Getting rid of background

[Shoff]

I need some help to get rid of the people in the back. I tried Extract, but I must really suck at it. It looked terrible. Any other suggestions? The people I'm doing this for are preparing their obituaries (morbid I know). So I had to take him out of a family portrait, clean him up a bit (hot spots, teeth, eyes) and finally I'll have to make it black and white. I also want to give them I color photo. And I need help to color correct the photo. Levels didn't do much of anything.

Here is the before and after (so far)

Any other suggestions would be appreciated

[Shoff]

Bump

[DannyRaphael]

Color correction isn't my strong suit, so I'll leave that for one better at it than me.

re: Isolating your subject...
Looks like you did a fine job of cropping, so we'll go from there.
* Assumption: What you've posted is on a single layer. If it isn't create a new layer and, while holding down Alt key, choose Merge Visible from the Layers palette.
* Click eyeball to turn off this layer for a moment
* Below this layer: Add a new layer
* Click the Foreground color swatch
* Set foreground color to a light yellow (don't panic)
* Edit > Fill > Foreground color
* From the Layer menu, choose New Adjustment Layer > Hue Saturation. Click OK (to the 1st dialog), and then OK in the Hue/Sat dialog to close it. We'll get back to this adjustment layer in a minute.
* Click on the subject layer (which will make it visible)
* Layer > Add Layer Mask > Reveal All
* Click D key. If foreground color is not black, click X key.
* From Tools palette, choose the Brush tool. Turn Airbrush setting on. Opacity ~ 50%, Flow ~ 80%.
* Select a medium size, soft-edged brush.
* Start painting black on the layer mask over areas of the background you want to zap. (Notice your yellow BG will show up.) You'll have to adjust brush size, opacity, flow as you go to get rid of larger/smaller areas.
* If you goof, press X (to eXchange colors) and paint white to undo what you messed up. Back to black to continue. This allows you to correct errors on the fly and for this purpose will give you a decent subject isolation.
* When finished isolating your subject, open the Hue/Sat adjustment layer.
* Drag Hue slider until you get to blue. Then adjust lightness to darken it up. Reduce saturation a bit and you'll end up with a respectful dark blue background.

Hope this gets you moving until the color correct gang arrives.

~Danny~

[Mike]

You say you are taking him out of a family portrait, I assume you have followed all the rules of copyright?

Mike

[DannyRaphael]

Originally Posted by Mike

I assume you have followed all the rules of copyright?

Mike

Mike: Do you think this would be an issue for a funeral / obituary photo?

[Mike]

Danny
Yes it is an issue, copyright is copyright, there is nothing in the laws I have seen that says "except for furneral / obituary" usage. And especially if they are preparing their obits in advance (that what I read in the orginal post).

In other forums there has been some talk about this and we are finding that the funeral homes (which if you have ever had any experiance with are NOT hesitant at all in making a profit) are now copying photos, running them through PS (cleaning up back grounds, doing a little painting to make them look good) and selling them back to the relatives at a real nice markup.

I, as a studio owner, would not have any trouble going after Shoff if the "Family Portrait" in question came out of my studio and especially under these circumstances.

Mike

[DannyRaphael]

Mike:

You raise some good points. From the original post it didn't occur to me the photo in question might have been taken by a pro in a studio, so your question and observations could well apply. For the record I support what you're saying as much as I believe in not using or distributing pirated software. Not everyone shares my values in this regard.

Yes, I've dealt with funeral parlors. It doesn't surprise me that some have gotten into the photo retouch game for this purpose. Friggin' bloodsuckers.z

I'd speculate once most people take delivery of photos taken by a pro, they have no clue regarding restrictions afforded by copyright protection. With the exceptions of quality and having had to pay for them, they make no distinction between them and the pics grandma took at the lake last summer.

While I agree copyright laws are copyright laws, my bet is when it comes to applying them to professionally taken photos most people just don't get it, but there may be a reason for this...

Over the years I've purchased packages from professional photographers (wedding, kids soccer, Little League, annual school-type, band, etc.) and not once has anyone from a studio mentioned nor has there ever been anything in writing that explained what I could/couldn't do once I took possession.

While ignorance of the law is no excuse, do you think there's room for more "customer awareness/education" on the part of studio owners?

~Danny~

[Shoff]

For a minute there I had no idea what you meant by copyright law. But since the family bought the photo don't they own the rights to it. Plus it's 25 years old and I have no idea what studio took it (they may have said it was a Sears thing)

[Mike]

Shoff:
Mere ownership of a copy of the work does not imply that you own the copy right. However you can become the owner of the copy right if you make some kind of arrangement with the owner. Copy rights last for fairly long periods of time, depending on when the image was produced. Copy rights may be owned by individuals or companies. Many times the large studios like Sears etc will give you permission to copy (get it in writing) since they usually do not keep the negatives or files for any length of time.

Danny:
You are right, copy rights are every where, photos, music CD's, software, books, etc etc. If you do not want your work copied, then you should not copy anyone else.
Yes I agree, most photo studios do not do a very good job explaining copy rights till they find someone out there copying their work. And it is a non-ending task to explain it too everyone. With the advent of the scanner, computer, desktop printer, its becoming a huge problem. Many folks are coming in to get a portrait, then just ordering 1 print, then go home to turn out whatever they want. Many of us have re-done our pricing structure to reflect this.
With all the recent uproar over the music downloads, one would think that the general public would begin to think about some of these things. Adobe's registration system with PS CS is a result of too much coping and lost revenue I am sure.

One can find more about copy rights than you really need to know by going to Google and doing a search.

Mike

[winwintoo]

I haven't done any PhotoShopping for quite a while so I loaded it up on my PowerBook the other day and started playing again.

I'm amazed at what happened. I've never tried this before - understand that I'm not offering *expert* advice here, just relating what you can stumble across by playing around.

I downloaded the image you posted on the right and tried my usual levels, curves etc. and couldn't make a dint in the bad colors. Then out of frustration, I started clicking on things I hadn't tried before. That's when I discovered the "split channels" menu option. My first reaction was "OOPS" but then I found that I could do levels on each color channel - I'm sure this is all documented somewhere - When I merged the channels again, this was the result:

Margaret

[FrannyMae]

I thought I would let you know that you don't need to split the channels in order to run levels on them independently: just activate each channel in turn, then use CTRL L to bring up the levels dialogue box. This way you can tweak each setting without having to split/merge the channels. This works for curves, as well. Hope this helps!

[winwintoo]

I know it should work without splitting the channels, but for some strange reason the levels dialog was grayed out. Must be something in my settings that I'm not aware of.

Anyway I've never come across the splitting channels before so thought I'd bring it up - might come in handy some time.

Thanks for pointing out the difference though, Margaret

[FrannyMae]

Sorry...I should have figured you knew that little trick! I've never had the levels dialogue grayed out...that's wierd. I do appreciate the channel splitting advice and will keep it in mind...never know when that little nugget will come in handy! Thanks!