49Digital Design Magazine 04/2012 | www.digitaldesignmagazine.com

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Photoshop CS5 | intermediate

1: STEP1. Open a new image and fill with black. Now open the cat image and paste it as a new layer. In the first step we need to crop the cat image. For that we will use the polygonal lasso tool to create a selec-tion around the cat.Next we are going to add a layer mask. The icon is located at the bottom of the layers palette. (As shown in the example above.) You should be left with just the cat image on the screen.

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tutorialTHe caT queen

50 Digital Design Magazine 04/2012 | www.digitaldesignmagazine.com

Leonardo Isidro PerezMy name is Leonardo, I am 19 and I’m Mexican, I’m a graphic design student. I started to design a few years ago, everything I’ve learned has been via the internet, I really like the design- most of my time I spend imagining things and translate them to images, I am also an amateur photographer, the illustrator and many other things ... http://be.net/by_me http://www.facebook.com/leonardo.isidroTwitter: Leo_isidro

This tutorial shows how to make a poster

of fantasy, a fund composition and photo

manipulation to achieve a nice effect so

to speak ... using Photoshop and some

photos. I hope you enjoy each step of

this tutorial.

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the cat queen tutorial

2: STEP2. In the second step we have to refine the cut we made in our image using the refine edge tool. Create a new empty layer. Double click on the mask in the layers palette this will bring up the properties box. Now click on mask edge. You should now have the refine mask dialog box. The refine edge tool (which looks like a paint brush) should be selected already, if not then select it now. Use the brush to go around the edge of the image to clean away excess background. Now press Ctrl + E to merge it into a single layer. A dialog box will pop up asking to apply the mask. Click apply.

3: STEP3. Press Ctrl + T to activate the transform tool. Rotate the image until the neck is almost vertical. Now using the “Rectangular Marquee Tool”, select only the cat’s head. Next we want to duplicate the layer containing the head by going to Edit, Transform, flip horizontally this will create a “mirror” effect.

51Digital Design Magazine 04/2012 | www.digitaldesignmagazine.com

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4: STEP4. Open up your second cat image copy and paste as a new layer. Then repeat the first two steps to isolate the cat by itself.

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52 Digital Design Magazine 04/2012 | www.digitaldesignmagazine.com

5: STEPIn the fifth step we will delete the parts of the body of the cat that just want the head. Now choose the eraser tool. Click on the mask, not on the image itself. Set your foreground color to white. I recommend using a soft brush setting to give the edges a feathered look. Create a new blank layer.

6: STEPMerge the cat layer with the blank layer by pressing Ctrl + E. Click apply on the box that pops us.

7: STEPSelect the original cat head ,its dupli-cated “mirror” image and the second cat head. Press Ctrl + E to merge to a single layer. Alternately, we can press Ctrl + Alt + Shift + E to merge the images to a new layer.

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the cat queen tutorial

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the cat queen tutorial

8: STEPOpen the red space image, make sure this layer is above the merged layer. Change the blend mode to “overlay”. This will remove the excess parts of the image while applying the effect to just the cat image.

9: STEPTo prevent the image from appearing through the back-ground we will place the cursor between the red space layer and the cat layer. Press Alt while clicking to lock the red space layer to only the cat layer and not the background.

53Digital Design Magazine 04/2012 | www.digitaldesignmagazine.com

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10: STEPIn the final step we will apply a background to the image. And add the text. You can adjust the opacity of the text to create the desired effect.

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