Help needed in Photo Shop CS6 Please...

[shaz]

Hello, I am very new to PS , so please forgive me if this is a very simple thing to do but I just cant find a way. Im using CS6. I Have just started a Graphic Design course and we have to copy a photo and pixelate it without using any filters. I know know to get the photo and a new page up onto the same screen and put the grids over the top.
Any help would be appreciated thanks

 

[shaz]

Sorry I should of asked. how do I fill the small squares on the grid without going out the lines ? Are there squares brushes ?

 

[Tom Mann]

I don't do people's homework assignments for them, but here are some hints:

a) Think about what an image with very low pixel dimensions might look like if magnified;

b) You can do your entire assignment with just two applications of the Image / ImageSize tool; and,

c) Read up on the differences between the various choices offered under "resample" in the "Image Size" dialog box, for example, this help page from Adobe.

Tom M

PS - IMHO (and I teach design), this is an excellent assignment. If done correctly, it will familiarize you with what is probably the most central concept in digital photography, ie, pixels.

 

[Tom Mann]

Sorry I should of asked. how do I fill the small squares on the grid without going out the lines ? Are there squares brushes ?

Suggestion: Don't use this approach. While the assignment could be done this way, it involves much, much more work than necessary, and almost certainly wouldn't be the approach the instructor was hoping you would come up with.

Tom M

 

[shaz]

Hi Tom,
Sorry I wasnt asking for you do it for me, tho thank you for the feed back .
They gave us a choice either to do it in PS or manually using paint and paint brush. I choose to do it manually as it was much easier for me this way. I was just wanting to know how to do it both ways for my own knowledge and no matter where I looked I just couldnt find out how.

Thanks

 

[bgoodman4]

A simple PS solution would be to reduce the resolution (possibly dramatically) while maintaining or increasing the image size.

 

[MikeMc]

Suggestion: Don't use this approach. While the assignment could be done this way, it involves much, much more work than necessary, and almost certainly wouldn't be the approach the instructor was hoping you would come up with.

Tom M

Agreed, and YES PS does have square brushes, and you can also make them

 

[Tom Mann]

Since bGood spelled it out for the OP, and apparently, the OP is going to use a non-computer method to complete his assignment, here's what a couple of applications of "Image Size" can do. This took under 20 seconds to go from one to the other.

BTW, the 2nd application of Image Size is necessary if you want to bring the image back to the same physical size as the original (ie, since most viewers won't have the option to simply increase the magnification in PS).

Also, I think I used 30 ppi, not the 12 ppi shown on the attached screen grab.

HTH,

Tom M

 

[Tom Mann]

The nice thing about doing it by computer is that once you know the basics, a huge number of variations become instantly accessible. One can either use them as final products, or as inspiration / sketches for hand-drawn art, e.g., ...

T

 

[IamSam]

Very cool Tom! Like them all but my fav is the first one. Splain howya dunit!

 

[shaz]

Thank you

 

[ibclare]

Really nice Tom. I'm going to make this an assignment for myself. Sam's question still applies. Hey teach! more hints!

 

[MikeMc]

I believe after dropping the res that is the mosaic tile function....under pixelate ?

 

[Tom Mann]

I believe after dropping the res that is the mosaic tile function....under pixelate ?

Hi Mike - Nope. After dropping the rez, it's already pixelated. You don't need to do any more pixelation. All you need to do at that point is to restore the image to its original dimensions using the nearest-neighbor algorithm. Upon doing this, each pixel in the tiny, down-rez'ed version will blow up and become a square, many pixels on a side, that is completely and uniformly filled with the one color, the color of the 1x1 pixel in the down-rez'ed version.

(See attached image of flat, colored squares with no space between adjacent squares)

Tom

 

[Tom Mann]

...Like them all but my fav is the first one. Splain howya dunit!

Hi Sam and Clare -

To get the first image in the series I posted earlier, you first need to pixellate it the way I described to Sam, above.

The next step is to make a huge number of microscopic, bevel-edged "buttons" with the minimum amount of work. The basic principle is the same as you would make a single, larger bevel-edged button, but now you have to make a (say) 30x20 array of them all at once.

One way to do this is to lay down a sharp-edged grid of thin white lines on a black background. (See attached. Normally, my white lines would only be 1 pixel wide, but for this tutorial, I widened them substantially to make them easier to see.)

 

[Tom Mann]

You then convert that into a selection (See attached)...

 

[Tom Mann]

...and then use that to delete all the selected areas from the pixellated grid of colored squares described in my response to Mike. This leaves the selected areas transparent. In other words, you havea grid of more or less uniformly colored islands.

You now can bevel the edges of each of the islands and put whatever background you want under this grid. (See attached)

 

[Tom Mann]

Note: For this tutorial, I intentionally greatly broadened the spaces between the islands to make them more visible. For real applications (such as I posted earlier yesterday), I prefer to have only 1 pixel of blank area surrounding each island, and I would tweak the spacing of the selection grid to exactly match the periodicity of the grid of colored flat squares instead of there being a mismatch like in the accompanying screen shots.

PPS - As usual, there are always many other ways to get this effect, but this is the route I took because it is very logical, straightforward, and only uses basic photoshop functionality (ie, no filters, no plugins).

PS#3 - Again, as usual, it took vastly longer to write down the steps of this tutorial than it did to actually do the work. Once you get used to it, this sort of thing just flies!



HTH,

Tom M

 

[Tom Mann]

PS#4 - BTW, for the 1st image in the series I posted yesterday afternoon, as I recall, I desaturated some of the bevel-edge squares and blended a bit of the original back into the image, almost certainly using something other than "normal" blending mode, and definitely used the blendIF sliders to tweak the look.

PS#5 - If you are allowed to use PS filters and plugins to get the "look" of the 1st post in that series, life becomes much, much easier than if you are required (like the OP) to do everything using only the native tools built into PS.

T

 

[bgoodman4]

Tom, I am not clear why you say you have to re-enlarge the image after dropping the res. Or is this part of the process and has nothing to do do with the settings available in the size box?(see attached)

I have always tried to reduce pixilation in my work but I must say the examples you showed above are quite interesting. I am not crazy about all of them but some are def very beautiful. Is this a technique you have used in the past (it sounds as if it might be) or is it something that has come out of the OPs question?