Create a Faux Fisheye image effect in Photoshop

A fisheye lens is a wide angle lens which captures a lot of detail both in front of you and to the side - often as much as a 180 degree radius. While other wide angle lenses capture rectangular photos, a fisheye captures images which are distorted and which bulge in the middle and curve in at the edges.

While there is no real replacement for capturing an image using a fish eye lens on your camera because the field of vision is hard to duplicate you can still create a realistic faux fisheye effect in Photoshop.


Open the image in Photoshop and enlarge the canvas. To do this, drag the edges of the window containing the image so you can see plenty of the grey space around the image and click the Crop tool. Drag over the entire image to select it and let go the mouse button. Now drag outwards on the crop rectangle handles to select an enlarged area all the way around the image. You want a good amount of extra canvas. When you have done this double click to add the extra area to the image. It doesn’t matter what colour this is as you’re going to discard it later.


Choose Filter > Distort > Spherize to display the Spherize dialog. Set the Mode to Normal and set the Size to 100 percent and click Ok. This distorts the image by blowing up the middle of it to give a typical fisheye type effect.


Click the Crop tool, drag over an area of the image to retain and double click to crop to this size.


If necessary, clone areas of sky or other elements to fill the photo frame. Here I cropped the image so it would be nice and tall and knowing there was a little bit of work required to fill the missing areas of the sky.

Alternately, for a circular result, drag a circular selection across the image, choose Select > Inverse and choose Edit > Crop to Selection. You will now have a photograph which looks like it was captured using a fisheye lens.

Before you shoot (if you can!)
If you know you want to create a faux fisheye effect with the images you are capturing, then plan ahead and capture a 2 row by 3 column grid of images from a stationary point using a tripod and the widest angle that your lens can shoot at – in other words, don't zoom in at all. Overlap the images around 25% on the edges so you can assemble them into a panorama later on.

Back in Photoshop or your software, assemble the images into a panorama. You may need to do this in three steps first assembling each row into a panorama and then assembling the two rows into a single image. This will give you more image data than you would typically have and will make the final result more believable.

3 Step Photoshop Every Image Quick fix

Ok, so not technically Photoshop only - this tip works for any image software that supports layers, has layer blend modes and can do a gaussian blur. That includes Photoshop, Photoshop Elements and Paintshop Pro as well as lots of other great photoediting programs.

This is a very quick fix for boosting and image and giving it a really nice look.

Step 1
Start by duplicating the image layer by choosing Layer > Duplicate Layer.

Step 2
Add a Gaussian blur to the top layer by using Filter > Blur > Gaussian blur. You need to use enough radius to get a nice light blur on your image. For smaller images you need only a small value blur - say 2-4 and for larger images you will need a higher value. Click Ok when you're done.

Step 3
Now set the Blend Mode for this blurred top layer to Soft Light or Overlay. You'll get a nicer looking image and the colors will get a nice boost. Reduce the layer opacity a little if necessary.

This is a simple and effective fix and isn't that the best type?

7 steps to throwing a Photo Party

Forget Photoshop for a day and put away your Digital SLR then grab a point and shoot, some photo paper and a lunchbox size printer and host a photo party that everyone will remember.

Make any occasion more memorable when you make it a photo party too. Instead of just taking photos, print them on the spot so everyone takes home a memory of the occasion. From weddings to birthdays and from retirements to anniversaries here is my 7 step approach to take any party to the next level.

1 Gather your tools
You will need one or two cameras - any digital camera will do and older ones are great because they take smaller images. If you have a newer camera, adjust the file size down to around 1200 x 800 in size and the quality to good (not superfine) as that is all you need to print a 6 x 4 photo quickly. Just remember to set these values back to normal after the party!

2 Grab a printer - lunch box size
To print the photos a small lunchbox photo printer is a great choice – it will print 6 x 4 and it can operate without needing to be connected to a computer. Simply pop the camera card or memory stick into the printer and start printing.

3 It is all in the planning
Test everything well before the party and get set up early on the day – you want to be able to enjoy the party not have to trouble shoot problems! I like to use one camera and two or more camera cards – in fact the piteously small cards you got with the camera are great for this job. Using it you can capture your first dozen or more photos, switch it out for a second (empty) card and get started printing.

4 Print and shoot
As the first photos are being printed, you can start capturing the next lot. Take one photo of each person or couple and don't waste time editing or cropping photos – just set them up to print and get on with capturing more photos.

5 Share the wealth
Once you've finished printing them - hand out the photos to all the guests. I like to keep a laptop to one side to copy the images to so I can delete them from the cards and still have them as a permanent record in case anyone wants duplicates.

6 Fancy a part time job?
Affix pre-printed sticky labels with details of the date and occasion to the back of the photos. If you've had fun being chief photographer at the photo party, it's a great sideline job so capitalize on the occasion and stick your details on the back of the photos too!

7 An album of Memories
For some parties like small weddings, showers, graduations, anniversaries, retirement parties and farewells I purchase a small album and add the printed photos to the album instead of giving them to the guests. Everyone then writes a message to the guest of honour beside their photo and the album is then given as a unique parting gift. If someone can't make it to the party, have them send a note and a photo ahead of time so you can include it in the album.


Photo Party Check list
-Check everything works before party day
-Train a friend to use your printer and camera so they can help out
-Photograph everyone as they arrive
-Print contact sheets – they're great for mini photos
-Have plenty of paper and ink on hand
-Delete bad photos in the camera so you don't print them

Stupid Photoshop tricks #1 - hold your own photo

There are heaps of creative things you can do with your images in Photoshop and one I think totally rocks is a collage technique that turns your photo into a photo of itself. If you're totally confused, check out the image - you'll see a hand holding up what appears to be a Polaroid image in front of a scene – the Polaroid image itself shows part of the background scene and it's all done in Photoshop - here's how:


To create this image you will need a photo with an interesting subject. I've used a spring landscape.


You will also need a photo of your hand held as if you are holding a photo in it. Take the photo of your hand with your point and shoot camera held in one hand and your other hand stretched out in front of you. You may need to use macro mode to ensure that the hand is in focus and not the scene behind. The ideal setup for photographing your hand is with a road or carpark as the background – the contrast between your skin and the road will make it easy to select around your hand.

While you can create your own faux Polaroid image, there is a good one you can download from http://lured2stock.deviantart.com/art/Polaroid-3262470.

Open the photo of your hand, the landscape and the Polaroid image in Photoshop. Crop the hand to remove excess background.

Select around the edge of the Polaroid image and remove its excess background so you have only the image itself.

Drag the background layer from the Polaroid image and the hand image into the landscape image. Each element will appear on its own layer.


Drag the hand to the top of the layer stack and hide the other two layers. Use your favourite section tool to select around the hand and add a layer mask by clicking the Add Layer Mask icon at the foot of the Layer palette (use Alt + Add Layer Mask if you selected the background rather than the hand). Using a layer mask makes it easier later on to remove parts of the hand so the Polaroid will look like it is held in your hand.


To transform the Polaroid image so it is the correct size, Ctrl + click on its layer thumbnail and select the Move tool. Press Ctrl + T to select the free transform tool and then Ctrl + 0 (zero), to scale the image so that you can see its sizing handles. Drag the Polaroid into the approximate position it should appear in the image and size it to suit. It should appear partially covered by the hand.



Make a selection around the inside of the Polaroid image and delete it or add a mask to hide it. Select the background layer and hide the two top layers. Move the selection over the underlying image – choose Select > Transform Selection and resize it in proportion if desired.



Choose Edit > Copy to copy the selection onto the clipboard, then Edit > Paste to paste it into a new layer, size it to fit the hole in the layer above. Brighten this layer if desired. Select this layer and the Polaroid image by Shift + clicking on each of them and choose Layer > Link Layers. Rotate the Polaroid slightly.



Make the hand layer visible again. Select the brush and black paint, click on the layer mask for the hand layer and paint out portions of the hand that should be behind the Polaroid. Add a new layer below this layer and paint a small drop shadow along the edge of the fingers over the Polaroid.

Photoshop - change the color of your house

You can change the color of anything using Photoshop. A friend of mine is about to paint her house but before her husband goes shopping for paint, she wants to know that the result will look good and that the house will blend nicely with its surroundings. It's a job for a digital camera and some Photoshop know-how. Here's how to recolor your house (or anything else) and save color combinations to review with someone else later on. I've used Photoshop CS3 but almost any version will do.

Open a photo of your house in Photoshop. I've used a bathing box for simplicity but the principles are the same for a house or, indeed, anything at all. You'll need one extra copy of the background layer for each item you'll recolor. For this image I've duplicated the background layer three times so I have a background layer, a layer for the house color, one for the door color and one for the trim and I’ve named them appropriately.

Start with the house layer and hide the others. Choose Layer, New Adjustment Layer and add a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer and drag the Saturation slider to -100 and click Ok. Add a second adjustment layer by choosing Layer, New Adjustment Layer, Levels and adjust the sliders until the area you’re focusing on looks like it could be painted with white paint. You want to retain the detail but lighten the area. Ignore everything else in the image for now. Click Ok when you're done.

Now add a third adjustment layer using Layer, New Adjustment Layer, Hue/Saturation. Click the Colorize option and adjust the Hue, Saturation and Lightness sliders until you have the color that you want for the area you are working on. Again, ignore the effect on the rest of the image. Click Ok when you're done.

Now, to limit the effect to the area you want painted in this color, select the adjustment layer just above the layer you're working with and choose Layer, Create Clipping Mask. Repeat for the other two adjustment layers. You should see the adjustment layers indented in the Layers palette. Now, you can paint on the color. Select the layer you're working on, in my case this will be the layer named house and hold Alt as you click on the Add Layer Mask button at the foot of the Layer palette. This creates a Reveal All layer mask so your photo should now be its original color.

Select white as your foreground color and paint over the areas you want to be coloured with the color you just selected. If you paint over something by mistake, switch to black foreground color and paint the original color back.


Step 1
For each area of color in the image, add the same three adjustment layers, one to remove the color, one to adjust the lightness and one to add color back. Create the adjustment layers as a clipping group with the appropriate layer. Finally, add a layer mask and paint the effect onto an area to recolor it.


Step 2
Because you will use adjustment layers for all the changes, you can alter the settings at any time if desired. Simply double click on the Adjustment layer thumbnail and the dialog will open so you can make changes to its settings and then click Ok to reapply it to the image.


Step 3
To save a color scheme, add a new layer at the top of the Layers palette, select it and press Control + Shift + Alt + E to create a new merged layer. Name this and turn its visibility off. Now change the colors to test a different look and save that version the same way.

Photoshop: Color that packs a punch

I like to see lovely saturated color in my photos but sometimes the color I capture just doesn't do justice to the subject and it isn’t what I remember the scene looked like. Boosting the color can turn a lackluster image into one that totally rocks. So, if you find that the color in your photos is lacking, here's what I do to make it better. The process is ridiculously simple, it requires no selections to be made, and it can be recorded as a simple action. It's my kind of fix – quick, easy and very powerful.

A word about LAB
The fix uses the LAB color space. This is not an often used color space and it isn’t available in most other programs so you won’t be able to mimic this effect in, for example, Photoshop Elements. However, LAB has been around in Photoshop for years.

In the RGB color space you work with the red, green and blue channels and in CMYK you work with cyan, magenta, yellow and black channels. In LAB you have three channels; L, a and b. The L channel is the lightness channel and, if you adjust it you adjust only the lightness in the image and you don't change any of the color in the image. This sets Lab apart from RGB and CMYK as color and lightness are separate in LAB where they aren't in the other modes.

In Lab the two color channels are a and b. The a channel contains color information for the green and magenta in the image. The b channel manages the blue and yellow colors in the image. If you were to look at these channels they would look very light because they contain only color information and no lightness data.

By separating lightness from color as LAB does you can make adjustments that would be difficult or time consuming to do in any other color space. However, that said, I think this fix works best on animals, landscapes and streetscapes – but not on close ups of people. On people it tends to destroy the natural skin tones.

How to fix in Lab
To see this LAB fix at work pick an image that has color in it but which you think could use a color boost.

Step 1
With the flattened image open in Photoshop, choose Image > Mode > LAB Color. If you're working on a flattened image you won’t see anything except LAB/8 appearing in the title bar of the image.



Step 2
Duplicate the background layer of the image by right clicking it and choose Duplicate Layer. You’ll make your adjustments on this duplicate of the background layer so that you can blend them into the background layer later on.



Step 3
Choose Image > Adjustments > Curves to apply the curves adjustment to the duplicate background layer. Don't use an adjustment layer as you'll only have to flatten it on returning to RGB anyway.

In the curves dialog, the L channel is visible on the screen. This channel that contains only lightness and darkness values so that you can drag on the curve to adjust this if desired.



Step 4
Select the a channel – this is the magenta/green channel. In a standard Photoshop setup green is on the left and magenta is on the right. Drag the bottom edge of the curve inwards 2-3 squares. Then drag the top edge of the curve inwards the same number of squares. It doesn’t matter how many squares you drag but you must drag the same number on either end so the curve line crosses the middle of the grid – this stops you from inadvertently inducing a color cast into the image.




Step 5
When you’ve adjusted the a curve, repeat the process with the b curve. At this point the image is probably looking very scary indeed. However, you need to make the adjustment strong enough that you get too much color rather than too little at this stage. Click Ok to apply the curve to the top image layer.



Step 6
To return to RGB mode choose Image > Mode > RGB Color. When prompted, select the Don’t Flatten option. This is critical because you want both layers intact back in RGB mode.



Step 7
Now drag the Opacity slider for the top layer back to 0 so you see the original image and slowly walk the slider back up until you get the amount of color you want in your image. When you're done, save the result.

Once you've done this a couple of times, you'll appreciate how much of a boost in color you can get and how fast you can do it. Record the fix as an action and you can do it in one click and then just adjust the opacity to suit.

In some cases altering the blend mode of the top layer can yield pleasing results. The blend modes in the Overlay, Soft Light, Hard Light, Vivid Light, Linear Light and Pin Light grouping in the Blend Mode list give the best results. You can also duplicate the top layer and apply different blend modes to each copy to bring out different areas of the image.

So, if you want to produce eye-wateringly beautiful color in your photos, chances are that a Lab color fix like this is just what you need.

The images below show the original image on the left and the LAB color fix applied to it in the image on the right. No adjustments other than working LAB and blending the resulting layers have been used on the right hand versions.







Post Script: To learn more about LAB color mode and the fixes that you can perform using it, look no further than Dan Margulis' book— Photoshop LAB Color: The Canyon Conundrum and Other Adventures in the Most Powerful Colorspace – it's practically the definitive book on Lab by the master of Lab himself.

I contibute to the Post Production blog at Digital Photography School and this post first appeared there.

Sharpening in Lightroom 2

Sharpening is the last step in editing an image. If you're working in Lightroom then you have a very sophisticated Sharpening tool at your disposal. It's hard to determine what the coolest part of the process is - the Detail and Masking sliders or the fact that sharpening is applied to only the image luminosity so it doesn't mess up the image colors.

To sharpen in Lightroom, open the Develop module and the Detail panel to show the sharpening tools. A good starting point for most images is to set the Amount to 100, set the Radius to 1.0 and the Detail to around 25. As an aside, it's nice to see that Lightroom is realistic about the appropriate radius to use and it limits you to a value between 0 and 3 which takes some of the guess work away from determining what value you should use.

Now you have a starting point, adjust the Detail and Amount sliders to see how they affect the sharpening. To see the before and after, press the backslash (\) key. The Detail slider is unique to Lightroom - it doesn't appear in Photoshop. What it does is to remove halos around the sharpened edges. Low values for Detail reduce halos and higher values allow them.

The Masking slider is a way cool tool. It lets you remove the sharpening from texture areas of the image and areas that you typically would not want to be oversharpened such as skin tones. To use it, drag the Masking slider to around 75 and compare the results. You should see less sharpening in areas that don't typically need it the larger the Masking value. To see what the mask looks like, hold the Alt key (Option on the Mac) as you drag on the slider and you'll see a grayscale mask in place of your image. The white areas of the mask are the areas that will be sharpened - they are the edges in the image - and the black areas are those that will not be sharpened or which will be sharpened with less intensity.



The mask gives you a lot of control over how the sharpening is applied to the image and it prompts the question "why isn't this in Photoshop too?"