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394 CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING Figure 10-17. Reducing the top layer s opacity to 75% brings out some of the details within the lines. The result will often change dramatically as you vary the offset of the two layers, sometimes in surprising ways. If you go too far, particularly in Difference mode, the painting will start to become blurry. It s an interesting balance that looks like what might happen if Van Gogh had tried to imitate Rembrandt s dark realism. You can get a similar effect by using Subtract mode, but in most cases, Divide will give a more pleasing image. However, it s worth a try when Subtract does work, it s spectacular. If you look closely, sometimes you can see the exposed edges of the background layer at top and left. Of course, you can crop the image to eliminate those edges before saving your painting. Embossing: Grain Extract Although Grain extract was originally intended for storing information to be used in simulating photographic grain, it s actually most useful for making an embossed version of an image. It works with almost any image, so it should certainly work with these flowers. Normally, you ll use the least layer movement with Grain extract (Figure 10-18). This is a particularly strong example, partly to make sure the effect shows up well, and partly because the color accents are attractive. In a real embossed work, the image would be colorless. Many other emboss conversions will use as little as one or two pixel shifts, and won t show much color at all, if any. You can always convert to grayscale to eliminate the color, of course.
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CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING 393 Less complex images will generate fewer lines, and can be moved less to get a more sketched look. You can further modify your drawing by playing with the colors, or turn it into a graphite pencil sketch by converting it to grayscale. Black Velvet Paintings: Difference Mode Sometimes, you want a dark result rather than something bright. You ll almost always get a pleasant pastel image from Divide mode. To get the opposite effect, use Difference mode on the same picture to create Figure 10-16. Figure 10-16. Difference mode makes a neon line drawing on black. The top layer was moved eight pixels to the right and ten pixels down while in Difference mode. That s a neat effect, almost like neon lights. But playing with the Opacity of the difference layer can make the effect more interesting, and turns the artwork into a black velvet painting (Figure 10-17). Too bad I don t have any photographs of Elvis to use as examples! Difference usually requires you to move the top layer more than in other layer mode effects. This picture is no exception, having moved only a little further right than Figure 10-17, but almost three times as much to the right. (When moving a layer over larger distances than a few pixels, remember that holding down Shift while pressing an arrow key moves the layer by a larger distance than by using the arrow key by itself.)
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392 CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING Figure 10-14. The top layer was moved three pixels right and six down in Divide mode. It s striking that such a dark image results in such a light drawing. Also, the complexity in the dark areas has created an effect very much like you would see when an artist draws with colored pencils on heavily textured paper. Figure 10-15 shows another example, with a more complex landscape photograph. Figure 10-15. The pencil sketch effect on a landscape photo
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CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING 391 Figure 10-13. A drawing capturing all the petal detail could take quite a long time. The top (duplicated) layer will be moved down and to the right by a few pixels. Tip A good way of moving a layer by small amounts is to select the Move tool, and then use the arrow keys to move the layer one pixel at a time. Each caption will tell you the exact number of pixels moved to achieve the effect shown. Your own experiments will probably use different shifts. Less movement will make finer lines; more will add detail and color. Sometimes you ll like more vertical movement, sometimes more horizontal. Fortunately, it s cheap and easy to experiment! Colored Pencil Drawings: Divide Mode Generally, you ll move the image only moderately when using Divide mode. The first rendering is a fairly strong example of the effect, showing heavy shadow detail by moving the top layer down more than sideways (Figure 10-14).
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390 CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING Of course, you can adjust the strength of the effect by changing the opacity of the upper layer. But with Burn, you may find that light areas are still too dark and you can t get the nice green hills you had when you started. Adding a layer mask to the burned layer can fix that. The goal is to make the layer opaque where you want the effect, fading to transparent in places you don t want to change. To do that, either paint in the area you want burned, leaving the rest black, or draw a gradient separating the part you want burned from the part you don t, as in Figure 10-12. Figure 10-12. A layer mask with a gradient can preserve the foreground hills while still showing detail on the distant city. Making Photos into Art: Self-Compositing with Modifications As you ve seen, compositing an image with itself usually affects the contrast, colors, and apparent sharpness of the image. It s a useful technique for changing iffy photos into better ones. But if you modify one of the copies of the image before you composite them with layer modes, you can create many other interesting artistic effects. Making Drawings and Other Effects Using Layer Offset The idea is to start with any photo you like, duplicate the Background layer, and then move it just a little bit. It s easier to describe what s going on after you see an example of the technique. In the first series, you ll see three effects applied to the same image (Figure 10-13).
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CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING 389 Figure 10-10. Stack multiple layers in Overlay mode to cut through haze even more. Figure 10-11. Burn mode cuts through the haze much better than Overlay.
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388 CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING Overlay mode excels at cutting through haze. Make a layer copy, and then set the top layer to Overlay. The city becomes much clearer (Figure 10-9). Figure 10-9. Overlay mode cuts through the haze a little. But that s just the beginning. With the Overlay layer selected, click the New Layer button again. GIMP makes another copy, already in Overlay mode and the distant city becomes sharper. Click again, and it becomes sharper still. You can keep adding Overlay layers until the image gets as sharp as you need (Figure 10-10). If that effect isn t strong enough for you, try turning off all but the first two layers and using Burn mode on the upper layer (Figure 10-11). Burn mode gives excellent detail and color on the city that previously was shrouded in haze. The down side is that the rest of the image becomes black and you no longer have those nice green hills in the foreground.
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CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING 387 Figure 10-7. Hard light is an easy and fast way to bring out color in an image that has no bright areas. The left half of the image is the original; the right half has been self-composited with Hard light. Using Overlay or Burn to Cut Through Haze I live near a major city, and it s frequently smoggy or hazy. When I try to take long-distance shots with my camera, I m often disappointed: objects that seemed perfectly clear to the eye are buried in haze in the photograph, as in Figure 10-8. Figure 10-8. You can barely see the city for all the haze.
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386 CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING Figure 10-6. Look at all the detail you can see in areas that were previously just mud, particularly the building at center right. Note In some cases, especially when you re just trying to lighten up a portion of a photo, you ll find Dodge mode works a little better. But most of the time, Screen is just right. Using Overlay or Hard Light When Light is Flat When you find yourself confronted by an image that s just way too flat and has no significant bright areas, self-compositing using Overlay or Hard light mode can help bring out color and detail. Hard light will tend to overwhelm any bright areas in the photo, so confine it to dull, washed-out images only. Figure 10-7 shows the striking difference it can make to a dull image. For images with very bright colors or a lot of detail, Overlay is more versatile.
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CHAPTER 10 ADVANCED COMPOSITING 385 Let s take a look at some of the corrections you can make by compositing an image with itself. Using Screen Mode for Dark Images Sometimes you pick the wrong f-stop. Sometimes the camera guesses the exposure wrong. Especially aggravating, sometimes there just isn t enough light where you want to shoot such as in Figure 10-5. Figure 10-5. A dark indoor shot from Las Vegas When your picture comes out too dark, you can try to adjust the color, brightness, and contrast to get the perfect balance. But there s a much quicker way to get nearly ideal brightening. First, go to the Layers dialog and duplicate the Background layer. Next, change the resultant layer to Screen mode. Usually, that s all you have to do. In some cases, the result will be too light, but you can adjust that by turning down the Opacity slider. Other times, such as with this picture, the original was so dark you need to lighten it further. In that case, just duplicate the second layer and you ll get a third layer, already in Screen mode. The picture will become even brighter. Figure 10-6 is the result of two additional screen layers. Of course, if your second or third layer goes too far, you can adjust Opacity on just that layer to get exactly the right level.
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