Recently I got really interested in Tilt-Shift photography, so I did some research and I made my own tutorial on how to achieve this effect with your own photo using Photoshop. Maybe this belongs more in the Tutorials thread in the Images & Graphics section but its more of a Photography thing so I'll leave it here. First of all, what is Tilt-Shift Photography (also called Miniature Faking) ? Its when you process your photo in such a way that the objects on it seem like miniature models, or toys. This visual effect can be achieved by focusing some parts of the image, blurring the others and messing around with colours. Here is an example of tilt-shift: AND You can look at other examples here. One recent example I can think of that you might know is Eurovision 2011 video postcards. There the tilt-shift effect is applied to the footage of the cities etc. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXzW6gm2hdM
Now to the tutorial bit: - What photos can be used to create tilt-shift ? Well what you have to consider is that you want to give an impression of a miniature model so pick a photo with a high viewpoint. As you can see in the examples above both pics have an elevated viewpoint. Photos with cars, trains, parked airplanes work the best as well as pics with a busy street etc. Here is what we will be creating in this tutorial: - Open Photoshop, open your photo file. - Select 'Reflective Gradient' - Press Q to open Quick Mask Mode. Or alternatively press this button on the bottom of your toolbar. - When you are in Quick Mask Mode with Reflective Gradient select the place on the photo you want to focus on and drag a line from top to bottom of the area where you want focus. You will see a pink highlight where your focus will be. This step usually takes a few tries to get right. - When you are happy with your selection press Q again to exit Quick Mask Mode. - Now you should have marching ants around your selection. Go to Filter>Blur>Lens Blur. - Standard Photoshop settings usually work fine but experiment with them to achieve the best result in your opinion. - Apply the Lens Blur and deselect the selection. Now we want to apply some Image Adjustments to enhance the miniature model effect. Go to Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation. - Increase the saturation value to around +40 although this can vary with different photos and your own preference. Apply the effect. - Go to Image>Adjustments>Curves. - Make a shape like this. This will add more contrast to the piece. You are free to experiment with the curves yourself or to use other contrast making techniques. - You are done ! Final Result: http://i.min.us/iyOHS.jpg I wrote this tutorial myself, but of course I didn't make up the technique of doing it myself. I'll post some examples of tilt-shift as I make them over time. Feel free to add your own.
Fair play to you for showing how it's done, but am I the only person in the world who believes this effect has been done to death now, and I want to headbutt the screen every time a see a tilt shift effect ruining an otherwise fine photo? To me it's become a terrible cliche, up there with colour pictures photoshopped to be black & white apart from on detail in colour, and photos of streams shot with a long exposure so the water blurs. Other than that, sorry, and carry on.
Looks horrible alright when it's not done on a suitable photo, but I still think its a very good thing to have in some of the photos
I thought tilt-shift lenses where mainly used for building photography to counter-act the tendancy for buildings to taper inwards as you look up at them? Of course, there's many other uses/experiments but I didn't think toy model looky-likey was it's primary use?
or..... a nothing photo taken on an iphone but put through instagram and bunged on Facebook and everyone gushes at how wonderful the picture is. No, it's not. The problem is that when a certain effect becomes popular, every loves it to begin with and does the same en masse then after a while it becomes tedious. I try to keep away from too much photoshopping these days. Used to do it a lot but I now try and make pictures as natural as possible, maybe just some cropping.
