Are you tired of blurry images?
It’s time to learn how to capture sharper images by finding your
lens’ sweet spot. This will give you more confidence, save time, and
help you take better photos.
In this article you’ll learn:
How to find your lens’ sweet spot (for sharper images)
Why you should shoot in Aperture Priority mode (and how to use it)
How to perform a test to get your sharpest image every time
How important is your lens’ sweet spot? Notice the difference
In the above images of the clock, the one on the right is sharper.
Look closely at the words and at the leaves behind the clock. The f/9
image is sharper throughout because it was shot in my lens’ sweet spot.
The f/3.5 one was not.
First, take a look at your lens
In this beginner’s guide, we’ll use an entry level zoom lens as our
example. Most kit lenses (the basic lens that comes with a DSLR)
generally shoot their sharpest at the mid-range aperture settings. To
determine the mid-range of your lens, you’ll need to know its widest (or maximum) aperture setting. It is located on the side, or end, of the lens and will look something like this 1:3.5-5.6.
For example, here it is on my Canon 18-55mm zoom lens.
This means that when my lens is zoomed all the way out, its widest
aperture is f/3.5. When zoomed all the way in, its widest aperture is
f/5.6.
The rule to finding that mid-range sweet spot, is to count up two
full f-stops (aperture settings are called f-stops) from the widest
aperture. On my lens, the widest aperture is f/3.5. Two full stops from
there would bring me to a sweet spot of around f/7.
Use this chart to count your f-stops
By Robin Parmar
There is some wiggle room in the mid-range, so anything from f/7 to
f/10 will capture a sharp image. Once you know the mid-range of your
lens, you can do an easy test to get your sharpest image. To perform the
test you’ll need to shoot in Aperture Priority mode.
Take control with Aperture Priority Mode
Shooting in Aperture Priority allows you to choose the aperture
setting you want, which gives you more creative control than Automatic
mode. By controlling the aperture setting,
it’s much easier to get a sharp image, and because your camera still
chooses the ISO (if you are set to Auto ISO) and shutter speed
automatically, it’s very easy to use.
You’ve probably heard that apertures like f/16 and f/22 are best for
keeping everything in focus. While that can be true, focus does not
always equal overall sharpness. Choosing a mid-range aperture will give
you sharper images throughout. You can improve them even further by
reducing camera shake with a tripod and a remote shutter release (or
your camera’s self-timer).
Here’s an example of how shooting in your lens’ sweet spot will give you sharper images.
In the above split-image, the f/9 image is sharper than the f/22 one.
The needles and shadows are not as soft or blurry as in the f/22 shot
(look at the crispness and sparkles in the snow too).
Switching from Automatic to Aperture Priority Mode
To take your camera out of Automatic and put it in Aperture Priority,
just turn the large Mode Dial to Aperture Priority. This is what that
looks like on my Canon (on Nikon and other brans look for the A).
Automatic mode is the green rectangle; Aperture Priority mode is the
Av (or A on a Nikon). Once your camera is in Aperture Priority mode,
turn the smaller Main Dial (shown here on the top of my Canon) to choose
your f-stop.
As you turn that dial, you’ll see the f-number changing on your screen. In the next picture, it’s set to f/9.5.
Perform a Lens Sweet Spot Test
Once you have your camera set up on a tripod, performing a sweet spot
test only takes a couple of minutes. To begin, put your camera in
Aperture Priority mode, then compose your shot and take a photo at
varying apertures. Start out with the widest, then click that main dial a
couple of times (to the right) and take another. Keep doing that until
you’ve taken seven or eight photos.
Upload your photos to your computer and zoom in on them. You’ll
quickly see which aperture settings gave you the sharpest overall image.
This next photo of my daughter was shot using natural light. Shooting
in my lens’ sweet spot gave me a pretty sharp image, even in this low
light setting.
The close up of the mugs shows the advantage of shooting in the lens’
sweet spot. Whenever you want to make sure you get the sharpest capture
possible, take a shot at each mid-range setting f/7, f/8, f/9, and
f/10.
Getting Your Sharpest Images
Now that you know your lens’ sweet spot, it’s time to practice. I hope you’re as pleased with the results as I’ve been!
I love shooting in natural light, and learning how to capture sharper images in low light has made me so much happier with my photos.
Tips for capturing your sharpest images:
Shoot in Aperture Priority mode
Choose a mid-range aperture (usually f/7 to f/10)
Use a tripod and a remote shutter release (or your camera’s self-timer) to reduce camera shake
Take a series of shots at f/7 through f/10 when a sharp capture is especially important
But don’t stop here. Keep playing with settings in Aperture priority
mode. It’s awesome to get images that are sharp throughout, but there’s a
lot more to aperture than that.
Learn more about aperture and depth of field here.
Do you have any lens sweet spot tips to share? Please do so by commenting below.
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Sunday, March 8, 2020
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2 Years with the Sony A7R III – Was it Worth Switching from Canon DSLR ?
It’s been almost two years since I purchased the Sony A7R III mirrorless camera as a second body to my Canon 5D Mark III DSLR.
Since then, I’ve used the two cameras side-by-side to shoot a wide
variety of professional events, from concerts to food to corporate
conventions. There have been pluses and minuses to using both systems
simultaneously, which I thought I’d share for those of you considering
the switch.
Why go mirrorless?
Prior to the A7R III, I had been using the Sony a6300
and was thoroughly impressed with its autofocus capabilities and video
features. On both fronts, this tiny camera seemed lightyears ahead of my
DSLR, so I was curious about how much better Sony’s full-frame cameras
could be. I was also expanding my photography business to include video
services and needed a camera that could shoot in 4K video resolution,
which the 5D Mark III could not do.
Why keep both systems?
So why keep the Canon DSLRs at all?
I have a large library of Canon L glass that I intended to use on the Sony via a lens adapter.
This worked with mixed results, but long story short, lens adapting did
not work with my style of photography (more on that below). Given the
significantly higher prices of Sony lenses, it made more financial sense
to keep the DSLR kit and simply purchase a couple of Sony lenses to
use. In the end, here’s what my resulting camera kit looked like:
*The overlapping 24-70mm lenses might seem like overkill, but there is such a HUGE size difference between the two.
What was worth it
1. Video features
The Sony A7R III and A7 III are packed with video features including
the ability to shoot in 4K resolution, 120 fps slow motion, in-camera
timelapse, and in-body-stabilization (IBIS), to name a few. Since this
is a photography site, I won’t go on more about the video features. But
the specs are more than what the newer Canon 5D Mark IV offers. So from a video perspective, the Sony A7R III was completely worth it.
2. Having an Electronic Viewfinder (EVF)
One of the ways mirrorless cameras differ from DSLRs is that they
tend to have an electronic viewfinder (EVF), while DSLRs have optical
viewfinders (OVF). An OVF shows you what the camera lens sees, while an
EVF shows you what the camera sensor sees. An EVF shows you almost
exactly what your final image will look like before you press the
shutter button.
There are pros and cons to using an EVF over an OVF, and most people
prefer one over the other. For me, the EVF is preferred mainly because
it allows for composing and shooting still photos with the LCD –
something that is still hard to do with a DSLR.
Shooting with a tilting LCD has been a complete gamechanger, allowing
me to find creative compositions that I wouldn’t have been able to do
with a DSLR.
3. A truly silent shutter
Another advantage of mirrorless cameras is that they can have truly
silent shutters. For the effort that Canon makes to offer a “silent
shutter” on its DSLRs, it’s still a jarring sound compared to a
mirrorless camera’s silent shutter.
The only thing to note is that silent shutters on mirrorless cameras
can produce banding in images where LED lights are present, so be wary
of that.
Sony A7R III with Sony 55mm f/1.8
4. Insane and Accurate Autofocus
My experience with the Sony a6300 taught me that Sony autofocus was
truly on another level compared to DSLRs. That’s still true on the Sony
A7R III. Not only do you have phase detection and contrast detection
autofocus with 5 focus modes, but you also get Sony’s acclaimed face
detection and eye autofocus.
To be fair, Canon has upped their autofocus game with dual pixel
autofocus, something that isn’t on the Canon 5D Mark III and thus isn’t a
feature I can compare. However, there are reports that a recent firmware update to Canon’s new EOS R includes “Sony-like eye autofocus,” so that much seems to have always been in Sony’s favor.
5. Rapidly developing lens library with lots of third-party options
Compared to the Canon and Nikon mirrorless camera systems, Sony, by
far, has the biggest lens library for both its full-frame and mirrorless
cameras. Even third-party brands like Sigma and Tamron have latched on,
currently offering high-quality lens options at a fraction of Sony’s
prices.
Better yet, lens adapters, such as the excellent Metabones V, allow
you to pull from Canon’s EF and EF-S lens library as well. So when it
comes to lens options, the Sony mirrorless is hard to beat.
Sony A7R III with Sony 24-70mm f/4. Look at the height of that stage – I couldn’t get this shot
without the tilting LCD.
What wasn’t worth it
1. Size and weight savings
The argument of switching to mirrorless cameras to have a smaller and
lighter system compared to DSLRs isn’t completely true. Sure, the Sony
A7R III is smaller and lighter than any of the Canon 5D cameras.
However, the fast Sony lenses that I would need to replace my DSLR
equivalents are just as heavy and bulky. When it comes to full-frame
cameras and fast glass packed with features such as image stabilization
(IS), there’s not much of a size and weight difference.
2. Adapting lenses isn’t for every scenario
There are some great lens adapters out there, such as the Metabones V
that I was initially sold on. In practice, the lens adapter worked 90%
of the time, which was okay when shooting things like food or portraits.
But that 10% failure rate wasn’t acceptable for the fast-moving concerts and events when it could mean missing THE shot of the night.
If you choose to adapt lenses, give yourself ample time for testing to make sure it works for your photography style.
Canon 5D Mark III with 24-70mm f/2.8
3. Realizing they aren’t completely dead yet
While many photography news sites publish headlines proclaiming the
death of DSLRs, Nikon and Canon prove otherwise. Both camera brands are
rumored to be releasing new DSLRs in 2020,
and there’s even supposed to be a 5D Mark V on the way! So if you shoot
with DSLRs, there’s no pressure to make the switch yet.
4. Canon could make a mirrorless camera comeback
Actually, this part could already be true if you look at Canon’s crop-sensor mirrorless camera line.
Even
though Canon seemed late to the mirrorless camera party, they are
making big gains with their popular EOS M-Series APS-C mirrorless
cameras, and the EOS R full-frame cameras continue getting better.
They are also developing innovative RF lenses
(have you seen the RF 70-200mm f/2.8?!) and allowing Canon shooters to
use DSLR lenses via their own lens adapter. It’s questionable if they
will be able to catch up to and surpass Sony’s cameras and ever-growing
lens library, but it is a good thing to see Canon continue to innovate.
Canon 5D Mark III with 16-35mm f/2.8.
In conclusion
So two years later, do I regret adding the Sony A7R III to my kit? Absolutely not.
The photos and videos that I’ve captured and the overall elevated
experience of shooting with this camera have been worth it. However, I’d
be lying if I said I wasn’t quietly rooting for Canon and hoping that
they beef up their full-frame mirrorless line. When they do, it might be
worth making yet another switch.
Sony A7R III with 24-70mm f/4
Canon 5D Mark III with 16-35mm f/2.8
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News: Inexpensive Canon RF Lenses are in the Works, Including a 50mm f/1.8
Last month, Canon announced
its intention to produce RF lenses over EF lenses. A Canon Europe
spokesperson indicated that the imaging giant would continue to support
the EF mount, but that we can expect to see only new RF lenses for the
foreseeable future.
For longtime Canon users who haven’t jumped on the mirrorless bandwagon,
this is a blow. But for Canon’s mirrorless users, this is excellent
news. One of the main reasons to switch to a company like Sony over
Canon is the mirrorless lens lineup; Sony’s mirrorless lens development
has had a big head start over Canon’s, and Sony now offers dozens of
full-frame and APS-C mirrorless lenses.
But with Canon focusing on its RF lenses, we might get to see it close the mirrorless gap.
In fact, it looks as if Canon is already making good on its
commitment to the RF mount, especially in the budget lens category. Up
until now, Canon has offered very few cheap RF lens options.
Over the twelve months, we might see that change. According to Canon Rumors, we can expect to see several new low-priced RF lenses announced in the near future, including “at least one…this year.”
This should include some type of pancake lens with an f/2.8 maximum aperture, as well as the possibility of an RF 50mm f/1.8.
While it’s unlikely that Canon’s 50mm f/1.8 could rival the price of the current EF 50mm f/1.8 STM, its good to know that we might have some strong options for consumers.
Thus far, anyone looking for a 50mm lens option (which is great for shooting portraits, street images, and more) would have to settle for the Canon RF 50mm f/1.2L, which currently costs over $2000 USD.
But with a cheaper 50mm option, the Canon RF lens lineup should feel much more accessible, even for beginners.
And with some luck, we should see both these new RF lenses before the year is out.
Saturday, March 7, 2020
Photography Freebie Ebook
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This ebook is FREE and yours for the taking. We routinely post one
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cover your particular interest in photography. Maybe Landcapes,
Portraiture, or Travel photography are your preference.
If so, just click on the link at the bottom of this page, "Amazon
Kindle Unlimited Access". They have a 30 day FREE trial. You can access any
of the Titles above (and more) free of charge for 30 days. Enjoy!
Viral video - Cell phone video, Inspiration for you videographers considering a topic for
your next project. 130,250
views on Facebook. Your video may receive
more.
You want to make your own
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So, you’re thinking about unleashing your inner artist? Good for you!
Old school photography can seem a bit limiting sometimes, with all
those pesky rules – the rule of thirds, the rules of thumb, sunny 16
rule. Who needs rules! Your creative after all and we creatives are born
to break the rules!
Fine art photography is one of those photographic genres that defies
rules, bends and breaks them and in the process of doing so the
photographer creates art. A bad out of focus image of a flower could
become your masterpiece; a mediocre landscape can hang in a gallery!
With a little know how, and a creative eye, fine art images are pretty
easy to create.
In this article we’ll discover what fine art photographs are, how to
develop your own artistic style, and a simple way to process your photos
into art images.
But Is It Art?
So what’s the difference exactly, between a fine art image and any
other kind of photography? Well, this is where a clear definition gets a
little murky.
Here are some general parameters, so we can talk about fine art
photography from a common perspective (excuse the pun). Art photography
is printed, and hung. (Hopefully in a prominent place!). It can be used
in decor, in homes and offices; or “art for art sake” in galleries and
exhibitions. Fine art photos are usually presented and sold as limited
editions.
Here’s a pretty clear definition I really like, from the Professional Photographers of Canada that covers most of the generally accepted requirements of a fine art image:
Fine art images may consist of unusual images, individual
images or a series of images. The range of styles and treatments varies
greatly, from the classic black and white scenes to more
non-conventional images. In fact, conventional beauty, formal design and
familiar subjects are often not components of fine art images and can
include painterly effects, soft-focus, journalistic, snapshot type
images, bizarre and erotic images and other unconventional approaches.
Fine art images are usually sold to individual collectors, museums
and business clients. Photo Decor is usually the term used to designate a
print hung to decorate a room, whether in a private home, an
institution, a corporate boardroom, a gallery, etc.
All right, now that we know what we are talking about let’s find out
about how to create these wondrous and unconventional images. For this
discussion we’ll be devoting our exploration to painterly styles and
effects – the coolest and easiest techniques to learn! Other fine art
photography techniques will be discussed in future articles. So hang
tough if your favourite style isn’t included here yet 🙂 And if you
don’t like photographs that look like paintings don’t despair – this is
only one way of so many ways you can create fine art photographs.
Finding Your Artistic Style
First, let’s look at classic fine art. I know this seems counter
intuitive – how can we break the rules if we’re studying classics –
didn’t they define the rules?! Well, yes, but…these historical styles
and techniques give us powerful insight into the range of artistic
expression that you can build on when considering painterly looks. Since
I’m a big fan of Sir Isaac Newton’s “..on the shoulders of giants…1”
school of greatness, I believe you achieve success in anything by
building on and learning from the achievements of others.
A great place to begin absorbing a fine art point of view is with the
old classic paintings, from Goya to the Post-Impressionists, and all
schools in between!
I adore works by Claude Monet, and much of my art photography style is of his influence (his picture to the right).
Not to be confused with Claude is Édouard Manet, whose use of colour in his still lifes also moves me deeply.
The great thing is you don’t even have to “study” these works, just
look at them and notice the colours, the brush strokes, the
compositions, the subject matter.
Are you inspired yet? Ok, here’s another artist for you to
investigate, in case you want more examples than just flowers in vases!
Look for works JMW Turner an 18th century water colour artist who changed landscape art forever.
He inspired this image of a reflection in a lake.
The Subject of Your Desires
If your aim is to sell your fine art images as decor, be sure that
your subject matter is something most people would want in their homes
or offices. Think about the context. Ugly doesn’t sell – no matter how
artistically it is portrayed. But beauty generally does. Artistic
treatments of flowers, landscapes, still lifes, abstracts and
impressionistic figure studies are safe bets as subject matter. They
seem to be almost universally accepted.
One of my most acclaimed art images – won several major awards – and
one that everyone absolutely loves is “the Devils’ in the Details.”
Someone loved it so much they bought it, but returned it to the gallery a
week later because once they got it on the wall – it was just too
freaky and disturbing!
If you plan on selling to collectors then usually any subject is fair
game – some lesser known van Gogh paintings were of old shoes. Who
knew!
But it’s YOUR creative interpretation and treatment of these
subjects, whatever they may be, that creates the WOW factor. And it is
here in your treatment and interpretation that you can break all the
rules!
Viewing the works of artists who have gone before will expand your
imagination and get your creative consciousness flowing for styles,
subjects and different and unique ways to portray them. Once you have
your image captured, you can then create a wild assortment of artistic
and painterly effects in your post production processing…which is coming
right up!
Creating Painterly Techniques in Post Production
One of the most flexible and fun ways to give your images a painterly
fine art quality is to use overlays, underlays and textures, which you
add in post production. As long as your favourite image editor supports
layers and blending modes you’re good to go. If you get really expert
you may even want to make your own textures and under/overlays to take
full control of your final image. You’ll be rocking epic fine art
photography.
Back
in 2006 I was playing with a program called Corel Painter – it is a
painting program where you can create all sorts of paint effects in a
digital way. I had created an image in Painter using an oil paint
“brush” and the texture and some subtle colours. Just our of curiosity I
layered this image on top of a landscape and wow! the brush strokes
came through in a most enchanting way – and so my own form of painterly
fine art overlays were born! I use these a lot and make new ones as
needed. But you don’t have to go to all that work – often using random
images you have in your folders can be just as useful, as we will soon
see.
Achieving a painterly affect in a photograph requires two main
components in post production, usually a texture to emulate canvas,
cloth, or some other base media; and at least one other texture or
overlay to give it the image the look of something other than a
straight-up photo – something like a painting! Depending on your initial
image you may not have to use both these types of textures. In fact
because there are no rules here you can stack multiple layers in a
variety of combinations to achieve stunning images.
“Winter Garden” started out as this. A fine mess of dead and withered grasses in my garden in January!
And it was transformed to this, and went on to win several national and provincial awards for Fine Art photography:
And now finally – How do I do this?
First, take a stroll around the Internet and look for free textures.
Not textures of wooden boards and bricks though – look for cloth and
fabric textures. Also look for textures of brush strokes or that have a
very fine pattern like rust, old concrete. Other photos that are out of
focus, or that have primarily one colour or pattern such as frost or
rain drops on a window also work particularly well.
If you’re not inclined to go on a treasure hunt right now, I’ve
created source files for you! Here are the files I used for Winter
Garden, to get you started!
(downloads) (warning: this is an 18MB download and will give you a zip file with a PSD file and some JPGs).
The idea is to underlay and overlay these textures and images with
your base image using blending modes and opacity to alter the way the
textures interact with the base image. Ready to get started?
The Process of Post Processing
In Photoshop or your image editor, open your main photograph – your
base image – in this case if you’re using my source files, Image 0852.
Double click on the Background layer in the layers panel to make your
Background layer editable. It will be called Layer 0. Set its blending
mode to Soft light.
Then go to File>Place and select the image 0853.jpg. Stretch it to
fit if needed. This will become Layer 1 Change the blending mode to
Hard Light.
Duplicate this layer, and set the blending mode to Luminosity, and
change the opacity to 20%. Flip the layer horizontally by going to
Edit>Transform> Flip horizontal.
Almost there! Now place Image 0775, this is a photo of frost that I
am using as a texture and colour overlay – stretch to fit if needed, and
then set the blending mode to color, and opacity to 49%.
Now we’re going to create the UNDERLAYS! These are layers that we will add UNDER Layer 0. How exciting!
So… place image 0870, and drag the layer to be immediately under Layer 0. Set Layer 0 to Soft Light.
Set your underlay layer to 53% opacity.
And finally we will add our last underlay layer by placing the
texture, Image 0809. Well add this in 2 places, but first place it as we
have done with the others, and move it to be the bottom-most layer in
your stack. It will be Normal and 100%.
Now duplicate this layer (CTRL J) and drag the copy to be the top-most layer in your stack. Set it to soft light and 42%.
At this point you should save your file as a layered image. What do you think? Quite painterly, no?
Want to adjust some more? Awesome! You can now play with these
layers, the order, the opacities, the blending modes and even adjusting
hue and saturation of individual layers to suit your own style and your
interpretation of withered grasses in the winter. You can add other
textures you may have on hand or that you’ve found online.
With a few simple images, some inspiration from the Masters, and your
own imagination, free from rules and constraints, you’ll be making fine
art images in no time!
Beginners Guide to Creating and Applying Texture Overlays Using Photoshop
Adding texture to photographs was happening long before the invention
of Photoshop and other editing programs. In the days of the darkroom,
we would scratch negatives with pins, sand paper them, stain the
photographic paper with fixer before exposing, layer two negatives on
top of each other in the enlarger, or push our film ISO to increase
grain. These days, with editing programs being our digital darkroom, we
simply have yet another way of adding texture to photographs.
What is a texture?
In digital photography terms it’s simply another layer added to your
photograph in an editing program, usually an image of some sort of
textural surface, such as paper, wood, concrete, etc., but anything at
all can be a texture. They can be photographed, scanned or even made in
Photoshop.
Some
examples of textures. A friend’s work bench, a close-up of my lamp
shade, a mossy rock,
fog from a smoke machine, and some very ugly
carpet.
Why use textures?
With the right texture overlay, and application of it, you can add
an extra level of depth and feeling to your photograph. You can use them
for anything – from adding a vintage or grunge look to your
photographs, to creating fine art pieces.
One of the best uses is to rescue a photograph that just isn’t quite
working. I’ve been told no texture overlay will save a terrible
photograph. While this is true for the most part, sometimes it can
transform an otherwise unusable image to something more promising.
A texture can transform an otherwise unusable image into something more promising.
Textures
can be added to almost any kind of image. If you’ve ever downloaded a
photography app for your Smartphone, you have most likely had them add a
texture with the app’s built-in filters.
If you’ve ever used a filter on a mobile phone app, you have probably already had textures added
for you.
Getting started
You don’t need to create your own texture to get started. There are
many pre-made, free textures available on the internet. A quick Google
search will bring up a bunch of free texture sites. But not all textures
are created equally, or usable legally. You need to look for textures
that are a decent size and resolution, a 200px/72dpi texture over a 3200
px/300dpi image probably isn’t going to work so well.
You’ll also want to make sure the texture has the right copyright permissions. Sites like deviantart.com
have many stock textures offered free by their artists for personal
use. These artists ask that you simply return the favor by sending them a
link to the image you created using their work. Other sites like freetstocktextures.com
offer their images copyright free for personal and commercial use, as
long as you aren’t reselling the texture images themselves.
Creating your own textures
Creating your own textures is as simple as taking a photograph. Why
do that, when you can download free ones? Because it’s fun, your work is
then completely all yours, and you can tailor your textures to suit
your images. For example; if you’re photographing skateboarders at a
skate park, you could also gather some shots of the concrete they skate
on, or graffiti around the place to create original textures that work
with, and possibly add to, the story of your subject matter.
Textures can add a bit more of a story to your images.
The image above is of my daughter asleep after a day at the beach
(many years ago) combined with texture of the water I took that day, to
add to the story and memory of the day, and give the photo an extra
dream like feel.
Create a texture with your scanner
Below is the first texture I created, one that I still use years
later. It was created by scanning the bottom of an old baking tray.
Scanning works well for textures of papers and other small flat
surfaces.
Scanned texture from an old baking tray.
The baking tray texture was used in the image of the cello player at
the beginning of this article, in combination with a manuscript image of
the music she played on the day. I also used it in the image below; one
of a series of images created in collaboration on album artwork with
Canadian singer songwriter Sora. The texture was used to tie all the
photographs in the album together even though some were taken by other
photographers. Yet another use for textures!
Textures can be used to tie a series of images together.
Create a texture in Photoshop
You don’t need to understand complex Photoshop processes to create a
texture quickly and easily. Here are a few simple steps to create a
basic texture in a few minutes:
Open a new file the size and resolution you require
Brush around a couple of colors
Add a Render Clouds filter
Adjust levels for a bit of contrast
Add a vignette and a color filter
Paint in some colors, add Render Clouds Filter, some contrast, then some colour and vignette. Easy!
Instead of a Render Clouds you could use the Blur Tool to swirl your
colors around, or try some of the other filters in Photoshop to get
different effects. I tested it out on what was originally a rather
terrible photograph of this orchid.
The texture, plus a few color adjustments and a warming photo filter, and it’s a whole different image.
While it does look a little like something you might see on your
Facebook stream with a positive affirmation written across it in an
awful font, it took me less than five minutes to do for this
demonstration to show you how simple it can be to create a texture from
scratch.
Applying your texture
It is really very easy to apply your texture. There are some more technical articles on adding textures here on dPS, but here is a quick guide to get you started.
Click
and drag your texture thumbnail in the Layers palette over onto your
original image. Your texture becomes layer 1 in your original image’s
Layer palette. Choose your level of transparency with the Opacity Slider
and use Free Transform Tool to move the texture about. Turn it around,
enlarge or stretch. See where it sits best.
Then it’s simply fine tuning the Opacity, maybe putting Eraser Tool
on a low opacity and painting out unneeded parts of the texture.
Alternatively use a layer mask to paint out some areas, as well as back in, if you accidentally paint out too much.
Have fun with it and experiment. Try a few different layer blend modes,
add multiple textures, or add the same texture image a few times,
perhaps with each layer having a slightly different hue. There are no
rules.
Have you created a texture that you love? Share it and its use (your images) in the comments below.
Share this article.
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