Here’s a quick tip for taming saturation when adjusting contrast in Photoshop. In the example below I’ve added a Curves Adjustment layer and made an edit at the quarter tones – your typical contrast ‘S’ bend. The left side is masked to show the original uncorrected. Whilst the contrast in the image has improved we’ve […]
When laying out your page, occasionally you may come across the need to make sure another box (image or text) needs to be placed near a specific piece of text, and that it tracks that text. This means that when the text moves, the other box moves with it. Now, you can just draw your […]
A very nice feature in Illustrator CC is the ability to create patterns. Basically you can create a collection of shapes, select them and then bring up the Pattern Options panel. Go to the top right-hand corner of the panel and click on the little drop-down menu. Choose Make Pattern. A dialog appears saying that […]
BASIC HIGHLIGHT AND SHADOW CONTROL IN PHOTOSHOP This week, in the first of a two part series, I’m going to run through setting up basic Luminosity Masks for shadows and highlights. Luminosity (or luminance) masking is a method for creating selections based on luminance values. Put simply, the mask is based on how light (or […]
One incredibly useful, but often overlooked, feature in InDesign is the ability to place one InDesign document into another as an Image Link. Go to File>Place… and you’ll see in the file browser that InDesign files can be selected indicating they can be imported/placed within a layout. This is a real advantage when placing artwork […]
Here’s a quick tip for unlocking all the Transform functions when working with Vector Smart Objects. In the example below I have two versions of a logo placed as Smart Object Layers – the top one is Vector-based and contains an Illustrator file, the bottom one is a standard Raster-based Photoshop layer that has been […]
Today I want to look at a simple method for optimising content styling in InDesign. This technique combines Paragraph and Object Styles so I will assume some familiarity – if you’ve used Paragraph Styles before then Object Styles are pretty easy to pick up. InDesign includes a set of panels aimed at storing the formatting […]
When working in Illustrator we tend to think of our vector shapes in terms of the points, or nodes, that make up each shape. However, each shape is a combination of the both the points and the segments that join them. Because our control system (the Beziér Handles) stem from the points it’s easy to […]
In the previous post we looked at using Shape Builder to control how 2D vector objects overlap. We used a Celtic Knot design where two different motifs were ‘threaded’ to give the impression of passing in front of and behind one another. Now lets look at a similar concept using Live Paint. To start with […]