How do I add to the edges of a photo?

[CJ Max]

I took a photo of some fireworks the other night. I rather like one image. Two problems: first, it was my first fireworks attempt and I used too long a focal length to print properly. An 8"x10" print cuts off too much from the top and/or bottom of the image. Second, to compensate for the "boo-boo" I should be able to add some black space to the bottom of the image and the left side so that when I crop to print, I get the composition that I want/need. The problem is that I don't know how to do this in Photoshop PS - it should be a fairly simple task. With luck the image will appear below...

[Gary Richardson]

Don't know if its the same in CS, but in PS7 I'd do the following.

First set Background colour to tone you require (sample from image).

Image/Canvas Size then click on the square that gave me the extensions on the side I wanted. Set to Relative if you want to specify the size of extension, de-select it if you want to set overall size of image.

Hope this helps.

[CJ Max]

Gary,

Thanks. It took me a few minutes to figure it out, but eventually I got it. I ended up increasing the size of the image by 1.5" on each of the two sides after I positioned it in the upper right hand corner. I chose to Clone Stamp and duplicated everything from an inch or so over except for the shoreline lights which I cloned from the far side of the image.

One may view the results at:

http://www.pbase.com/image/45754042/large

The original image was skewed to the left and cropping to print an 8"x10" image left out part of the reflection upon the water or cut off part of the fireworks. To put it bluntly, no matter what I did, the composition was the pits. Now, it's halfway decent.

I appreciate the help.

Heard the bad news on the TV - hope you and yours are well. I realize that you're not in London, but that doesn't preclude family...my best to all across the pond.

Cliff.

[Mike]

This works well IF you have the right kind of back ground.

Paste your image onto a canvess of the size you want. Crop so you include what you want.

When you did that with your fire works photo, you needed more black back ground on the sides, right?

So make a selection of just the back ground along that side, include as much as you can, then do a Ctrl T, drag the side out so the background now goes to the side of the canvess, hit enter, and thats it!

You can place the image in the center of the canvess, do the above to both sides and there is perfection!!!!

Mike

[Gary Richardson]

Hi Cliff,

Nice picture, works really well.

Thanks for the thought, fortunately I don't have any relatives living in London any more, and none visiting thankfully.

Like all right thinking people, my prayers are with those affected.

[CJ Max]

Mike,

This technique sounds very interesting. I'll sit down and give it a try this weekend.

Thanks,

Cliff.