Learn How To Use Photoshop’s Levels in this tutorial with a Levels Adjustment Layer used to assist with visibility when Pathing.
Video Tutorial Outline
1
00:00:01,572 –> 00:00:05,242
Welcome to PEN TOOL Photoshop. In this tutorial, I’ll cover some more things that revolve
2
00:00:05,242 –> 00:00:08,290
around cutting out, just not the actual pen tool but other tools you can use to assist you cutting
3
00:00:08,290 –> 00:00:12,684
out. Sometimes, it can be difficult to see visually where there is a line or an edge around an
4
00:00:12,684 –> 00:00:18,075
object. So, you can use something called the levels, an adjustment layer. It explains it here how
5
00:00:18,075 –> 00:00:22,055
to get to it. But you can click on the layers pallet, click the little half circle here, and choose
6
00:00:22,055 –> 00:00:22,683
levels.
7
00:00:22,683 –> 00:00:27,983
So, what levels does is click the little triangles here and you can drag these triangles to adjust the
8
00:00:27,983 –> 00:00:31,178
color. So if you want it a bit darker, you can adjust the midtones. Here, you can adjust the
9
00:00:31,180 –> 00:00:34,132
shadows. In this case, it’s not really the shadows that are the problem, it’s all the midtone
10
00:00:34,136 –> 00:00:39,716
This region here. You can see this corner is a bit hard to see. It just makes it a bit easier to cut out.
11
00:00:39,716 –> 00:00:42,748
So, I can leave it like that, and I can turn this layer off and on.
12
00:00:42,748 –> 00:00:48,369
But it just assists me to see this edge here. So, these tutorials from 12 onwards, a lot of it is
13
00:00:48,369 –> 00:00:52,325
mostly just practice. I’ll explain things here and there as to where it will be to your advantage to
14
00:00:52,325 –> 00:00:56,218
understand the day to day working of how you cut certain images out. But most of it, is pretty
15
00:00:56,218 –> 00:00:59,581
much practice. So I’ll go through cutting this item out and you can just watch on. And I’ll
16
00:00:59,581 –> 00:01:01,373
probably speed the process up in the video.
17
00:02:01,586 –> 00:02:05,350
You can see that process took about 2 minutes. Relatively straightforward. Quite a simple
18
00:02:05,350 –> 00:02:09,248
job to do to cut around things. Just take your time and a bit of precision. The other thing is,
19
00:02:09,258 –> 00:02:12,989
like I said, it took two minutes. It is a good idea to time yourself when you’re first starting out,
20
00:02:12,989 –> 00:02:17,176
because it’s really helpful when you come to a cost a job. If someone comes to you with a
21
00:02:17,176 –> 00:02:20,399
job, it might be a design job or a photography job, and they ask you to cut things out, if you look
22
00:02:20,399 –> 00:02:23,150
at the images and you think, “I can’t wand that, I’m going to use the pen tool,” then you have
23
00:02:23,150 –> 00:02:26,705
you to start to think, “Okay, right. This sort of image,” say you have 10 perfume bottles to cut
24
00:02:26,705 –> 00:02:31,080
out, “Okay, that took me 2 minutes,” so times ten and you can work out your costing. It’s very
25
00:02:31,080 –> 00:02:34,301
handy that way. It’s a good idea to understand different shapes, different objects, how complex
26
00:02:34,301 –> 00:02:36,784
they are, where your skill level is and how long it will take you to do. And then, you can cost
27
00:02:36,784 –> 00:02:40,034
accordingly. At the end of the day, the client just wants a really nice cut out product. So even if it
28
00:02:40,034 –> 00:02:43,034
took you a really long time, slowly you get better and better at it, and you get quicker. So, that
29
00:02:43,034 –> 00:02:47,409
was pathing and using levels adjustment layer to see the edge of the item you’re pathing out. And
30
00:02:47,409 –> 00:02:48,820
I’ll see you in the next tutorial.
31
00:02:51,540 –> 00:02:53,713
PenToolPhotoshop.com