Let’s Change the Background, Shall We?
basixvideos

Let’s Change the Background, Shall We?

on May 25th 2011 with 30 comments
Tutorial Details
  • Program: Adobe Photoshop
  • Difficulty: Beginner
  • Estimated Completion Time: 5 Minutes

Final Product What You'll Be Creating

This entry is part 22 of 29 in the Photoshop Basix Session
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Are you new to Photoshop? Have you been trying to teach yourself the basics of Photoshop but have found the amount of educational material available on the net a bit overwhelming? As the world’s #1 Photoshop site, we’ve published a lot of tutorials. So many, in fact, that we understand how overwhelming our site may be to those of you who may be brand new to Photoshop. This tutorial is part of a 25-part video series demonstrating everything you will need to know to start working in Photoshop.

Photoshop Basix, by Adobe Certified Expert and Instructor, Martin Perhiniak includes 25 short video tutorials, around 5 – 10 minutes in length that will teach you all the fundamentals of working with Photoshop. Today’s tutorial, Part 22: Let’s Change the Background, Shall We? will explain color range and refining the selection in a Layer mask. Let’s get started!

 
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Martin is a Hungarian graphic designer, digital artist and an Adobe Certified Expert and Instructor (Design Master). He is currently teaching and working in London but usually travels around the UK and share his love for Adobe products and graphic design. You can follow him on his blog or on Twitter.  

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  • Andrea

    I’ve been using photoshop for 3 years and I thought I know all the basics already, but I learned so much from your video tutorial series, Martin – you’re such a big help! I’ve watched all 22 videos and I keep coming back to some of them to hone my photoshop skills. Thanks so much!!!

    • Cumbrian

      i second that andrea. sometimes going back to basics yields surprisingly good results!

  • sebastian

    the final result is really poor around the trees.

    • MIchael Owens

      Agreed.
      Yes, this is a BASIX tutorial, but come on – that is poor finishing in anyones tastes!

      If you are going to teach the basics, then please – do it right first time! Otherwise, all the newbs who follow this tut, will have no idea how to eliminate those fringes.

      Sort it out!

      • Hafiz Faraz Mukhtar

        yes there are some problems around the tree and on the left side of the church

    • http://www.antsmagazine.com Nahid

      No one would ever get excellent effect in one shot. You need to keep trying till you succeed. Expert designers have done it that way. You will be one..!

      Love!

  • Hugo

    Obviously great help for beginners but couldn’t you just have used something like the advanced selection tool to brush away the blue around the trees? It really doesn’t look good :(

  • http://www.bryanvickersband.com BryanVickersBand

    What kind of embedded player is PSDtuts using?! I used to be able to watch them but lately none of them even appear! Help! Windows 7 IE explorer 8

    • http://www.shaneparkerphoto.com Shane Parker

      In this day and age of advanced, modern web browsers, why on earth are you using IE8?

      • http://www.octv.be Mbile

        looool! totally agree with you!

      • http://www.bryanvickersband.com BryanVickersBand

        What browser would you recommend? I’ve also tried Chrome and Firefox and the videos on THIS SITE ALONE will not appear on this computer! ???

      • http://www.shaneparkerphoto.com Shane Parker

        Hm, sounds like you have much bigger issues than a web browser. Time to call tech support :)

        But yes, Chrome, Firefox and even Safari are all far better than IE8. Hell, IE9 is far better than IE8 (although not as good as the other browsers, IMHO).

  • http://www.bryan-kun.deviantart.com Bryan GC

    One little question: how do you change the hardness and size of the brush with your mouse?

    • TheJinX

      You can’t. But there are some shortcuts available.

      Increase / decrease brush size
      With the Brush tool selected, you can increase / decrease the brush size by pressing [ or ] key (square bracket key). Press Shift + [ or ] will increase / decrease brush hardness.

      • http://www.bryanvickersband.com bryanvickersband

        Actually, you can. Hold Alt (Option on Mac) and right click with your mouse. While holding Alt/Option+Right click, move your mouse side to side to increase/decrease size, or up and down to increase/decrease hardness.

  • Gabriel

    Hello PSDtuts, im from Brazil and i also love this site. Still a beginner but some day, i believe, i will be doing some professional and “impossible” stuff that u provide to us! Thaks a lot!

  • http://www.arke1.com.au arke1

    Not a bad result, could do with a little refinement though.

    1. Selection is too sharp, needs some feathering especially around the top.

    2. Needs some defringing, removing of the halo on the right hand side.

    3. The tree definitely needs some work.

    • http://www.yesimadesigner.com Martin Perhiniak
      Author

      Hello Everyone,

      Thanks for your comments and I just realised that the image included is not the final result, that is before using the Refine Mask step. I already asked Grant to replace it with the proper final result that I just sent him.

      I totally agree with you guys that image shows a bad selection. Sorry for the mistake, it will be replaced soon!

  • http://leonking.com.ua leonking

    Hello Martin. I often open this tab but did not know how to use it. Thank you!

  • http://www.antsmagazine.com Nahid

    Excellent tip for beginners. We want tutorials like these. I usually share free psd on my blog.

  • Pato8

    Hey, I knew everything used in this tutorial, but I don’t know, how did you quickly change the size of the brush?

    • http://www.yesimadesigner.com Martin Perhiniak
      Author

      Select Brush tool or any drawing tools and then Ctrl+Alt+cilck and drag (on PC it is right click).

      • nott

        another great tip! this will save alot of my time!

    • http://shaneparkerphoto.com Shane Parker

      You can also do: CTRL+OPTION+CMD (on Mac) and drag w/left button on mouse to increase/decrease edge hardness of the brush. I used to use those shortcuts until the latest Wacom came out with buttons and a scroll wheel on it; now I just use the Wacom for brush adjustments.

  • Trevor

    Great Tut. as usual. One question; After clicking on the refine edge link I do not get the same options as you could it be that you are using CS5 when I am CS4?…Thanks again.

    • edwinhollen

      CS5 has a couple more refine edge options than CS4.

  • mystro

    hey man, out of all your tutorials ot would have been nice for you to link us to the images, its not the same following the tutorial woth different images, you dont have to host a zip file, bot for all the editng you could have gave us the before image so we could give it a try with u.

    making selections this one, most of them really.

  • http://2000ah.blogspot.com/ Edward

    I am thinking now i need to get CS5

  • dough

    It’s Groundhog’s Day with Adope FlushPlayer…I’ve installed it 17 times and I still can’t play videos. What gives? NICE!

  • http://www.cobwebsdesign.com/ Gloria Winger

    Thank you for the nice post . PS CS5 or updates need to do it ..