Hey everyone. I've been thinking of ditching my muslins and creating digital backgrounds that look like the standard solid color muslins for portraits. I haven't seen much about this here-- anyone using chromakey? Anyone have a good workflow for creating nice backgrounds for portraits?

tia

Seems like one could make decent looking BGs based on the Clouds or Difference Clouds filters.

Is this the type of look you're looking for?

i use the same image and motion blur it 100% then colorize it the color i want. Then add a hot spot by using a large brush with the dodge tool. Im trying to add a picture but its not working so ill try again later.:)

www.myspace.com/kissofglamour

hi-- thanks for weighing in. Ya, I know about clouds, etc. I just don't really like the effect as it usually looks like render--> clouds.

What really got me thinking is when I was reading another thread and someone was trying to get the look of the artist. I wasn't too concerned about copying the artist per se, but I really liked his clean backgrounds and simplicity. It then occurred to me that they look like they may be doable in Photoshop with render--> lighting. For the backgrounds take a look:

http://www.patrickhoelck.com/frameset1.html

Looks like vignetting on a background layer might do it for you.

For the glow from center look, try this...
* Create a layer
* Fill with black
* Add a Hue/Sat adjustment layer above this layer filled with black, but don't change settings for the time being. Click OK to close the dialog.
* Create another new layer
* Make an oval-like selection using Lasso. It does not need to be neat or perfect.
* Edit > Fill with white
* Deselect
* Gaussian blur to the max
* Open Hue/Sat dialog. (x) colorize and fiddle with controls until the desired color is achieved...

The trick is getting the foreground subject isolated well enough so it doesn't look fake against the BG.

Check out the "things you can do with clouds" thread over in Studio, the satin tutorials, and if that's just too much work to bother with:
http://www.digitalanarchy.com/backdrop/backdrop_main.html

thanks, guys for the tips. Time to get cranking :)!

Danny, your method got me in the ballpark anyway... Followed your method, added some texture via filter-artistic, make a quick mask of model (real rough as you can tell), moved her in and added a color filter to give the skin a subte touch of the background tone. Not going to celebrate just yet, but on the right track!


final
http://fstopstudios.com/Gallery/Model-Portrait/firsttry_001

orig:
http://fstopstudios.com/Gallery/Model-Portrait/orig


thanks

I use digital backgrounds for al my images. To make muslin like backgrounds I use brushes i Photoshop ( I think they are very powerful with all parameters you can set for them ). Heres an example of a Photoshop muslin behind the subject.

http://www.studiobild.com/images/imagee8.jpg

All images on my photography site has new backgrounds.

Pelle, fantastic port and gallery!

Thank you!

Although its a very time consuming, and in many ways a very limiting way to make images I find the advantages bigger. Partly beacuse you can make "impossible" images, all backgrounds and models will be reusable =) and its nice to have some sort of niche.

wow, pelle! really nice backgrounds! I'm saluting you! woot woot!

Gerry