tool to select background or subject. In our example, I use Magic Wand Tool.

2. After using Magic Wand tool select all white background, use Quick Select Tool deselect subject.

3. Go to Select to Inverse from background selection to object selection. Now, click Add layer mask icon

4. Click Select and Mask on the top or Go to Select>Select and Mask.

5. Select Refine Edge Brush Tool (R)

6. In the properties of Select and mask, you have these options: Show Edge, Show Original, View Mode. Normally, I start Opacity at 50%, check Smart Radius. Adjust Global Refinements such as smooth, feather, contrast and shift edge for the perfect result.

Decontaminate Color helps you to reduce the edge of the leftover colored pixels around the edges of a selection.

Output To drop-down menus has these options:

• Selection: When you press OK after refining the edge, then your output will be just a selection. It leaves you with marching ants.
• New Layer: Creates a new layer which contains only the selection. It deletes the background.
• New Layer with Layer Mask: Creates a new layer with a layer mask.
• Layer Mask: Add a layer mask to the selection. One of the most used output by me.
• New Document: Create a new document/file which contains only the selected pixels.
• New Document with Layer Mask: Creates a new document with a layer mask which only contains the selected image.

7. Click to output the result.