334
2
The simplest way to change
its perspective is to use Free
Transform, holding COS
LAS while dragging one of
the corner handles to get a perspective
distortion. The problem is immediately
clear: there’s no side to this guitar.
1
This guitar has been photographed
directly from the front, in common
with many objects sourced from stock
photography collections. In real life,
you’d hardly ever see an object in this
position: and placing it in a montage will
always look flat and unconvincing.
O
NE OF THE MOST
common tasks the
photomontage artist has to
contend with is changing
the viewpoint of an original
photograph. Sometimes you
can get away with simply
rotating an object to make it fit
in the scene; usually, it’s a little
more complicated.
The problem comes
when an object has been
photographed head-on, and
you want to view it from
an angle. Not all objects
lend themselves to the
kind of three-dimensional
amendments shown here, but
the principle used on these
pages can be applied to a wide
variety of source images.
1
This old coin has been
photographed directly from above;
with close-up photography, an angled
view would have made it difficult to
keep the entire coin in focus. But we can
create any view of this object we like
with just a few actions.
2
The first step is to use Free
Transform to squeeze the coin
vertically: if you hold O A then it
will squeeze towards its center. You may
wish to add perspective distortion as
well, but it isn’t really necessary.
3
Then select the coin by holding
C L and clicking on its
thumbnail in the Layers panel. Using the
Move tool, hold O A as you nudge
this selection up one pixel at a time
using the Arrow keys, and you’ll create
this milled edge as you go.
Adding depth to flat artwork
GUITAR IMAGE: PHOTODISC
12
The third dimension
SHORTCUTS
MAC WIN BOTH
335
HOT TIP
Boxy objects
such as computer
CPUs are easy to
transform, even
if photographed
head-on. Simply
copy a plain
portion of the
front of the
unit, and distort
it to form the
side and top (if
required). Adding
appropriate
shading means
you can get away
with a lot with
little effort.
4
That milled edge is perhaps a
little too strong. To fix it, use
SCi SLi to invert the
selection and make a new layer from
the edge. Preserve transparency with
/ and fill with a color picked from the
coin itself.
5
Now use the Dodge and Burn tools
to add highlight and shadow to
this new edge, using thin vertical strokes
to create the illusion of light reflecting
off the edge.
6
Since this was created on a new
layer, we can simply lower its
opacity to allow the ‘original’ milled edge
to show through underneath.
3
The side is best drawn with the Pen
tool on a new layer, although you
could also use the outline of the guitar
as a starting point to get the curves
correct. Here, the shape has simply
been filled with a flat color to see if the
perspective works.
4
A section of the guitar front is
copied, duplicated and then
flipped vertically to make a seamless
tile. This is then used to fill the new side
by clipping it with the side layer and
repeating the pattern until it fills the
space.
5
The key to realism lies, as ever,
in the shading. The Burn tool
has been set to Midtones to add the
shadows – setting it to Highlights would
have a more extreme effect, but would
lose the warmth of the wood. Start
slowly, and build up the shading.
How to Cheat in Photoshop CC
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