Photoshop Creative No. 139

Fixing photos is what many people associate Photoshop with, from improving holiday snaps to transforming images for the media. Even the most creative projects can also benefit from a bit of editing, as enhancing your start images can only make your final artwork better! Turn to p.16 to discover 20 photo-fixing techniques that you simply must learn. There are also step-by-step tutorials on creating incredible typography with photos, making your own paint-splat people, compositing an action scene and much more. And if you want to show off your art in a professional portfolio, see how you can use Photoshop for all your web-design needs in our advanced guide. Plus, learn how to restore old photos, design a magazine cover and more in Elements. And don’t forget that this issue’s FileSilo…

There’s nothing more inspiring than surfing the internet and seeing what other artists are creating, and we encourage you to do so. Here are some of our favourite pictures that caught our attention recently, from some of the world’s most exciting artists and designers. Ashraful Arefin www.ashrafularefin.com I wanted to create an autumnal scene. I took the main shot, then I collected some dry leaves and photographed them separately. I added the leaves in Photoshop and used the Gaussian Blur filter to blur out some of the leaves to mimic camera focus. Laura Palumbo www.behance.net/ Laurapal ‘A Flat Trip Around Europe’ is my thesis project in Graphics for Publishing. It’s a series of books containing illustrations of European cities, forming a unique visual journey for travellers and tourists of all…

Bruno Gomes www.photoshopcreative. co.uk/user/BrunoArts Image of the issue This image was created with the idea of what it would look like if someone was invoking flames. I wanted it to be dark but with strong colours. I used stock photos and adjustments in order to bring this together. Andrey Matskevich www.photoshopcreative.co.uk/user/killoton This image was created using a stock image of a subject and colour fill layers to create the water. Blend modes were important in creating this image, and so were adjustments to give the sunset feel. Fábio Paiva www.photoshopcreative.co.uk/user/fabiopdesigner For this photomanipulation, I mainly used two simple images. Masks and layers were adjusted with a balance of colours, a Brightness/Contrast adjustment and another layer tweaking the illumination in the picture. Raphael Andrade www.photoshopcreative.co.uk/user/Raphaell Motion blurs were important in this…

Challenge entries The best entries and overall challenge winner 1 Mugie Santoso Welcome Home Party The idea behind this picture is that a man has been away for a long time, and he is returning to his wife. All four start images were used in the final picture. 2 Marcus Jones Always Thinking of You I wanted to create a dreamy image of someone always thinking of their loved ones. I used three of the images; the sea, frame and girl. All done using Elements 12. 3 John Kelly Colour Me Happy I wanted to document the transition from a dark place to a happier one with this picture. The main images used are the photo frame and the picture of the girl. 4 Mark Gergely Molnar Edit Before/After I…

If you’re an iPhone/iPad user and a fan of mobile gaming, you may very well have heard of Monument Valley (www.monumentvalleygame.com). This award-winning app – in 2014 and 2015 its accolades included BAFTAs, an Apple Design Award, the Apple iPad Game of the Year, as well as notable industry awards – comes from the exceptional minds of the team at ustwo. ustwo is a digital product studio achieving world domination thanks to its four studio locations (London, New York, Malmö and Sydney), as well as a dedicated games studio. It delivers stunning and creative visual solutions for its well-known clients, as well as its own ventures, including the aforementioned Monument Valley. Being a cutting-edge design studio, Adobe’s image-editing app is never far from the heart of the process of bringing…

Ready for the day 09:30 I arrive at the London studio. I start the day by reading some design blogs and the studio Slack channels. I grab some cereal and coffee, and get myself ready for the day. Daily review time 10:00 Every morning the team does a 15-minute stand-up, allowing us to talk through what happened yesterday, what we’re working on today and to raise potential issues. Everyone gets a better picture of what’s going on. Planning a project 11:15 I discuss the user journey for a new feature with the UX designer, then sketch out different possible routes and attend a sketching workshop with the whole team – it’s good to get all the brains together! A spot of downtime 13:00 I have some time to unwind my…