Adobe Photoshop CS3 - Manual (Page 394)

PHOTOSHOP CS3
User Guide
387
Tips for creating special effects
Creating edge effects You can use various techniques to treat the edges of an effect applied to only part of an image.
To leave a distinct edge, simply apply the filter. For a soft edge, feather the edge, and then apply the filter. For a trans-
parent effect, apply the filter, and then use the Fade command to adjust the selection’s blending mode and opacity.
Applying filters to layers You can apply filters to individual layers or to several layers in succession to build up an
effect. For a filter to affect a layer, the layer must be visible and must contain pixels—for example, a neutral fill color.
Applying filters to individual channels You can apply a filter to an individual channel, apply a different effect to each
color channel, or apply the same filter but with different settings.
Creating backgrounds By applying effects to solid-color or grayscale shapes, you can generate a variety of
backgrounds and textures. You might then blur these textures. Although some filters have little or no visible effect
when applied to solid colors (for example, Glass), others produce interesting effects.
Combining multiple effects with masks or duplicate images Using masks to create selection areas gives you more
control over transitions from one effect to another. For example, you can filter the selection created with a mask.
You can also use the History Brush tool to paint a filter effect onto part of the image. First, apply the filter to an entire
image. Next, step back in the History palette to the image state before the filter was applied, and set the history brush
source to the filtered state. Then paint the image.
Improving image quality and consistency You can disguise faults, alter or enhance images, or create a relationship
among images by applying the same effect to each. Use the Actions palette to record the steps you take to modify one
image, and then apply this action to the other images.
Improve filter performance
Some filter effects can be memory-intensive, especially when applied to a high-resolution image.
❖ You can do any of the following to improve performance:
• Try out filters and settings on a small portion of an image.
• Apply the effect to individual channels—for example, to each RGB channel—if the image is large and you’re
having problems with insufficient memory. (With some filters, effects vary if applied to the individual channel
rather than the composite channel, especially if the filter randomly modifies pixels.)
• Free up memory before running the filter by using the Purge command.
• Allocate more RAM to Photoshop. If necessary, exit other applications to make more memory available to
Photoshop.
• Try changing settings to improve the speed of memory-intensive filters, such as Lighting Effects, Cutout, Stained
Glass, Chrome, Ripple, Spatter, Sprayed Strokes, and Glass filters. (For example, with the Stained Glass filter,
increase cell size. With the Cutout filter, increase Edge Simplicity, decrease Edge Fidelity, or both.)
• If you plan to print to a grayscale printer, convert a copy of the image to grayscale before applying filters. However,
applying a filter to a color image, and then converting to grayscale, may not have the same effect as applying the
filter to a grayscale version of the image.
See also
“Use the Undo or Redo commands” on page 51