Design Inspiration : MagazineArt.org
Posted by Jennifer | February 16, 2007 | 1 Comment
MagazineArt.org is a wonderful site featuring a huge database of magazine covers from the 19th and 20th century. It contains covers from magazines you probably never knew even existed - women’s magazines, gardening, movies, pulp and the artwork is terrific. I particularly like the Adventure section with lots of fairly rough looking dudes or damsels in distress on the covers.
So if you’re having a creative block, take a look at this site for some inspiration.
Photoshop Tutorial : Using the Sponge Tool to Adjust Saturation
Posted by Jennifer | February 15, 2007 | Leave A Comment
In this tutorial, we’ll look at how to increase the saturation in selected parts of an image. When you change the saturation of a color, you adjust its strength or purity. The Sponge tool is useful for making subtle saturation changes to specific areas of an image.
I’m using an image of a bunch of roses on a wooden table. It is a slightly dull (in terms of colour) image of some red and pink flowers.
1. Select the Sponge tool (
), hidden under the Dodge tool (
).
2. On the tool options bar, do the following:
- Select a large, very soft brush, from the Brush pop-up palette.
- Choose Mode > Saturate. (Saturate increases the intensity of a colour, Desaturate decreases the intensity of a colour
- For Flow , enter 50% for starters – if the changes are happening too rapidly, then decrease the flow.
3. Drag the sponge back and forth over an area of the image. The more you drag over an area, the more saturated the color becomes. In the image, I’m using the petals are starting to look much more colourful.
If you wanted to remove colour from an image, you can use the same tool. Just set the mode to Desaturate in the tool options bar.
Photoshop Quick Tip: Minimise the Toolbox
Posted by Jennifer | February 14, 2007 | Leave A Comment
I’m in Spring Cleaning mode at the moment. Yesterday’s tip was about getting rid of clutter in your Photoshop workspace by clearing away your palettes. Here’s another quick one. Just double-click on the bar at the top of the toolbox and it is instantly minimised down to the bar with the feather image. To get the full toolbar back, double-click on the bar again. Absolutely invaluable when you want to make some space on your screen.
Photoshop Quick Tip: Hide Those Unsightly Palettes
Posted by Jennifer | February 13, 2007 | Leave A Comment
The Photoshop work area can become a very busy place with the wide variety of palettes that can be opened at any one time. If you want to show someone your work without all the clutter, a quick way to get rid of them all is to press Tab on the keyboard. That gets rid of ALL the palettes.
If you want to keep the Toolbox and the Options Bar visible, press Shift + Tab.
Photoshop Quick Tip: Find the centre of your document
Posted by Jennifer | February 13, 2007 | Leave A Comment
Here’s an easy way to find the exact centre of your image in Photoshop using the rulers and guides.
With your document open in Photoshop, make your rulers visible (Ctrl+R in windows, Cmd+R on the Mac). Make sure that Snap is turned on, you can check this by choosing View > Snap. Then click and drag a guide out from the left hand-side ruler towards the middle of your document. The guide should snap automatically when it reaches the vertical centre. Now click and drag on the ruler at the top of the document window and drag down towards the centre. Again the guide should snap when it reaches the horizontal centre. And there where they meet, you have the very centre of your document.
Photoshop Quick Tip: Flip those guides!
Posted by Jennifer | February 12, 2007 | Leave A Comment
Yesterday we saw how you can use the guides to help you find the centre of your document. Today’s Photoshop tip shows you how you can flip a guide from being a vertical guide to being a horizontal (or vice versa).
Let’s pretend you’ve pulled out a vertical guide when you really wanted a horizontal guide (I know, my mind wanders too). Well you don’t have to go back to the rulers and start again, all you need to do is hold down the Alt Key (in windows) or the Option key (on the Mac). This will flip the guide from horizontal to vertical or vertical to horizontal. A handy little time saver.
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About
Hi, my name is Jennifer Farley and I am a designer and design instructor based in Ireland. Read more about Laughing Lion Design .
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