Hi. This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
I’m going to show you how to transform a photo into a create a sexy, steamy portrait engulfed in thick fog.
Open a photo you'd like to use for this project.
I downloaded this one from Shutterstock.
The first step is to make a selection around your subject.
We'll use it to separate your subject from its background.
There are many ways to do this, but for this example, I'll use the Quick Selection Tool.
If you're using this tool, as well, I generally find that a 10 pixel radius works fine for
most sizes and resolutions.
Drag the tool over your subject to select it.
If you want to remove areas of the selection, press and hold Alt or Option as you drag over those areas.
To check your selection, press "Q" on your keyboard to see it as a quick mask.
Press "Q again to revert it back into a selection.
If you're using version CC 2015.5 or later, click the "Select and Mask" button or go to
Select and "Select and Mask".
If you're using an earlier version, click the "Refine Edge" button or go to Select and "Refine Edge".
I did in-depth tutorials on both Refine Edge and Select and Mask, so if you'd like to watch
them, I provided their links in my video's description below.
Check "Smart Radius" and drag the Radius slider to the right until you start seeing the fine,
wispy areas of your subject like the hair.
To finesse those areas, adjust the size of your brush here or press the right or left
bracket key on your keyboard.
Brush over the fine, wispy or feathery areas.
Output it as a "New Layer" and click OK.
Create a new document by pressing Ctrl + N on Windows or Cmd + N on a Mac.
Make its width: 1920 pixels, its height: 1080 pixels and its resolution: 150 pixels per inch.
The color mode is RGB and 8 bits per channel.
Click "Create" or OK.
Open back your subject.
To place it into your new document, press "v" to open your Move Tool and drag it onto
the tab of your new document.
Without releasing your mouse or pen, drag it down and release.
To resize it, open your Transform Tool by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + T. To see your Transform's
entire bounding box, press Ctrl or Cmd + 0.
Go to a corner and when you see a diagonal, double-arrow, press and hold Alt or Option
+ Shift as you drag it in or out.
To reposition it, go inside the bounding box and drag it.
To accept it, press Enter or Return.
To fit your document back onto your canvas, press Ctrl or Cmd + 0.
Make the background active and click the lock icon to unlock the layer.
Unlocking it allows us to add filters to it.
If your foreground and background colors aren't black and white respectively, press "D" on your keyboard.
Click the foreground color and for its Brightness, type in 20, which gives us a dark grey color.
Then, click OK.
Now, your foreground color is the dark grey we just typed in.
Go to Filter, Render and Clouds.
Open your Transform Tool.
Click the chain-link icon, which links the width and the height.
Whatever percentage we type into one, will be the same for the other.
In either field, type in 500.
To accept it, click the check-mark at the top or press Enter or Return twice.
Since the background's size was greatly increased, it extends way past the visible canvas.
So, we’ll crop it.
Press Ctrl or Cmd + A to select the size of your canvas and go to Image and Crop.
To deselect it, press Ctrl or Cmd + D.
We'll convert our image into a Smart Object, so we can add filters to it, as well as, be
able to modify the filters at any time.
To do this, Shift-click the top layer to make it active, as well, and click the icon at
the upper, right corner to open the fly-out list.
Click "Convert to Smart Object".
Click the Adjustment Layer icon and click "Hue/Saturation".
Check "Colorize".
For the Hue, I'll type in 186, the Saturation: 44 and the Lightness: minus 9, however, feel
free to adjust these amounts.
Make your image active and go to Filter, Blur and Gaussian Blur.
Make the Radius: 14 pixels and click OK or press Enter or Return.
If you want to make your Layers panel a bit wider, so you can better see the layers' descriptions,
go the vertical line to the left of the eyeball icons and when you see a horizontal, double-arrow,
drag it to the left.
Make 2 copies of your image by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + J twice.
Click the Layer mask icon to make a layer mask next to the active layer.
Go to the layer mask and press and hold Alt or Option as you drag a copy of it next to
the layer below it.
Hide the bottom 2 layers and scroll to the bottom of the Layer panel.
Make the bottom layer active.
Go to Filter, Blur and Motion Blur.
Make the Angle: 0 degrees and the Distance 150 pixels.
Scroll to the top of the Layers panel and make the top layer visible and active.
Double-click the "Gaussian Blur" Smart Filter and change its Radius to 4 pixels.
Make the layer mask active and open your Brush Tool and Brush Picker.
Make its Size 150 pixels, the Hardness: 0% and the Opacity and Flow both 100%.
I'll brush around the edge of my subject and some other areas that I'd like to blur a lot.
Keep in mind, brushing over your image is actually brushing black over your layer mask,
which is hiding those areas of your image.
Make the layer below it visible and make its layer mask active.
Brush over some of the areas of your subject that you'd like to blur, as well.
If you want to finesse some areas of either of the blurs, make the respective layer mask
active, reduce the opacity of your brush and brush black or white over the areas of your
image that you'd like to add or remove blurs to.
To brush in white, press "x" on your keyboard to invert your foreground and background colors.
This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
Thanks for watching!