PHOTOGRAPHY EXPOSED
PHOTOGRAPHY EXPOSED
by John Peters A.R.P.S.
PAINT.NET
GENERAL BLENDING
The third function in our list.
GENERAL BLENDING is very like the previous process but with the important addition of varying the amount of transparency or opacity of your 'LAYER 1'.
IMPORTANT, PLEASE NOTE!
1. We will take things in PAINT.NET from the previous operation as far as option 6, that is we will follow options 1 to 6.
Use FILE / OPEN or because we have performed this operation already, we could use FILE / OPEN RECENT and pre-load the BACKGROUND. Use MENU option 'Layers / Import From File' and load our LAYER 1 as shown below. This is the layer we will blend.
In this example, we will blend with a reduced 'opacity'.
W-I-P WORK IN PROGRESS - UPDATE SCREENSHOTS TO REFLECT PROPER/ORIG USE OF PAINT.NET
We have a choice of BLEND modes, but we will select MULTIPLY for our needs. Let's move the slider so that 160 shows in the 'opacity' window, not 255.
You will now see the top or Layer 1 is much lighter having reduced the opacity to 160 from 255. This is the general method for combining layers and changing the opacity of the top or selected layer. Try different settings for opacity and study how it affects the outcome.
Notice how the sky is much lighter by reducing the opacity level.
If you have done this successfuly, you wll see the 'opacity' of LAYER 1 has changed. We now have a light blue LAYER 1 instead of it being dark blue. This could be a sky or background photo in another example. Flatten the image using menu option IMAGE / FLATTEN then SAVEAS named of your choice. You now have the ability to lighten or darken a sky for example. We have blended whilst reducing the opacity of the layer. This creates numerous oportunities for our editing or workflow. Try some of the other blend modes, experiment. Don't save anything and no harm will have been done. If you want to SAVEAS the image, go ahead.
4. REPLACE SKY
5. REPLACE A BACKGROUND
6. MAKE AND USE PAINT.NET TO CREATE THE EFFECTS OF AN 'ND' (NEUTRAL DENSITY) FILTER
7. MAKE AND USE PAINT.NET TO ADD A GRADUATED LAYER OF COLOUR OR GREY (ND)
8. SELECT A SPECIFIC AREA TO APPLY AN EDITING FUNCTION
9. ADD MOTION BLUR
10. ADD A VIGNETTE