Core77's Hack-2-School Guide: Classroom

Core77's Hack-2-School Guide: Classroom


Make Your Product Shots Look Awesome Tip #2: The 3 Essential Photoshop Tricks

Threre are more Photoshop tutorials out there than you can throw a lasso at, but for our money, there are three Photoshop tricks that will turn your dull, generic digital photo from drab to fab (and the first one's not even a trick.)


STEP 1: CROP TIGHTER
There is nothing more boring than a picture of a design in the middle of a gray background. Don't do that. Instead, consider a tighter crop of the object, maybe bleeding it off the edge of the frame.


STEP 2: USE THE SHADOW/HIGHLIGHT FILTER
Many people go up to the "Image" menu in Photoshop and try to optimize using the "Brightness/Contrast" and "Hue/Saturation" tools. But for our money, the most startlingly useful—and underused—filter is the "Shadow/Highlight" filter. Set it at 25 and hit OK. Then do it again and see if it's even better. If not, back it off with undo. Easy.


STEP 3: TRIM THE ENDS IN LEVELS
There is an encyclopedia to be written about how to master Levels, but a quick way to get big results is to simply "trim the ends" on the histogram. If you've got flat lines on the left and right, move the two outer arrows in toward the center. The darks will get richer, the lights will get brighter, and it will take you about 2 seconds. Play with the middle arrow if you like, but really, you could save-for-web right about now.