Photoshop DUMMIE!

Alright, so I have photoshop CS, but that darn thing is so complicated. I see some portraits people do where they sharpen the eyes only, and they are BRILLIANT. How the eff do I do that?! Can someone give me some basic, step by step tutorial on how to sharpen the eyes? Aaaand any other basic techniques used to enhance portraits? I am trying to break in to portrait photography but need to master photoshop to acheive the results I truly want. Thanks guys!!

 

what i typically do is i select the eye with my wand and use unsharpen mask in the filters tab. i also like to make a new adjustment layer once the eyes are selected and use color balance for added tone and to give the eyes alot more focus. let me know how it works for you

 

plenty of tutorials on line, utube has thousands

 

I use a Tablet, so what I do may be different then how you'd use a mouse. I like to select the eyes with the magic wand. Then I select the inverse (Under Image Menu I believe). Then I apply an unsharpmask filter to it. Some people also you a gaussian blur or other such filters...you can play with it all you want.

 

http://www.emmaalvarez.com/2008/01/top-best-55-photoshop-tutorials-for.html

That site has a ton of great tutorials.

 

Thanks so much!! I will deifnitly take a look at those tutorials, and will probably make a purchase of PS for Dummies

 

Personally I love the Scott Kelby CS3 book. Tons of great info. He's the photoshop guru.

 

I find magic wand to be poorly suited to eyes. In fact, I think it's poorly suited to most things, even in CS3. In my opinion the best way to do eyes is to use the standard lasso tool around the pupil, with a little room to spare. Right click the selection and choose "layer via copy." Then edit that layer. Then go back with the eraser and remove the excess selection around the pupil. It's rarely a good idea to select the whole eye (including the white).

 

I will try that Max.

Yea I only have CS, not CS3, so I don't want to get the CS3 book and have some of the comands not mtch up, ya know?

 

Then here is the book for you.

It's like a book of recipes. you lean how to use photoshop by trying multiple projects.

http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Photosh...=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201388932&sr=8-1

 

lots of good info here, thats everyone. I will defiantly learn from these!