Photoshop or.............?

[Manxman]

With photo manipulation being mentioned in another thread, I was wondering what software you guys use.

I’ve tried a few programmes and have settled on Photoshop CS5 Ex. When CS6 became available I down loaded the trial version from Adobe. The interface had changed for the better in my opinion, the background colours especially.

 

As of the “improvements” to the whole package, I found few that would improve my work flow or photo’s. I’m really what could be called a basic user, not into 3D or the painting side.

 

One great improvement I did find thought was the upgrading of Content Aware, CS5 is pretty good at it but CS6 was really Aware.

 

Over on the Adobe Forum http://forums.adobe.com/community/photoshop/general every day new bugs are being exposed, you’d think that as CS6 is really only an upgrade to parts of CS5, there wouldn’t be to many bugs in the whole of the programme.

 

Needless to say I won’t be paying somewhere in the region of £180 to upgrade to CS6.

[Andy_1984]

i got lucky with photoshop and illustrator CS5 when the company i worked for bought a multi user license and gave me one to work from home it has everything i need for modifying images but i cant see any real benefit to it over other free softwares that are available if all you want to do is change brightness/contrast and color correction which i dont think really justifies the cost of the software.

[kirisute]

photoshop cs5 for me as well.

i do alot of digital artwork and painting so thats my main workflow package. oddly enough i dont do alot of photo manipulation in photoshop..much of my photography just gets cropped and adjusted for brightness and balance etc and much of the time i use Windows Live Photo gallery for that; or my ipad with iphoto! LOL!

if im working on a project for school or a wedding etc then ill head straight for photoshop though; moving heads about and repainting hair and shadows and all that stuff then there is no better software.

CS6's content aware stuff is amazing..hugely powerful stuff but i dont know how much id rely on it to makethe choices i would if left to its own devices.

i use CS5's dynamic content scaling occasionally and thats a really impressive feature.

Edited August 23, 2012 by kirisute

[snakey1]

I use Lightroom 4.1 for most of my stuff, I export from it into CS5 for stitching panoramas together and also into photomatix pro for HDR work but apart from that lightroom does most of what i need.

[ayjay]

I use a programme called Photo!Editor for cropping, resizing, light and colour levels. it has a few other widgets which get used occasionally for cloning out stray twigs etc., and Neat Image for noise removal.

 

They're both free and I find them simple to use - you can see the changes as you make them and go back if it's not right or do more, as you want.

 

Probably old hat compared to Photoshop, but I have a copy of that and barely understand it.

[Manxman]

Your right Andy freebies are good for absolute basics, but to get the best from a photograph took in RAW Photoshops the way to go in my opinion. One of my obsessions is level horizons, I use a small spirit level in the flash hot shoe, but even then I need to tweak it a bit occassionally. Most of my landscapes are combined of two or three bracketed shots, as I'm not a fan of using filters on the camera except for a circular polariser and an ND ten stopper.

 

 

I have only made one attempt at digital art Kirisute, I was playing with a photo I took of one of my fishing spots with a ten stop filter. I must have spent four or five hours developing it. I was pleased with the result of my first attempt.

Any chance of you posting up a couple of yours? It's something that I may be able to get into in the winter evenings, and maybe a short tutorial?

[kirisute]

Your right Andy freebies are good for absolute basics, but to get the best from a photograph took in RAW Photoshops the way to go in my opinion. One of my obsessions is level horizons, I use a small spirit level in the flash hot shoe, but even then I need to tweak it a bit occassionally. Most of my landscapes are combined of two or three bracketed shots, as I'm not a fan of using filters on the camera except for a circular polariser and an ND ten stopper.

 

 

I have only made one attempt at digital art Kirisute, I was playing with a photo I took of one of my fishing spots with a ten stop filter. I must have spent four or five hours developing it. I was pleased with the result of my first attempt.

Any chance of you posting up a couple of yours? It's something that I may be able to get into in the winter evenings, and maybe a short tutorial?

by digital art i mean fantasy and sci-fi and horror stuff mate. starting out from a 3d rendered figure and then hand painting hair,clothing and special effects etc to create a finished fantasy art piece:

you can find most of my stuff here:

http://kirisute.deviantart.com/

some of it is mature content so be warned!

as for tutorials:

NOTE: due to the nature of the artwork (fantasy stuff) some images in the files might be have mature content...semi naked forms, blood etc nothing disgusting but just so you are aware.

ill list each pdf and what it roughly contains:

book 1 Glints: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book1%20glints.pdf

adding glints and lens flare type effects to an image

 

book 2 Touch ups: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book2%20touchups.pdf

using various tools to repair bits of an image: good for restorations

 

book 3 backgrounds: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book3%20backgrounds.pdf

adding backgrounds to an image: might be useful if you fancy dropping in a sunset or new sky to a photo

 

book 4 highlights: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book4%20highlights.pdf

highlighting the human form with overlay and screen brushes and layers; very good for enhancing portraits and other images

 

 

 

book 5 whole image: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book5%20whole%20image.pdf

this is a start to finish tutorial on an entire piece of my artwork; the latter stages are photoshop based and have a wide variety of effects and stages that some might find handy.

 

book 6 compositing: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book6%20compositing.pdf

dropping two images together to form a new image. handy if you want to drop a figure onto a new background etc

 

book 7 hair: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book7hair.pdf

hand paitning hair onto an image. also useful for touching up hair in wedding photos or similar

 

book 8 hair: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book8%20hair2.pdf

slightly different method of painting hair

 

Cloth: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/clothtute.pdf

a couple of methods of hand panting cloth and clothing into an image. also usefull if you wish to touch up clothing in a photo

 

Frazetta tutorial: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/frazettahomage.pdf

tutorial i wrote for a competition help file. contains a start to finish image with alot of photoshop information regarding; hair painting, cloth painting, creating and using brushes, effects, actions and much much more

 

Wounds and Gashes etc: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20359976/book%209%20wounds.pdf

hand painting it cuts and suchlike; but also usefull for painting gashes into materials like wood and metal etc as well as trails of fluid and stuff

 

again content in tutorials might have mature stuff in it so be warned!

some of the techniques like using layers with overlay and screen etc and paiting with screen rbsuhes etc i use on photos alot so they might be of use for you.

Edited August 23, 2012 by kirisute

[Manxman]

Some very impressive stuff there Kirisute, thanks for the links to the tutorials. I've just had a quick scan through them and added them to my favourites.

The Highlights one I will read tonight and see what I can do with a photo I took the other night, I have a plan lol.

 

Do you draw your own figures?

I nicked the figure I used here of the web, difficult to find them. So this is my only attempt so far, but once I've read up a bit I'll go and photograph things I can maybe use.

Thanks for a very comphrensive post.

 

My attempt.

 

[nursejudy]

afraid i'm not in your leagues i only ever use picassa as dont like doctored pics

[kirisute]

Some very impressive stuff there Kirisute, thanks for the links to the tutorials. I've just had a quick scan through them and added them to my favourites.

The Highlights one I will read tonight and see what I can do with a photo I took the other night, I have a plan lol.

 

Do you draw your own figures?

I nicked the figure I used here of the web, difficult to find them. So this is my only attempt so far, but once I've read up a bit I'll go and photograph things I can maybe use.

Thanks for a very comphrensive post.

 

My attempt.

 

Nope, figures are 3d rendered models useing a piece of software called Poser

http://poser.smithmicro.com/poser.html

It uses models from various sources placed into a scene and rendered out as a 2d image. Think the technology used in Shrek etc Or maybe a virtual Barbie and Action Man you can place however and wherever you lie in whatever position you desire.

 

I do model buildings and weaponary and various bits and bobs myself but I'm not good enough to model human figures yet. You basically buy content you wish to use....render the base scene then use photoshop to finish the artwork.

Depending on skill level, or time etc you will find levels of post work will vary...some very skilled artists will create everything in 3d and just tweak the final image for colour etc others will produce a naked base figure and then hand paint everything else in with photoshop.

Book 5 and the frazetta homage will give you an insight into how I use it and work with the 3d models.

 

Some of my art there is pure hand painted stuff as well....the comic stuff is colouring in for the modern age! Lol!

Edited August 23, 2012 by kirisute