Over 90% of the world’s creative professionals use Adobe Photoshop. Even if you don’t do art for a living, it’s still nice to learn this program so you can kick your hobby up to the next level.
If you already own Photoshop though, you might feel confused and overwhelmed when you open it up. There are so many buttons; how do you know which ones to use when? And how do you use them?
Here are 4 Photoshop techniques you should start off with to get the hang of things!
1. Use Filters
A basic Photoshop technique is to use the preset filters. These can give your images special looks; some popular filters include film grain, colored pencil, graphic pen, stained glass, and charcoal.
To use a Photoshop filter, click on “Filter”, then “Filter Gallery”. Click on each option to see which ones look nice, then make your final decision to set your image.
With enough experience and practice, you’ll be able to make these effects yourself. But in the beginning, it’s useful to click on these filters and get instant effects!
2. Add a Vignette
A vignette can immediately make your picture look serious and draw the viewer’s eyes to the center. For the best results possible, be subtle with your vignette, unless you’re going for an old-timey look.
To apply a vignette, you’ll need to click on “Filter” and then “Lens Correction”. Click on “Custom” and under “Vignette”, you can move the sliders.
Drag the one under “Amount” slightly to the left to the “darken” side. You can also adjust how much the vignette is by moving the slider under “Midpoint”.
3. Turn Photos Into Drawings
If you’ve wondered how to draw in Photoshop, here’s a quick way to do it.
You’ll want to first convert your image to grayscale, then to a line drawing. Then after you’ve set your background and foreground colors, you can add pencil shading. Then, add the cross-hatching effect and voila, the end result looks like you drew a picture by hand!
4. Perform Color Grading
Color grading is where you adjust the saturation, brightness, color tints, and more. By fine-tuning all of these things, they’ll all come together to create a sharp and eye-catching photo.
Be careful not to drag the sliders too far with any element, as it’ll look unnatural and abstract. So unless you’re going for that look, we recommend you keep things subtle to achieve an “unedited” appearance!
Perfect Your Photoshop Techniques
It’ll take a little bit to get the hang of it, but once you’ve perfected these Photoshop techniques, you’ll have images that look like they’re from a professional. In fact, the results might be so impressive that you’ll have family and friends lining up around the block for you to edit their photos!
Now that you’ve graduated from Photoshop for beginners, why not browse the rest of our blog for cool Photoshop tricks?
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