2009 October | Colorrage Web Design Blog

Archive for October, 2009

18

Oct

Waterscape Photography: Beautiful Waterscapes and Tricks of the Trade

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Nature provides us with a never ending supply of inspiration, look no further than the coast for an array of majestic scenery. This article focuses on the point where land and sea meet, with 24 stunning waterscapes, essential tools of the trade.

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Beauty of the Ocean

Taken in Jaffa, Israel using a 30 second exposure thereby freezing a slice of beautiful life.

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Seaside road on an early morning shoot which results in an image that is both bold and vivid.

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Shot in Kogelbay, South Africa it makes exceptional use of shutter speed to give an ethereal feel.

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A stunning image that uses 4 different RAW conversions blended with various methods.

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Shot in Sintra-Portugal using Photoshop to desaturate the tones to creating a dramatical feeling.

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A beautifully shot sunset which has a superb contrast between the sky and pearlescent water.

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Captured in Pellinge (an islet outside Porvoo in Finland), it’s both moody and vibrant.

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An amazing capture of sunrise on the North East coast of Brazil, with very little post processing.

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Shot in Finland at sunset, processed RAW in Photoshop then cropped, burned and dodged.

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Captured in RAW in Portugal and then given small tweaks in contrast and vibrancy in Aperture.

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An amazing capture of the movement of the waves and color variations in the sky in South Wales.

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A beautiful image which perfectly captures the tones of Crystal Cove near Laguna Beach, California.

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An 8 image stitch of sunset on a rainy afternoon at Redgate Beach in South Western Australia.

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Sunrise over Pulpit Rock, Australia with the sky and water processed separately from one RAW file.

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A beautiful capture of a cold winter dusk on Chios Island, Greece, it has a haunted somber feel.

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A six image stitch of Coogee Bay with great movement in the water and drama in the sky.

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Sunrise at Turimetta, Sydney, the contrast between the foreground and sky is just stunning.

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Taken on Portugal’s south west coast with subtle adjustments to the vibrancy, colour and levels.

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A beautiful evening at Troon, on the the Scottish coastline, with the Isle of Arran in the background.

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An amazing shot as the sunsets behind the headland, casting beautiful light along the beach.

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Captured in Jaffa, Israel with a short shutter speed, the exposure on the water is beautiful.

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A two image stitch of Thistle Cove in Esperance with superb colors and detailed textures.

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Captured in Noosa, Australia, the movement of water towards you is just stunning.

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Capturing the beautiful light with an inspiring composition of The Sauzaie beach at Bretignolles.

Tools and Tips For Outstanding Waterscape Photography

One common practice in waterscape photography is learning to setup a good long-exposure shot. Done right, one can manipulate a waterscape into a near-mystical scene. An exposure of 3 seconds can lead to a photograph that captures the landscape and all of the action of a powerful ocean. A 30 second exposure can result in a peaceful, awe-inspiring capture that seems out of this world.

There are a few tools that are needed to take a fantastic waterscape photograph:

Treat Yourself to a High Quality DSLR Camera

A good camera accompanied by a high quality lens can go a long ways. If you’re interested in taking your photography to the next level, it may be time to invest in something other than an ordinary consumer handheld camera.

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Canon Digital Rebel XSi 12.2MP ($632.88)

Another fine choice for starting photographers (includes the stock 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 Lens).The additional $100 buys you several notable improvements from the XTi, plus an extra 2MP for slightly higher image resolution.

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Nikon D90 12.3MP ($814.95)

The D90 made quite an entrance into the marketplace of Digital SLRs after it was announced that it included a High Definition (720p), smooth (24fps) video capture feature. It’s a Digital Camera, and Video Camera that performs incredibly well for its price tag. No lens included.

Get a Wide Angle Lens

When it comes to landscapes and waterscapes, a wide-angle lens is pretty much unparalleled in its ability to capture the essence of an environment. Anything in the 10-22 range is usually perfect, but these lenses often are expensive.

If you’re interested in learning more about lenses, check our article on Camera Lenses and Focal Length.

A Good Tripod

Since you’ll be working with long-exposures, it’s important that you keep the camera as still as possible during the capture. We don’t want anything except for the water to be moving to get the right effect in the picture.

You can learn some effective ways to reduce camera shake in your photographs, but in the end, a tripod is your best bet:

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Graduated Neutral Density Filters

Consider this: When shooting landscapes, you’ve probably noticed that if you try to set your exposure based on the sky (in daylight), you’ll greatly underexpose the ground. Similarly, if you set your exposure based on the land/sea, the sky becomes very overexposed.

This is where a graduated neural density (ND) filter comes in handy. These filters are placed over the lens, and gradually get darker from top to bottom so that less light comes in on one side of the lends (it is adjustable by the user to control which side has more light coming through). Using a filter like this, it’s possible to get a decent exposure on both the land/water, and the sky without heavy post-processing.

Read up more about these filters, and many others in our photography filters guide.

Share Your Tips!

We’d love to hear how you take waterscape photographs. If you’ve got any advice, handy tools, or favorite items, please share them in the comments!

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18

Oct

Design a Realistic 3D Baseball Cap in Photoshop

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In this Photoshop tutorial, I will show you how to create a realistic 3D Baseball cap in Adobe Photoshop using the Pen tool, brushes and some nifty tricks.

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Step 1: Create the shape

Create a new document in Photoshop and fill it with white (#FFFFFF). Create a new layer and use the Pen Tool (P) to create the shape of the cap (you can use an image of a cap as reference for this, or use the outline shown below). After that, press Command+Enter to transform the path into a selection. Then fill it with the color #1c1812.

Step 2: Define shapes

It’s time to define some parts of the cap. Use the Burn Tool (O) for adding some shadows to the cap (shown below) and then use the Pen Tool (P) to create two lines (#413a2f).

Need Help Stroking Paths?

You can learn how to stroke paths using the pen tool and the brush tool in our photoshop tutorial on creating fireworks.

Step 3: Create the Texture

The rear part of the cap must be darker. Create a selection on the back of the hat, and use the Brush Tool (B) to fill the selection with a black color on a new layer.

Step 4

Right-click on the layer with the rear part of the cap and select Blending Options. Then go to Pattern Overlay and add the below settings. /> Blend Mode: Hard Light /> Scale: 7% /> Opacity: 13%

Step 5

The seams of the visor are created with the Pen Tool (P). Create each seam on a separate layer by drawing the line with the pen tool, stroking with a thin hard brush, and then erasing the edges with a large soft eraser. Select these layers with the seams, and Merge Layers.

Duplicate them, invert their color (Ctrl+I) and place the black seams layer behind the other ones. This gives it a bevel effect.

Step 6

Create a new layer. Again use the Pen Tool (P) to create a shape like below and fill the selection with black. Then add noise to the selection (Filter > Noise > Add Noise | Keep it below 10%), and keep the Opacity of the layer to 75%.

Step 7

Create another layer and build a shape like below using the Pen Tool (P). Next thing you’ll have to do is to add some light, to make the rear side of the cap look more transparent (as if light is fading through from the other side). Use the Brush Tool (B) with white color and add some smooth light.

Step 8: Add logo

To give it an unique look you can add a brand or some unique design elements of your own. I used #7b7452 and then set the layer to Color Dodge.

Step 9: Details

To create the shape of the deeper lines in the cap, use the Pen Tool (P) to create shape selections, add lights and shadows using the Burn and Dodge Tools. Smudge the highlights and shadows to give them a softer look.

Step 10: Light

You must add some light on the visor, so make a selection and use large white brush to fill in the selection. Then select the Hard Light blending mode and decrease the opacity if needed.

Step 11: Realistic Texture

The material looks a bit cartoonish and smooth, so we need to brush some spots with different colors (darker/lighter). You can smudge them (or give them different Filter>Blur>Motion Blur effects) to make them look more realistic.

Step 12: Background

The cap is finished. Now you must create the background.

Step 13: Light

To make it more obvious and shiny, we must modify the contrast and the brightness. Select all the hat layers and merge them onto a new layer (Ctrl + Alt + E). Adjust the Contrast and Brightness (Image > Adjustments > Brightness and Contrast) until the hat pops out from the background significantly.

Step 14: Shadow

The cap looks like it is floating so we must add a shadow.

Step 15: Background

Create a new layer (ctrl+shift+n) and place it behind the cap layers. After that use some grunge brushes (like these) create a nice background using various colors.

Step 16: Background

The final step of this chop is to add light on the bottom and shadow to the top to create the space where the cap is placed.

Use PenTool(P) to make the selection and using a large soft brush create the platform for the cap.

Conclusion

Try to improvise as much as you can when you are creating the design of the cap. It’s not necessary to use all the same colors, or create a grungy background! Enjoy, and feel free to download the free PSD for reference!

Click on the image to view it at high-resolution.

Download the PSD

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18

Oct

39 Astonishing Examples of 3D Typography

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The surge of interest in Typography has lead to a huge soar in popularity of different types of Typography based design artwork, with 3D Type being one of the most popular variations. This post features 39 unique and inspiring pieces of 3D Typography.