Open Photoshop, and create a new document (File > New) with the following settings: Select the Print category tab, then set up the document to be 5.5 inches wide by 7 inches in height, 300 pixels/inch, RGB color mode. Choose White in the Background Contents area, and click Create.

Download the large TIFF image of Salvador Dalí from the Library of Congress (LOC) website (FIGURE 8.4), or open it from the chapter08-start folder. If you’re working with the original download from the LOC website, rename the file dali.tif and place it in a folder on your Desktop named chapter08 before opening it in Photoshop.

Crop the photo so that only Dalí’s head is in the frame (FIGURE 8.5). This will give you a more accurate understanding of the size of the part of the file that you’ll use in the collage.

View the document’s resolution by choosing Image > Image Size to open the Image Size dialog box. Notice that the image was saved at 400 DPI. Safely (meaning, do not add pixels to the document) change the resolution to 300 DPI. Make sure that the Resample Image box is not checked before you make this change (FIGURE 8.6).

Dalí’s head is nearly as large as the new document, so you now can be assured that the image will be large enough to meet your specifications. Click OK to exit the Image Size dialog box if you haven’t done so already. Press Command-A/Ctrl-A to select all of the image on the active layer. Press Command-C/Ctrl-C to copy the selection. Click the tab of the untitled (new) document (FIGURE 8.7). Press Command-V/Ctrl-V to paste the image of Dalí into the empty document. Rename the layer dali. Choose File > Save As and save the working collage document as chapter08.psd.

Close dali.tif. You don’t need to save changes you made to the document.

Continue to work in the Photography Workspace. (Choose Window > Workspace > Photography if another workspace is active.) Select the Pen tool from the Tools panel (FIGURE 8.8).

You can start anywhere to begin creating your path. I clicked the Pen tool once on the dent in Dalí’s hair to begin my path (FIGURE 8.9).

Release the mouse. My second anchor point is just over the first curve of his hair. If you click once past that curve, you’ll notice that the path created by two clicks is a straight line (FIGURE 8.10). Because you want the path to curve at this point, press Command-Z/Ctrl-Z to undo the last step. Instead of a single click, position the mouse in the same location, but this time press and hold the mouse button while dragging mostly to the right but also slightly downward (FIGURE 8.11). You’ll see the curve begin to form. Drag until the curve traces the contour of his hairline.

The next place you want to click is toward the top back of Dalí’s head. I’ve purposefully pressed the mouse button and dragged to try to make the path fit my contour in the way that I watch new students do this (FIGURE 8.12). Notice that the last part of the path starts to meet my needs, while the first part deviates from my intentions. When you create a curve, the next anchor point will be drawn in the direction of the previous curve. In this case, the direction of the previous curve is essentially the opposite of the direction that my path should be taking. Again, press Command-Z/Ctrl-Z to undo this error. You need to make one crucial move before drawing this path in the next step.

Because the curve changes the direction of the path, and because the contour does not follow what the Pen tool is set to do, tell the anchor point to remove the Bezier handle directing the curve. Accomplish this by pressing the Option/Alt key while clicking the anchor point (FIGURE 8.13). Now one of the handles is missing, but as you plot your next anchor point, you’ll notice that you can control the curve to fit the needs of your path.

Now plot the point you tried in Step 4 at the top of Dalí’s head. Drag slightly downward so the path matches the contour of his head (FIGURE 8.14). The curve of the path aligns beautifully with the shape of his head.

Zoom out slightly, if necessary, and plot the next anchor. I placed the cursor and dragged downward near the lower-bottom of Dalí’s head to fit my path around the shape (FIGURE 8.15). My anchor point is purposefully above the area where the curve changes again to move back inward.

Option-click/Alt-click the anchor point, again, to remove one of the Bezier handles and allow the path to change directions (FIGURE 8.16).

Your next click will be just above his ear. Keep working in this fashion around the perimeter of Dalí’s head. If you’re not sure when to Option-click/Alt-click the anchor point, you can always try to make the next move and see if the path is following the contour. If it doesn’t, press Command-Z/Ctrl-Z (Undo) and delete a Bezier handle. It’s okay to work in a way that includes an element of experimentation and best-guessing until you understand the tools. When you get to the bottom part of the bust, you can make a large, sweeping curve that excludes the furry element near his jacket (FIGURE 8.17).

You must complete or “close” the path by making your last click meet up with your first anchor point. Notice that the Pen tool displays a circle icon near the bottom of the tool to indicate that the click you’re about to make will close the path (FIGURE 8.18).

The Paths panel is grouped with the Layers panel. Click the tab of the Paths panel to open it, then save the path in the Paths panel by double-clicking the Work Path. Name the path dali-head, and then save the file by pressing Command-S/Ctrl-S (FIGURE 8.19). Now the path is saved with the file.

Zoom in to about 200% by pressing Command-+/Ctrl-+. Inspect your path; you can start anywhere. I’ll begin in the same area where I started plotting my anchor points. I’m looking for any place where the path doesn’t fit the contour of my shape.

Choose the Direct Selection tool from the Tools panel (FIGURE 8.20). This is the same tool you used in Illustrator to modify the paths created in Chapter 3. The first modification I’ll make is in a place on the back of Dalí’s head where the path includes a little bit of the background. I’ll simply drag the path and move it inward so the contour of the path is on the outline of his dark hair (FIGURE 8.21).

I’ve noticed that my path is also slightly askew near Dalí’s ear. In this situation, the curve doesn’t match the contour. I can control this by modifying the Bezier handle. First, I’ll click the anchor point with the Direct Selection tool to show its Bezier handles. Then, I’ll drag one of the handles to see how that modifies the curve (FIGURE 8.22). Click anywhere outside the path to deactivate it when the modification is complete.

In some cases, you may need to move the anchor point and modify the Bezier handle (FIGURE 8.23).

You also might need to add an anchor point and then modify it. To add an anchor point, click the path directly with the Add Anchor Point tool (FIGURE 8.24). Then, use the Direct Selection tool to make modifications (FIGURE 8.25).

Finally, you may need to convert an anchor point from one that indicates a straight, angular connection of lines to one that supports a curve. The Convert Point tool (FIGURE 8.26) is used for this purpose. With it, you can click any anchor point to change it from anchoring a straight line to anchoring a curve. In my path, there is a section of hair waves that are repeatedly drawn with curves. Somehow, one of my last dips took on a hard angle. I used the Convert Anchor Point tool to change that anchor point from straight to curvy and to modify the end of my path (FIGURE 8.27). You may need to adjust it so it is closer to the contour of the hairline with the Direct Selection tool.

I’m still not happy with that last hair area. I noticed an extra anchor point. Too many anchor points will make your path bumpy or inconsistent. When using the Pen tool, the dictum “less is more” couldn’t be more appropriate. I used the Delete Anchor Point tool (FIGURE 8.28) to eliminate one of the anchor points and then the Direct Selection tool to reposition the path (FIGURE 8.29).

Press Command-S/Ctrl-S to save your work.

In the Paths panel, activate the path by clicking it once (the path will appear blue); then click the Load Path As A Selection icon (FIGURE 8.30).

Look at the Layers panel. Only one layer, dali, should be active. (Click it once if it somehow became inactive.) Click the Add Layer Mask icon at the bottom of the Layers panel (FIGURE 8.31). The marching ants surrounding your selection are translated on the layer mask as a black-and-white representation of the areas hidden (not selected) and shown (selected). Press Command-S/Ctrl-S to save your work.

Inspect the dali layer. The layer has two icons. On the far left is the layer thumbnail. I like to think of this as the “content icon” because you can see the actual content of the layer represented by its icon. Click once on this to make it active; you’ll see four white corners surrounding the layer thumbnail (FIGURE 8.32). When the layer thumbnail is active, any action will modify the layer itself. For instance, painting with black paint on the image while the layer thumbnail is active literally adds black paint to the image (FIGURE 8.33). (If you followed my drawing activity in Figure 8.33, press Command-Z/Ctrl-Z to undo the brushwork.)

Continue to inspect the dali layer. To the right of the layer thumbnail is the layer mask thumbnail. The icon is a black-and-white representation showing which parts of the layer are hidden (the black background areas) and which parts are on display (the white bust). Click once on this icon to activate it. Again, you’ll see four white corners surrounding the layer mask thumbnail (FIGURE 8.34). When the layer mask thumbnail is active, you’ll be modifying the mask, not the content. This is typically achieved with white, black, or shades of gray using the Brush, Pencil, or Gradient tools. You can also select an area and fill it with white, black, or gray on the mask. If I painted with black paint on the image while the layer mask thumbnail was active, I would be adding black paint to the mask. This is different than adding color to the pixels of the bitmap image. Here, I’m telling the mask where to hide pixels. Black indicates hidden pixels, so my same mustache-inspired swoop of black renders part of Dalí’s face transparent as I add it to the layer mask (FIGURE 8.35). (If you followed my drawing activity in Figure 8.35, press Command-Z/Ctrl-Z to undo the brushwork.)

Click the dali layer content thumbnail.

Press Command-R/Ctrl-R to show the rulers; then drag a guide from the left ruler to about one-third of the distance across the document space.

Press Command-T/Ctrl-T (or choose Edit > Free Transform) to decrease the scale of Dalí’s bust. Drag the top-left transformation box downward and to the right until Dalí’s nose is in line with the guide you created (FIGURE 8.36). Press the Return key to commit the transformation. Select the Move tool and hold down the Shift key to constrain the movement to a 90-degree angle while you adjust the vertical position of the dali layer so that the top of his hair is about an inch from the top of the document.

Add a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, then select Colorize to create a monotone wash on the bust of Dalí. Adjust the Hue to set the color in the range of cyan (FIGURE 8.37).

Finally, organize the Layers panel by grouping the two top layers. The adjustment layer should already be active, so Shift-click the dali layer to add it to your layer selection. Click the hard-to-see and unlabeled panel menu icon at the top right of the Layers panel to see a list of Layers panel commands. Choose New Group From Layers (FIGURE 8.38). Name the group dali, and click OK. The two layers are now organized into a single group. You can click the sideways arrow to expand or collapse layers contained in the dali group. Collapse the dali group before proceeding to Exercise 6. Press Command-S/Ctrl-S to save your work.

Open hand.psd, an image I created for use in this collage. (It’s saved in the chapter08-start folder on the companion website.) Notice that the document contains a layer group named hand. In it is a layer containing a photo of a hand and a Levels adjustment layer.

Collapse the layer group, and click the folder so the entire group is active. Select the Move tool from the Tools panel. Press and hold anywhere within the image of the hand in the application window (not in the Layers panel), and drag the pointer over the tab of our composite document, chapter08.psd (FIGURE 8.39). The chapter08.psd file will come to the foreground of the open documents.

Continue to hold the mouse button down and drag down from the tab into the Dalí image document (FIGURE 8.40). Release the mouse. If it didn’t work for you on the first attempt, try it again. (It took me three or four tries the first time I learned to do this with tabbed documents.)

With the entire hand group active, use the Move tool to position the hand in the composite so the thumb is near Dalí’s chin. Then, press Command-T/Ctrl-T to access Free Transform. Rotate the hand by dragging just outside one of the four corner points to about –38° (the rotation value is displayed in the Options bar), and press the Return/Enter key to commit to the transformation. Set the hand in place so the thumb barely touches Dalí’s chin (FIGURE 8.41). Save your work. You can close the hand.psd document now that it’s part of the composite image, chapter08.psd.

Download the moon image from the companion site or the National Space Science Data Center. (Use the high-resolution TIFF, and rename the file moon.tif.) Open the moon.tif document in Photoshop.

With the moon.tif document open in Photoshop, press Command-A/Ctrl-A to select the entire image area and then press Command-C/Ctrl-C to copy the image. Click the chapter08.psd tab to activate the collage composition. Press Command-V/Ctrl-V to paste the moon from its home document to the collage. You can close moon.tif when you see the moon pasted into the Dalí collage image.

Rename the new layer moon. Select the Magic Wand tool from the Tools panel (FIGURE 8.42). In the Options bar, set the Tolerance level to 18 (meaning, select like-colored pixels within a range of 18 levels brighter or darker). Select the Anti-Alias and Contiguous options to make the edges of the pixel selection crisp and to create a selection based on image areas that touch one another. Make sure that the Sample All Layers box is not checked, as you want to sample and select only pixels on the moon layer. Click once anywhere in the black image space surrounding the moon. You’ll see a selection around the contour of the moon and into its crevices on the right side (FIGURE 8.43).

Add a layer mask to the moon layer (FIGURE 8.44). Surprise! The result is the opposite of what you wanted. If you selected the area that you wanted to remove and then added a mask, don’t worry. The good news is that it’s simple to invert your layer mask. Make sure the layer mask is active, and then choose Image > Adjustments > Invert. Or press Command-I/Ctrl-I, a good keyboard shortcut to know if you, like me, will repeatedly find yourself flip-flopping the selected area (FIGURE 8.45).

Click the layer thumbnail to make the content of the layer active. Position, scale, and rotate the moon so it seems to be popping out of where Dalí’s eye should be. Use the Move tool followed by Edit > Free Transform again, as you did in Exercise 6. Press Return/Enter to confirm the transformation.

Clean the layer mask (see the sidebar).

In Photoshop, open the ant image from the chapter08-start folder.

Choose Select > All, then copy and paste the ant image to the chapter08.psd collage file (see Exercise 7, Step 2). Close ant.jpg.

Name the new layer ant, and attempt to select the white background surrounding the ant with the Quick Selection tool. This tool is grouped with the Magic Wand. It behaves similarly but allows you to draw on the areas you want to select, similar to holding Shift with the Magic Wand tool to add to its selection. You’ll find that increasing the Brush size to about 32 will be helpful. Drag around the negative space surrounding the ant. You will make a selection that fits the contour of the ant and includes parts of its legs (FIGURE 8.48).

Click the Add Layer Mask icon on the ant layer. Invert the mask (Command-I/Ctrl-I). Clean the layer mask on the ant layer. You may need to brush in a leg or parts of legs using white paint. (Remember that white paint will make those layer parts visible.) For this portion of the exercise, I used white paint on a small brush in the layer mask while the mask was deactivated. I pressed the Shift key while I clicked the mask to deactivate and activate it while editing. I also hid the other layers by clicking the eyeball icon next to them for a clear view of those tiny ant legs (FIGURE 8.49).

Make the layer thumbnail active. Consult the final resulting image (Figure 8.3), then move, scale, and rotate the ant using the Free Transform command (Command-T/Ctrl-T).

Add a yellow color wash to the hand and moon images, starting with the hand. You can use a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, or you can do this in the Blue channel of a Levels adjustment layer (because blue is the complement of yellow). Because the hand layer group already includes a Levels adjustment, I modified the midtone blue levels (FIGURE 8.50).

Add an adjustment of your choice to apply a yellow color wash to the moon image. I repeated a Levels adjustment and modified the midtones in the blue channel.

Did you notice that as you add adjustments above each layer, they affect the whole document? The image of Dalí became much less cyan because these adjustments for yellow (or away from blue) were made to the hand and moon layers. Coincidentally, those two layers appear above the dali layer in the stacking order of the Layers panel. In this step, you’ll clip the adjustment layer to the one layer it should affect. Press the Option/Alt key while clicking between the adjustment layer and the image layer beneath it; then repeat this on the second pair of adjustment and image layers (FIGURE 8.51).

Organize your Layers panel with a new layer group, moon, to contain the moon and its adjustment layer.

Finally, duplicate the ant layer, scale and rotate it, and then duplicate the smaller ant and repeat to create the ants in the palm of the hand. I made the copies of the small ant by Command-Option-dragging/Ctrl-Alt-dragging it.

Create a copy of the hand photo layer and name it hand w shadows. Add a small shadow beneath each ant using the Burn tool (set to Midtones, 10%) to make them appear more connected to the hand (FIGURE 8.52). “Floating” images are often easily grounded with a small shadow. When you’re done, organize the duplicate ant layers into their own layer group. Clip a Black & White adjustment layer to the group. Save your results in PSD format. You can view my process in the Screencast 8-2: Duplicate, Transform, Burn, Organize, and Adjust—Ants in the Hand video.