Question on liquify feature

[cendres]

I was trying to utilize a tutorial from "restoration & Retouching" by Katrin Eismann and am having a problem that maybe someone can help.

The tutorial involved enlarging an eye using the liquify command(pg 252).
I have a nice pic of my son and his grandmother, but his right eye is half opened and it would be easily fixed using the warp tool as shown in the tutorial, but unfortunately the picture was taken from a distance rather than like a portrate.

When I go and select his eyes to do the work, I create a new layer via copy of the selection. Then select liquify, and the dialog box opens up. Unfortunately the eyes that were selected are so small I can't work on them. Nowhere in this dialog box can I zoom in which would allow me to see what I am doing clearly.

Does anyone have a suggestion or work around- Any help would be appreciated - Thanks Carl

[DJ Dubovsky]

Hi Carl
I just got 6 installed so I may not be the best one to answer this question. But here goes. I tried selecting a small eye from a photo as you did to it's own layer and saw what you mean. In the help file there is no way to zoom in on the picture.

Soooo...here's an idea to get around that. Make layer active and use the transform-scale and hold down the shift key while you expand the image. This keeps it in correct proportions as you make it larger. Then when it's big enough to work with, select the liquify command and it should be easier to see.

When you finish you will have to lower the opacity so you can again use the transform-scale and shift key to move it into position and shrink it down in place over the bad eye. Then reset the opacity.

Sounds like a lot of extra work but maybe the next feature for Photoshop to incorporate should be magnify in the liquify feature.

Of course I could be all wrong in this as I just got this version and maybe others know how to increase the picture size without going through all this trouble.
DJ

[cendres]

Hey DJ,
Your recommendation worked good until I was ready to scale the retouched layer back. Is there a way you know of to make sure you are scaling back to the exact original size. Let me know if you do - Carl

[DJ Dubovsky]

You scale it back the same way by transform- scale and hold down the shift key. By making the opacity of the layer lower you can see when things line up. You adjusted the upper part of the eye so I would say line up the lower part of the eye. You may have to readjust the size a bit. Zoom in so you can see what you are doing. I don't like the idea of having to do it this way because you will have to play with it to fit it. It's no different than bringing something from another photo that is scanned at a different resolution. You need to resize it to fit your photo. If you get it close then hit the move tool and use the arrows on the keyboard to nudge the to better fine tune the positioning. Remember the bottom of the eye should line up but not the top.
DJ

[DJ Dubovsky]

Carl,
This has nothing to do with the liquify tool but if your son has one good eye. Why not copy it and using transform flip it horizontal and fit it over the closed eye?
DJ

[cendres]

Hi Ed,
Well I went ahead and used your second suggestion and it seemed like it worked pretty good. I have not had a chance to print it yet, but on screen it looks good.

I then read your other suggestion, and may give that a try tomorrow to see which version I like better.

In either case, thank you for your help, I hope Adobe does think about adding a zoom feature in the liquify dialog box on the next version.

Hope you had a good weekend, and thank you for your input - Carl

[DJ Dubovsky]

You're welcome Carl
DJ