Photoshop Tutorial: Content Aware really IS your friend!

Hey!

Yeah i know, off the radar again! I would love to say the reason for my blogging absence is due to being so mega busy that there simply aren’t enough hours in the day…etc…etc…

Fact is - i’ve been too lazy! Ok, a little bit busy too, but mainly lazy!

Anyhoo - as the title suggests, we’re going to touch a little on photoshop.

A couple of weeks ago I was over at Theater Oberhausen, doing a promo shoot for an upcoming production.

You’ll note, that yes, i have shot slightly less insane things.

The above image is straight out of camera. You’ll not that we’re shooting inside a built set, within a larger hall. We were actually in the set building hall belonging to the theatre. No much room to shoot inside this wooden box, and a ton of natural light flooding in through the windows.

It needed to be a moody shot anyway, so killing the ambient light and bringing in flash was always on the cards. The biggest problem though was framing the shot. I shot with the widest glass i had - 17mm on a FF sensor - and had to hold the camera to my side against the wall, so i had no real idea what i was shooting.

Anyway, because of the constraints i had, this meant there would be a fairly heavy chunk of post production coming my way in order to keep this shot wide-looking, but having it look like were just in this stripy room!

The final image

Obviously, i’m not a genius, and don’t have hours and hours to spend bringing images through post production. But, the content aware tool is your friend. Selecting parts of the image that are outside of our little ‘room’, and using the Content Aware fill, really does help to speed up the process. In most cases, it’s pretty accurate in expanding the background.

There’s obviously going to be some imperfections to the background, but they can be tidied up using the clone stamp tool, and with some creative (and fairly liberal) use of dodge, burn and vignette, the image came up good!

Here’s another example:

Note the wall to the right of the finished image also came through CA Fill successfully

Content aware is a fairly simple thing to use: use lasso, patch, pen tool, selection brush - whatever you prefer to select an area - hit delete, select content aware, hit enter - job done! There may be some fixing to do afterwards, particularly with busy images, however, the hit-rate is pretty good!

So, this wasn’t really meant as a photoshop tutorial, but whatever! Thanks for reading!

Until next time!

Ant

Buy your own shizzle! Lightroom Presets Now Available!

Hey guys!

Anyone who dropped by the shop recently will have seen something new!

For the first time, i’m offering up some Lightroom Preset Packs! That’s right kids, now you can edit in one click - apeman style.

Currently, there are two Lightroom Preset packs available, both containing 5 presets. One set colour, and one set of bangin’ black and whites!

And whats more - they’re at a crazy stupid low introductory price - so get on it, check them out!

Just make sure you purchase and download the packs on a real computer! Phones don’t like that sort of thing!

much love

Ant

Insta-unfamous

Morning all!

I'm still trying to get the second-part-of-the-Multi post together! So if anyone out there actually reads any of this (i know that by now, that number could quite possibly have reached double figures by now), and are expecting that post - it's coming, and i humbly apologise. Big sorry (those two words will be coming to another blog post soon!)!!!

Now, i'll be the first to admit that i'm a bit addicted to instagram. I love it. It's not even really that interesting is it? But still - 10 years ago it was dirty films all day, now it's instagram all day!

I'll even admit, that as i'm out there in the world offering a service (ICYMI - Photography), i have also indulged in a little bit of instagram advertising from time to time. You now? That little 'promote' tab you have next to that picture of your best friends sisters cousins cat? That's the one! Hit it! You'll be welcomed into Facebooks world of advertising!! 

On Facebook, it's a pretty pro set-up. It takes time to get an ad together and up and running. After much toil and bother, similar to the process of dealing with google ads, you can enjoy the experience of Facebook sapping money from your bank account on a regular basis in return for little to no results!

These days, everyone wants to be 'Insta-Famous'. The equation is fairly simple: Set up a profile, call yourself an influencer/lifestyle blogger/consultant/evangelist or whatever else springs to mind, take a crap photo of yourself, that looks like the other twenty photos you're planing to post, post that photo, hit 'promote'. Finished.

You're hot to trot now! Bajillions of online dollars and internet celebrity await.

All you need now, is the poor buggers like me, to double-tap that photo to death!

The thing is, i now seem to get (and i have checked) a promoted post from some so-called lifestyle expert or something similar EVERY 5 POSTS in my timeline! And to be honest, the quality of the posts/profile/person in general is questionable.

The first thing i think is not 'oh, follow follow follow, pleeeeese pretty please follow me back!'

It's not even 'well, this seems like a genuinely nice bloke who really has something to offer the world'.

What i tend to think is something more like 'seriously, this donut is spending money on this?'.

It's gotten to the point now where the profiles, or promoted posts are so bad, that i'm double-tapping the shit out of everything!! Why? Well, because then they get charged for their ad being successful! Suckers!

These promoted posts have also now become so frequent, that i thought i'd share some of my favourites. It's a bit mean i know - but these guys are looking for promotion anyway right? So, here it is fellas, free of charge - and do forget - bad publicity is good publicity!

Let's start with Ali Romeo! He's apparently offering a 'product/service' i'm guessing as a love guru - although, he seems to have spelt it wrong, so who knows. I'll let him off of the bad spelling though, based on the lovely way he edits his photos.

Ali, the love nono

Next up! Alex Schwarz. Not just any Alex Schwarz though - no, the OFFICIAL one! When he's not spending all his pocket money on advertising, he's lashing it out down at Snipes.

Nice Rolex. Your dads?

Next, mister whatshisface. A musician, who, with his army of followers is spreading the love of wrist bands an not giving a fuck. 

'I don't give a f***'. No? Me neither!

Lastly, for now at least, a fellow photographer. This one hurts. Area51 Photography. The guy is too out of this world for me, and should return, along with his selfies, to the Nevada desert at once!

#followme - Noooo! Follow meeee! Pleeeease!

May god have mercy on me! 

Until next time, yours, instagram advertiser, Ant