Compositing - Composing in Photoshop

Compositing - Composing in Photoshop
Level - Intermediate and Advanced

Photoshop is a very powerful and useful tool, I have used it to compose my drawing and painting reference images for over fifteen plus years. This program makes it possible for me to work out my idea for a drawing or a painting that was inspired by being out in the field, rummaging through my image library, or form a simple thumbnail sketch. I am able to move elements around, create elements that didn’t exist in my original image, resize, crop, distort whatever I need to help create the composition that I have in my head. And it saves me a great deal of time and I get to see if my idea works visually before starting.

In this course, I will walk you through my creative process using Photoshop in five different exercises. We will start with the basics of the program’s tools, interface, and the all-important concept of layers. Each exercise will build on the previous starting with simply erasing the background of a subject and then inserting that subject into a new background. In later exercises, we will even create shadows, rim lighting, and even a haze on top of a pair of zebras, an element that did not originally exist in the image to begin with!

My hope is that after you finish this course and get comfortable using Photoshop that you will see the endless possibilities you have in front of you. You are not stuck using one single image to draw or paint from. If the subject is on the right but you think it works better on the left with a cast shadow, then move the subject and create the cast shadow. And most importantly you can see if your idea works visually before ever picking up your pencil or paintbrush.

Materials

• Computer
• Mouse
• Photoshop installed and ready to use
• A notepad and a pen to write down notes