Creating Surreal Dreamscapes with Photoshop Composites

[Music] [Ted Chin] Okay, hello, everyone. Thanks for coming. My name is Ted aka TedsLittleDream. Today we're doing a quick session about Creating Surreal Dreamscape with Photoshop Composite. Let's go. Yeah. So the agenda is like how it all started and finding your voice as an artist, how do you find your style, define it and few key of blending when it comes to realistic Photoshop blending, some of like the tricks I like to use and tool I like to use for my artwork and the fourth one, beyond Photoshop. It's actually something I'm super excited to share with you guys. So please make sure to stay tuned till a bit like all the way at the end, you get to see something really, really fun.

Yeah. So how it all started, right? I graduated from college trying to figure out what I wanted to do and I remember I was like, at the time I was like I really love animation. So I love like Pixar, Disney, Studio Ghibli, like anime, manga, all that type of thing that inspired me. So I was like, I want to be a storyteller. So I was like, I'm going to move to San Francisco, study grad school and become like one of the best. It didn't work out but anyway. I had a great time like study film, learning everything. But while I was in there and then going to school every day from like 8:00 in the morning till like 8:00 PM. It was like four hours class or eight hours every day. I was like getting really stressed out. I was like I'm doing something I want to do that I really love to do but I just want to create art for fun, like I don't want to do it for homework or assignment. I just want to make it because it's like for me, right? So I was like searching for creative outlet to do. And at the time, Instagram community was also growing. This is back in 2014, 2015. So there's like all type of like, photo walk with like photographer and all the community every weekend. So it's imagine like, you pick a spot in the city and then 30 photographers showed out that you don't know them but you get a network and then learn from each other and take photos. So it was really fun. And beside doing that, one of my favorite thing to do as a grad student that doesn't have a lot of budget is to go to gallery receptions. Why I like to go to gallery reception you ask? It's because there's always free food and drinks. You also get to networking with the artist and then see how their thesis work on their art project and also like meet other art lovers and collectors, right? Yeah. So one day, my friend hit me out. He's like, "Hey, it's this really cool artist, does some like surreal art. You might like him like Kan Hingau." I was like, "Okay, great. I'll be there." It's Friday afternoon, I'm ready to part, networking, right? So I got there and then all excited and I got here, I was like, wait like, something doesn't feel right. It's not really a gallery. It was like at a-- One of those like lecture halls, so it turned out it was like a lecture class for like three hours. It's probably one hour but it felt like three hours, but the artist came and then like he talked about, actually he talked about how he used photography, Photoshop and 3D model and working with like, model in different campaign and how he does his stuff. So that's when I first find out about like creative advertising or this is like a different whole production that exists out there. I didn't know that was like a format that beside being an artist, there's also like commercial artwork that you could do. So I got really excited. I was like, Okay, I already know Photoshop, I already know photography and then this is like, could be the creative outlet I'm looking for. So I went on to YouTube, I tried to study it and it was just like a really fun journey. And there's like the reason why TedsLittleDream as a project and become an artist now is because like, as a person who love to travel but have difficulty like have the money and budget and time to go everywhere, I start to imagine like, if I'm visiting a place, that's how I see and then how I experience and then there's special different guardians, spiritual, interactive, all type of different ideas and concepts. So it's a project that continues to grow. Every few years I like rechallenging myself. "Okay, I did travel thing last year. Maybe this year I'll do more folklore or a tale or different story and maybe next year I want to do more cultures, right, experience." So it's constantly I can just always like change my mind but TedsLittleDream, the project itself stayed with the core, it's like escaping reality.

Do you mind like, where do I start? If I want to become a Photoshop composite, like, where do I go, right? I don't know about you guys but ten years ago there's not a lot of YouTube tutorial. Those are like the CS4, CS5, the Photoshop book is like this thick stacks like how to Photoshop, so it wasn't really helpful and I went to the library, I remember looking out for photo composite, a book I found was like super old and it was like black and white and then doesn't really teach me all the tool where I need to find. So I was really struggling but don't worry guys. I got right here. These are the three people I enjoy watching on YouTube. Of course, there's other amazing artists too but we have, Jesus from Photoshop Training Channel, Unmesh from PiXimperfect and Aaron from Phlearn, he's sitting right there. So it's really cool. I've been watching his tutorial and then like now we're friends, so it's really fun. Just like, oh hey, like, it's weird that you're there, I'm here because usually it's the other way around. But anyway, so if you want to take a photo, like, they are really expert and professional on all type of Photoshop knowledge and a lot of times I ask them too because I don't necessarily understand how the tool work. I know how to use it but I don't really know how it works. So yeah, make sure you check them out.

So concept for your project, right? Now, you know how to like, where to find tutorial and then when to learn and take your first step but the most important part for me is concept for my art, right? How do you come up with a fun idea, right? There's so many ideas exist out there already. I know when you start it's like someone done that. I don't know if I want to do the same idea, right? But the concept for your project, how do we, how do we go with that? So finding your identity, right? How many of you here are artists already? You already have your styles, you already know why you're doing everything. Okay. I see four, five, ten. Okay. So it's pretty good amount but for those of you who haven't found your style yet, this might be some good tips I learned from some professors, right? Finding your style.

Your favorite artist. So I remember when I first started trying to figure out what art I want to do, what other style I want to go with, where do I start, right? My professor told me that, "Hey, go find 10, 15 or even 20 your top favorite artist. Put all their artwork next to each other. And instead of finding what's the difference between their artwork, find what is the same thing they all have in common. And from there you redefine the key elements that what was attracting you to the artwork and that is something what make you passionate about it. And by grabbing all of that key elements and then you added your own twist and ingredients, so now you finding a style that's close to what you love." So for me, these are some the artists I really love. And we have Erik Almas all the way on the top right. He was the guy that actually jumpstart my career with by going to art reception that was an art reception. So he was the artist that gave the talk that day. And the bottom left we have Erik Johansson. He's also another amazing, Photoshop concept artist. So some of you might be familiar with his work. And we have some other, James Jean, or Pascal, all these amazing concept artists that I love. And I actually get to meet some of them and become friends, so it's really fun. So yeah, by putting their artwork next to each other, then you start to realize, okay, it's a little bit harder and difficult to find what they all have in common but that is the key element that helped me a lot when I first realized, "Oh, I love surrealism." So I have Dali, Rene Magritte, right. All these other cool artists and studio like the Ghibli films have all these fantasy dream landscape elements that I linked towards you. I want to go on a fun journey. So that's what make TedsLittleDream a project I love to do, it's because that's what I always wanted to do like daydreaming as someone would say, right? So understand that and use it as probably a really good first step to help you find your style.

And it comes, storytelling. I know a lot of us probably enjoy TV show, movies, novels. I do really read every comic book so it's different form of storytelling. So storytelling is very interesting because I feel most of the artists that I talk to, every one of them just say, "Yeah, we love, we are trying to tell a story." Right? And so for this art I created is inspired by the Greek mythology, the fate, three sisters, so you can see there's a gold line that goes from the left hand to the top to the bottom, so that play with this line that goes all the way around and tied to the main character's leg, right? It's just like, "Can you escape your fate?" So that's a fun thing, I got inspired by the lore and then I was just, "Okay, I want to turn that into a visual." This is how I see it. So they are curious about this person just passing by and they design this whole thing and that's a complex storytelling. Not super complex but it's already exist, right? But I remember when I was going to grad school because we have to make short films and writing scripts, I asked my classmate, I was like, "Do we always have to make storytelling so complicated? I know there's like, do I always have to add three different plot twist and the ending of all this layer hitting me, like, can I just do something simple for fun?" And he told me like, "Yeah, you can totally do that. You can just make art because you want to have fun. You can just make whatever you want, it doesn't always have to be super complex and difficult, it could just be something simple that make you happy." I was like, "Oh great, I'm going to then make some really fun stuff." So like, some of my art always looks really simple, some of my art looks complicated. So here is other cool art that I made. There's only two, three layers compared to the left one that have probably 30 different layer of color and shading. On the right side just a fun concept of fishing out in the sun. I saw the photo of the sunset. I was like, "You know what would be really cool if it was a yo-yo playing up and down. But I said that's hard to visualize. "I'm going to use a fishing pool." Because I always see fishermen around the ocean at nighttime or in the morning, so this is a way of me interacting with that storytelling. It's just like, it's a fun idea and concept that I enjoy doing. So it doesn't always have to be super complicated but I know as a professional you have to keep it like a certain level of your artwork, a lot of people are have a high expectation of you. But sometimes you just like, "You know what, I just want to have fun, just let me be me." "What is most personal is most universal." So what do I mean by that? I think like, I remember this artist told me that "When you have a problem that is so personal to you, it become universally related to everybody else because a lot of people might be experiencing the same thing that you are experiencing right now." Of course, art block, right? Who doesn't love a good art block? So I created this visual, I had this in my head, I was going to make a super-giant square on the head for the art block because that's always how I felt but I was like working on it, I was like, it doesn't have to be that big but in this, this is our art block, everybody. A lot of artists go through it and this is how I felt. You see there is a block cement head, there is facial on there but the eyes are closed and the mouth not there, I know, the mouth is not there. It's because I feel I have some really fun idea, I know it's in me but I couldn't find a way to express it, so I lost my mouth, right? Now, there is a tool on the hand that's floating, the chisel that you can shape your mouth, shape your idea but there is no hand to grab it and use it. So a lot of time when I have art block, I don't find any inspiration, I don't know what to do, this is how I feel. And by turning that thought into art and sharing with friends, just "Hey, everybody can relate to that, that's a pretty fun way to do it." So this is an art block that I made it this year.

And the next one is called Bond, went through a breakup in February earlier this year so I don't know how many people can relate to this but that was a feeling I had, an emotion that I want to create and share, so it's like two couple with each other, their heads on fire and there's arrow crossing their hearts. Might be a little bit graphic but and then this is just the emotion I have at the time and then I share with my audience online asking, hey, how do you describe this? How do you feel? Right? Some people say, "This looks like a toxic relationship." Some people say, "No, they just stick with each other for everything that they went through." Right? So it really determines how you interact with my art and how you see but for me it's very interesting just like, "Yeah, this is so personal to me but when I share with other people, I realize that everybody, like, have a lot to share that together." So this is one way to do it, like just expressing that feeling, right? So Bond is what I call final. I always wanted to call it toxic. I was like, Bond is probably better because it's a different way to bond them together. Yeah.

Learn from others, right? So I love learning from other artists. I collect a lot of art. I am an art collector. I collect sculptures and print but I also collect everything on digital because those are free. All you have to do is right click and save. You create a giant Pinterest board or even on Instagram, I have some crazy mood board that I create all the time, right? I always like to borrow all the artist idea but I remember earlier I mentioned that you put all your favorite artist together, right? You find the key elements, what attracts you in putting up and mixes on your own takes. So you can always borrow their idea but always add it to your own style and twist and that's what make it become yours, right? Become personal. So it's like, I saw this cool skies and then ocean and then there's this really cute monster or a bus or something. I was like, "Hey, you know what? It will be fun to mix it all together and then do my own take." Like, a lot of my art has big skills difference, so you have a tiny human or a giant animal or something. It's because it's like that's the way how I explore the unknown world. So you'll always find that in my artwork and by using that, it's like that's my not a signature style but I was just like a lot of people see it, they're like, "Okay, that's like, Ted's art would probably relate to that." So always borrow their ideas, add your own twist and I don't always carry a sketchbook with me but I know it's important when you have a idea, draw it down, right? It may be like, say, are sleeping in the middle of the night, you have this really cool dream, you wake up for five minutes, you're just like, "I'll think about it tomorrow, I'll polish that idea." Don't do that. It's got to be gone forever in the morning when you wake up. So just jump off the bat, have a sketch, just write something down, draw some keywords because those ideas are always floating around but when it comes to you, if you don't put it down, it sucks when it's gone because I was like, "I had this really cool idea but I don't remember what it was but it was really cool but I don't know what it is." So write it down. And community, surrounding yourself with the right people or other amazing artists because you can always ask their advice and learn from them. Personally, I didn't collect I have a group of friends that are all amazing artists but sometime while I'm working on my art, I need some advice or help or critique, you'll get a message from me 2:00 in the mornings, "Hey, what do you think about this? How do you think about this shadow, what else should I change?" And I know they're sleeping but I was just, "I really want them to reply." But they reply to me in the morning, just like, "Hey, you should fix this and that." So it was really great to have a community out there. And the people in that community doesn't have to be art expert, they can just be someone who enjoy art too, because they might see things that you don't see. So it's always fun to ask some of my friends who doesn't do art, I was like, "Hey, do you this concept?" They always like, "Okay, yeah, this is pretty cool but have you tried this?" I was like, "Wow, like, I didn't know you had that in you." He worked at Wall Street but it's a very different. But he enjoyed the art I do, so I always have a great conversation with him. And the more you see, the more you know. I put it in this way is like, thinking about your brand, you're constantly feeding it off what you observe online, right? So if you feed it a lot of cool art, concept, storyboard visual, movies, anything that inspire you, when it comes to creating something, you can pull that out of your brand library. I guess it's what I call the mind library, right? You start to build it up and you feed it healthily, right? I spend a lot of time on TikTok so I know sometimes it's unhealthy with all the other visual but I always go back to Pinterest and, Instagram to find cool artists and say, "Okay, this is ten art from that I really love." Put it onto this folder. So always feed your mind, take an hour or two hour a week. Doesn't even have to be there. Just an hour a week and just spend all your time reading all type of different thing that you feel inspired by. And then feed that into your mind, make it healthy. So now you have this super library that you can always use it from. Even if you don't remember but subconsciously, your brain get triggered by the image you see and everything. So it helps me a lot so I hope that's a good tip for you.

I have an idea, now what? Now, so we start with on, okay, where to find the tutorial, how to do it and go from forming concept and all this. Now, I have a fun idea, now what? It comes to the key elements to realistic Photoshop. Ta-da. So these are the three key elements that I learned, I found out that helps me a lot is to have a deeper understanding of these three elements really helps. So first, you have lighting, right? And you have perspective. And then the third one, I wouldn't really call it color graded but more color matching, right? This is just a really good example for moving color grading if you work in a production set, you understand, okay, there's post editing, matching color of highlight, shadow and everything, but we'll go over each one of these and give you a fun demo.

All right. So perspective, lighting, color matching. Here's two quick videos just help you understand how it works. Don't worry, I'll go deeper depth on this but it's something I made with Adobe Express. Shout out Adobe Express. Yeah Express Ambassador. Yeah. Yeah so this is, you can see for my artwork I like to create foreground, mid-ground and the background and then different layer and scale that I mentioned. So giant moon, tiny person, polar bear floating in the air. It's just some people call me crazy but this is something I like to explore and make.

So perspective. How many of you guys here draw? A lot. So you guys are expert with perspective and I don't have to talk about it. I'm just kidding. So I can't draw. I like to draw stick figures and that's how I usually reference my models and stuff. I was like, "Hey just do this pose with that dress, I don't know what I'm doing but how do you find a solution, right? By taking photos. So on the bottom right you can see that there's some photo reference, just a quick way to understand how perspective and scale work, right? So a lot of time, if I have some ideas I'm trying to composite with a simple drawing with the distance, perspective, everything, how to make sure if it looks correctly around, I will grab all the objects around me and put it on the table, take my phone out and then just move it around like I'm the giant camera looking around just like, okay, something doesn't look right. I was like, "I need to move this in here." And I transfer that to my canvas. So take a lot of photo. I go hiking. I love nature. I love cities, street photography. So if you are photography, you probably take 10,000 photos every month, which is a lot, right? But surprising those knowledge helps me a lot when it comes to this. And if you know how to use 3D program, you can also put some simple stuff in there and it helps a lot. I think it was a new feature they have was the Substance 3D Viewer. You can download it from beta and test it out. So you can actually put object onto your canvas in Photoshop and rotate it, but we're not going over that today. Yeah, so here's a quick example of a photo I took of San Francisco Street and I was trying to figure out, what would be a fun way to edit this. So I found this stock image of this beautiful landscape. I said, you know what? The horizon matched already, let me just take this street out, put that in, it's not super complex, it's literally two layers but it's pretty fun for me to do. I was like, okay, this is practice. For me personally, when I create something, most of the time it's about practice, right? Practice, practice 'cause then I know what is I can get better every day. So it doesn't have to be too complicated for this one. I just want to make sure, "Okay I still got it." Like I didn't wake up and forgot all my skills. I was like, "Okay, that's something really simple editing." And here are three other artwork that I may have a different perspective on this. And the one, for the whale one, you can see, we as a person, the character who's looking at you this were at the lower perspective, so everything looking like this. All right. So you can see under the wing of the whale, the belly of it, the mountain should also match it on the top of it because you're looking up to that and the lighting matching from the similar way. And the monster in the middle one, it's your bird eye's view looking down. So you can think about, how do you get that reference, right? Well, you can also think about looking this way because it's the same way how you look like the subject, right? It's the same, just rotate it. Just think about using your imaginations and it helps a lot. So I have that in there. And then the third one is, like, instead of looking from the bottom or looking from the top, you're looking into like, when you go on a hiking trail, you reach to a viewpoint, right? That's the view and perspective you see. So in that one, in the third one with the deer, it's, like, I'm imagining that I'm hiking and I found this giant glowing deer with the tree on the horn looking down. Having a conversation with this guy, learning about Photoshop or something, I don't know. But that is a fun way for me, does I actually use your imagination to see, like think how real it would look and then transfer that onto the canvas. So you really just need to think. But I know imagination work very different per every person so that's why we have mood board, right? Reference board, photos and everything that helps you to visualize it easier.

And here are three other cool perspective from concept artists. So first one, it's actually pretty impossible to get that in real life but if you put a super wide angle fish eye lens onto the ground in the rock looking up, you can probably get that perspective. And the middle one is establish out the hero going over the ocean looking down with the city on the giant bone on there and the third one is super high above looking down, right? And you're probably wondering, why am I showing you these three? It's because I want to aim toward to the one day I can just easily composite photo with these three perspectives. I was like, "Okay, I'm getting better." Right? So I'm still working on my way to there, but it would be really hard to do it but it's a fun challenge for me. It's just like, "Okay, how do I get better? What can I push for next level?" Right? So perspective is one of the way I want to definitely challenge myself for that. But I'm not saying you guys have to do that but it's just really fun when you change your perspective, shift it, right? Lighting. The second key element when it come to Photoshop composite.

How many of you guys do photo, video or anything with camera? Cool. Okay. A lot of people. Nice. So you probably have a strong understanding of how lighting work, but for those of you who doesn't do this, imagine when it comes to canvas, the canvas painting on 2D, it's not just from left to right or top to down, it actually goes a whole 360, 3D view, right? So you have to think about how light works, right? So this is where I put out my imaginary library if the light is coming from this way, how would it actually work physics, physically as its physics? Yeah, how the light work bouncing back. What material is around the subject? Does it reflect more or does it doesn't reflect at all? And how to observe light, right? I'm not saying, I'm 120% super accurate about this but I'm going to say, as long as you're getting super close to that, the right direction, it will trick your brain when you look at the photos. Okay. That looks real enough. So this is like, think about how light works. And if you're not sure, just grab a bottle or a can and then turn your flashlight on the phone just like go around it, it's okay like, that's how light works on this object. So if it goes on my canvas, it should look like that.

So here's another quick example of this stock image I found and I was just like, "Hey, I want to add the helmet on the lady's head. How do I mimic that light?" Right? And for this reference, it's a little bit more challenging 'cause the light is coming from behind her and it also glow and shine around it. But luckily, she was already holding a sword. The photographer did a wonderful job. So all I do is mimic that same lighting and color onto the helmet. So it wasn't too hard but it wasn't too easy. I definitely spent a lot of time trying to get it right. So hopefully this is correct. I'm pretty sure it's like some professional come here and look at it and say, "Hey, something's wrong." I was like, "Just tell me, DM me later. Don't tell me in public." But yeah but I always take critique and I was like, "Yeah, tell me more how you will approach this." I would love to learn from other artists and how you would do that. Because it's like the same goal but 50 different path, right? And I would like to know if there's a easier way or you took the longer way. I was like, "Hey, the view is better this way or that way, right? So this is a fun way, I practice the lighting surrounding the helmet onto it.

And as I mentioned earlier, right, these are three different environments. The first one is an elephant fly in the sky under the ocean. So when you see that, you got under it doesn't really see, but when you create that art, right? You got to imagine like, if you are swimming in the pool and looking up, how does the sun reacting to the surface of water and reflecting on the subject? If the pool is too shallow, you can always go the ocean, it's a little bit deeper and then you do start to realize that the deeper you go the bottom is darker, right? But for this art, it's easier to create the cloud, the blue is super easy to match and just pinning it all around. And in the middle, you have a giant Kong, the monkey with the little tiny person and the fisherman on the boat. But in this photo, so I live in San Francisco. It gets foggy all the time. So for me it's really cool to see a building that's slightly fading into the fog on the street. So it was a little bit easier for me to understand the reference, how object would look when they're reflecting different type of light in this environment. So you can see the backside where the lighting's coming from. It's losing that details. You have that gray shadow on top of him but then with the shadow and everything. And then the bottom image, the stock image is a really good reference too. So when I added the fisherman onto there, I was like, "Okay. I can simple this color, cover it and then using the object in the same distance, 'cause different distance have different light refraction on that. So it's like, okay. I'll use something that's close to it to mimic that similar lighting and it works pretty fun. And then the third one is a morning mist. If you ever wake up in the morning, the nature or go on a hike or stay over in the cabin, you know how the mist reflecting everything. Slightly different reaction to fog, right? It's still water, so it's like, just use your imagination. Turns out, "Okay, like, this have to match that or here's a photo I took five years ago on a vacation with my kid. That's the fog environment would look like, right? I don't have a kid but that's the idea. So yeah, so in that and then, I added the grass, the vine onto the horn and everything and trying to mimic everything to get it right. So when it comes to composite and just think about how it actually might look realistic in person, So it helped me a lot just like, "Okay, it's time to daydream, time to take a break, where do I want to go today, right?". So these are some of the location that I imagine I was there.

Lighting and Color Matching demo. Yeah. It's demo time, guys.

When I did a demo yesterday, I blanked for a millisecond but I've been practicing before this session, so it should go super smooth. But, if not, I'm sorry. But we'll go over some of my favorite tool from Photoshop.

See, we have a snail. Okay. So let's talk about something real quick. When it comes to composite, the three key elements that I mentioned earlier, right? The first thing I like to identify is where the lighting is coming from, right? So this, for this photo, it's a little bit difficult, but I can see there's some highlights on the left side of this pole but that shadow looked weird. I was like, "Okay, it's not really coming from the directly left side." So I was trying to find a better way to understanding and I see the grass. I was like, "Okay, okay. And then, I found this windmill on the back. I was like, "This is a great way to break it down." By seeing that, okay, there is highlight here.

I didn't turn the layer on. Sorry.

There you go. I was like, "Why is it not working? I said, "I didn't turn the layer on." Right here, let me erase that. Okay. You can tell the highlight is right here. I'll assemble that color and then the shadow is right here. So you can tell the light is coming from this way and then it's casting that shadow of going there, right? But a lot of time for me it's still hard to identify because there's so much other thing going on, there's textures, there's color and other things. So my favorite tip is turn your photo to black and white. I learned this during my grad school class, like, the first thing my professor asked me to study is black and white film. And I was like, "Why are we doing black and white instead of all the cool new film that's super colorful and everything." He say, "The color is a distraction." It's not bad, right? It's actually really good but that's why it distracts a lot. So when you take some of the color away from something Oscar award like winning, award winning movies, you actually get to see all the other little thing that direct the heights in there, like textures, lighting, directions, all the leading light. All the little thing that's there that you've got distracted by color because the color was so pretty. Right? So when I take the color away it was for me it's okay, I can totally see this way better compared to this really nice green and orange and all the different thing. This really helps me a lot.

So when it comes to the object I want to blend in, putting this thing into Photoshop and since a lot of you say you use Photoshop, right, just double check. But there's some other way to remove the background. You can press W or go into this selection tool right here, magic wand or quick selection. You can select the background that you don't want, or simply click select subject. Thanks Photoshop. So I press Q to see the quick mask mode.

I don't really know how to explain it, so you might have to ask Aaron this but this is pretty much that I'm seeing the red part is the part I'm not selecting and then the color part is the part that's being selected. And by pressing B again, go on the brush mode, I can easily control the edge of my selections. So I can go in here, be on the white brush and paint over. So it's similar as mask, right? So I'm not going to go super detail on it. Feel free to ask me later. I'll just point you to him. And press Q again that you can see. So if this is going here, let's say I'm on the wet brush, I select here, press Q again, now you see its part of the selections. There is a new selection tool right here called-- Right here, the selection brush tool. But it's kind of is a reverse way but it's a correct way we're working but anyway-- Going onto here. Going back pressing M. I'm going to jump back to. Here you can see, okay, now, it's a easier way to see where the color is coming from the snail. So we're going to try to match the snail to as close as using this windmill as a reference and I have a preselected snail right here. Hold shift, clicking down mass, you can see the mass I got removed and then we're going to go in. And in the other ways, like, so let's jump back to perspective, right? This is easy because perspective wise, if the snail is far in that distance that's the same perspective so I didn't have to worry about it too much. If the snail is floating in the air, instead of looking a flat square, right? So let me hide him real quick. If the snail is on the ground, it's more of like this perspective but if the snail is in the air, it's like that perspective. I can't draw, I told you guys, I warned you. But you will be able to see the bottom part of the snail, right? And then, if the snail is facing you or facing the other way, it's a whole different type of perspective. I can't really draw but I understand it so I can draw you this. So this is the best I can do.

It's all right. Sounds you don't have to be a 100% correct but as long as you understand and get close to it, it will work. Okay. So snail is here in the simple position and then I'm going to jump into some of my favorite tool and I felt this tool are my secret weapon but apparently everybody know from the last session so I'll ask you guys in a bit. The first few I like to use is hue, saturation, color balance and brightness and contrast. And I always clip them to the subject so you can hold Options on Mac, I think Alt on PC and just hover the mouse in between the layers so everything I do will only affect the layer I clip it to. And if you don't have this adjustment layer, it's literally under window adjustment. Sorry. You guys can totally hear that.

This guy right there. And if you don't know what they actually do, you can also click on this three bar right here, it goes to the modern view. I think they, with this view actually tell you what each icon does. I already know what they do so I don't really need this view so I just jump to classic, right? So all the tool I need is right here. And my other favorite tool is if you click these, right here, it's called selective color. Now how many of you actually know selective color or use it? Okay. It's last name yesterday. Yes. I can impress you guys. But anyway, I'll tell you what it does. Okay. So basically, first I like to do is to-- Give me a second.

Why is my mouse...

Stuck onto this circle thing? It's working but I can just click that anyway.

Basically, I like to desaturate my subject first because think about where the object or subject I want to blend in, I want to re-color it because it's easier to desaturate, re-color it to match the background than the other way by trying to add color straight on top of it because I already have all this other thing on there. So I'll just desaturate a little bit, pop onto color balance so it's shadow, mid-tone and highlight. If you don't know what to do, it's totally fine, just click it and then you can drag this around and you can see what area and section this is affecting to. So the highlights will affect the highlight color and then the mid-tone is the same overall and the shadow usually do like the other part, right? So it's pretty easy to understand. So basically, highlight is where the light is hitting you, shadow is this part and mid-tone is on my face, in between. And there's like, it can get really complicated because the face is not flat so it is like this angle of my eyebrow casting shadow but nose is bouncing light back. So it comes like photography and everything, like deep understanding of drawing, everything but snail should be easier shape to understand. And the last one, not the last one, is the contrast. So reduce the contrast because the contrast of windmill, it is pretty high but this is a giant object that's fading away in the distance because it's huge, right? So it should have less contrast compared to the windmill. Also these things are huge. Bring the brightness to here a little bit and I'm going to put, drag this there to the top and then we can start working on mid-tone. Usually, I start with targeting mid-tone to get that green color working for it. Get down here and then you can do that. And okay, let's talk about selective color. So selective color, when you created it, right here under colors, there's all this thing. Just ignore the rest of it. We're only going to use white, neutrals and blacks. Basic thing about this is the same as highlight, mid-tone and shadow. So for example, if I click blacks, you can just drag around and see, "Okay, this is targeting the darkest part of that image." Right? So trying to match that color. Here's all the tips. So what you're trying to do is you can hold option to sample the color of the shadow on image, right? I'll show you a quick example. These are some type of the shadow on this image and the highlight is about there. This is the brighter part. Nothing, right? So trying to match your subject or something you want to Photoshop to with the similar color group. It doesn't have to be exactly the same, but if it's in that same color feeling, right? 'Cause this is still very different like green but they are very similar green. So if I can get the snail's darker shadow green, close to it or how I close into these, it's starting to make more sense to my brand. Like, hey, these are the same photo. So it's tricking your own brand to it. And then, so the same thing with this, adjusting a little bit and then I'm back to shadow. You can adjust all this different to adding a little bit more red, green and I don't always remember which one it's adding or removing. So you can always just drag it all the way to the extreme to see like, "Okay, I know I just need to push it down and bring back a little bit to get it as close as possible" to the combination you want to do. So and it comes to the part like the perspective, right? Because remember, we are trying to match the house onto top of the snail is how do you do it correctly, right? So a fun way you can do is just bring here and then creating a mask, remove the button. Actually, sorry. Let me not create a mask yet. Basically, what I want to do is I hold Command T to transform. You can always right click and using a wrap to match in that or you can also use liquify all the way to do it. Why I'm doing it is because I'll show you a quick final look of the snails.

I'll turn everything on. So this is the perspective I'm trying to get it to work closely. So it looks like a house moving castle but snail's moving home or something, I'll make it up. Yeah. So I was having trouble putting this house on top of the snail because I couldn't get the perspective right. I was like, something is not right and I don't know why. So here's a quick preview look of something I worked on before I fixed the new render. I was like, there's something wrong about this photo but I don't know what's wrong with it. So as I mentioned earlier, what I do? I text my friend two in the morning. He's like, "Hey, what's wrong with this photo?" Right? So he is a great, graphic design artist. He's like, "Okay, I'm seeing what's wrong. He's telling me that there's this section right here, it should be part of the snail's shells, right? So it should be landing onto it, go around the neck and there's all this thing." And he's like, "The lighting's a little bit harsh, you need to fix the shadow. And then I was like, "Okay. Got it." So got that feedback right away and then I have all this. I'll show you. So we talk about tool I like to use, desaturated, de-contrast it, adding color with the color imbalance. Here, I'll show you real quick each layer have a really mini adjustment. And do the selective color doing the same thing with highlight, mid-tone and shadow and sometimes I do it again just 'cause I-- Okay. I don't want to go back and try to find the perfect one. I'll just overlap it over and over again to get it correct. It might not be a good way but that's just how I work. And this is the other fun part is painting over onto the snail, right? So what you want to do is basically, what you could is create a layer, clip it to the snails and sample any color that you want around it and use 30% and just brushing over it. And you can do the same thing with the highlight, same thing with the shadow by similar. Remember what I mentioned earlier, right, you want to match it as much as possible. Well, it would be easy to just paint it over, right? So it's almost like I love learning digital painting. I want to do more next year and so this is some stuff I watch how other artist works. It's like, "Yeah, let me borrow that, see if it works on Photoshop." So it's the same thing painting over. And then you have to also remember...

There is all these little highlights, right? Because if the light is coming. Yeah, I never figured out. I didn't tell you guys where the light was coming from. So instead of light coming from left side, it's actually toward to the camera. So it's going in that directions for that. And so it's the same thing, if the light is coming from where the shadow is casting because I remember we have the shadow is right here casting. So it's similar with that. So I got to do the same with the snail's thing, right? The highlight's coming here, shadows there, coming there. So I have to paint it over and over again. So this is before I paint it, after and adding some more highlights onto it, right? And then the same thing going again and see all this layer is pretty much the same thing but over again fine tuning, adding a little bit here and there. And by adding the house onto the top, putting the mask and everything, so you have this right here. So I start doing the same editing I showed you guys earlier about, putting onto all this fun adjustment there, then I got to jump back to the snail with the shadow casting because now I have a house on the top, like how does the house react to the shadow onto the subject. So all this little tiny detail here and there, not that. And so the final result we got this. One cool thing I forgot to show you. When the snail is far away in the distance, right, there's this haze around. So the easiest way to do it is simple the same color, 30%-40%, paint it over like that so now it looks that morning misty fog that's at the bottom over there when you look at it. And so with all this, other there that I added, this is the highlight and then the color adjustment targeting the highlight and shadow. And if you want to do that, you can also just click on here and go on gradient map and doing to turn this into soft light. Click on this. This is how it works. This kind of effect like what the shadow color you want it to be and click on here. You can change the highlight color of different thing you want. This is not really the great color I usually like to use but you can also reduce that. So this becomes color grading, not color matching but this is a fun way to do it and that's how I got to the snail. Jumping bag and I totally forgot to look at people waving at me again. So I'm really sorry if I'm going too fast. Okay. Jumping bag. This is another quick example what I did with our friend McDowell. He like generate the AI with the giant, rock humans and my job was just to match the color with the highlight shadow and when the second person that's far away, I imagine, when the giant monster is walking, they kick up the dust. So those are the dust that's filling the background with that and then the second person is further away, so he's fading into the sunset. The sunset have these warm color but a little bit blue and cold. So the second person's color should be a little bit colder or closer to the sunset to the first rock, human. And then the little person riding the horse, when horse riding on the desert, they kick off dust. So there's a little trail on the back of it you can see there. So this is just something to think about when I'm composing and editing and it helps a lot.

Tricks and Tips with Photoshop, one thing I forgot to mention is the brushes. So when you press F5 and B, you can see all these brushes. So I collect a lot of brushes. Like, I'm talking about a lot but maybe not a lot enough but a lot. But you're like, okay, he probably don't use most of it. I do use most of it. It's because I have some really weird brushes. For example, if I pop to here onto the top, click a new layers real quick, I just want to showcase you guys my brushes. It's pretty fun. There is this waterfall wave. I use it to masking in different texture. There is the waterfall one and the fun part that I showed you out there, there is the hair one. So I used to use this to mask out, retouching of models. I can get the hair right. There's no gem fill. I was like, you know what? I can use this to pin it over on their hair. It's pretty weird. People hate that brush but I love it.

Jumping back to presentation, masking brush, I like to call it. And, GenAI, I love to use GenAI but that's just something people get scared like, isn't GenAI replace you, steal your job? I was like, "No, you got to use it the right way." So here's a fun quick fun way that you could do with Firefly. What you do is that you draw a very simple shape and color in the outline and you throw onto Firefly type in composite reference, put it onto there and then type in the prompt you want to use. And Firefly will generate an image based on the outline drawing that you did. So you see there's a giant moon behind the mountain and there's a little hill and with the grass, I want to mimic Yosemite. And the third one is literally just like a donut in the air but I just want to see, if I put a giant circle on there, is it going to recognize as a donut? And it did work. And the middle ones, it goes, I created for Halloween, just a little sad ghost, waiting for his girlfriend to show up and there's only a bird and an empty candy jar right there. But I couldn't find a bed sheet ghost, so I couldn't get a 3D model or anything reference. Don't have a friend to put the bed sheet on. So I select the square and generate a bed sheet ghost, and it works really well. And I create the artwork in the middle. So it's a pretty fun way.

Thoughts on AI. Don't let AI replace you? Use it as a tool. Different way to use it and I was experimenting a lot on Generative AI + photography. And you're like, what does that mean? So quick video, this is to see the Firefly one and it would jump to the next one. I showed this last year in the Creative Now video just saying like, okay, I saw a video of tornado twisting walking, looks like a human walking in the distance. I was like, "That's really cool but how do I recreate that?" There's not enough photo of tornado and stuff. It's really scary to chase it as nobody want to get that close. So I use GenAI to create tornado photos and re-composite into this. So here's a really quick, time lapse video that might make you dizzy but it's really cool 'cause I made it. No, I'm just kidding. But it's a superfast video of how I work, right? So I'm generating the tornadoes, adding in, joint little stick figure leg and then manipulate the tornado. Move with that color matching it, using the same thing we talked about earlier, right? So I got the perspective, I got the key lighting and I got the color close to it. So this is a quick fun way that I recorded, just to show you. This is a little video so I'll let it play for five more seconds. Okay. You guys probably see enough.

Beyond Photoshop. Okay. Thank you guys, for staying for this long. This is the most exciting part that I'm doing. So basically, if you're from San Francisco, I have an art show this Saturday in San Francisco in the city. So what I'm doing is turning my concept art into sculptures. Yeah. So I'm very excited. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. So having, like I was trying to figure out, I feel like a lot of digital artists, storyboard artists and concept artists, graphic artists, like their art doesn't usually get accepted by traditional gallery, so one creative way I thought was like, you know what? I'm going to make sculptures. So I hired some people, worked with other artists. I also got a 3D printer but I'll mess around with it next month because I just want to make sure, I don't put it too close to the gas tank. Apparently, resin, alcohol and gas tank doesn't go together.

Can't put that in your garage. So yeah. So this is the flamingo splash screen I did in 2021 for Adobe and so that's definitely the must turn to sculpture. And next one is the Zen. I call it Zen because this was a tribute to the three northern white rhino at the time. There was the only three left but the male one passed away. So this is towards you like, "You're no longer being harmed. There's a bonsai tree on your horn. There's peace, little osprey, osprey bird on the back will protect you and the moon. It's a place for him to relax. And of course, I got to turn that to little sculpture, they look so fun. Yeah. So how about like, they're like this big, you can touch it, don't touch it but it's pretty fun, it's really cute. And then there will be a moon displaying behind that too, so it's exactly like the picture.

And the next one, Unexpected Guest. So in a lot of my artwork, I put giant monsters or animals but I would like to think they are the guardian of this, the spiritual animal that if you go to your nature, you respect that area like nothing's going to harm you. So this is a way of the octopus came across with this guy in his house that he's about to get a knock-knock on the door but he has no idea what's happening outside. This one is really cool. It turned to a sculpture, that is like a resin pouring, everything reacted to a light and then there's a little person in the window too. So I work with the studio for this one, obviously I can't do that by myself but this is like-- - [Woman] That's so cool. - Thank you. Thank you. Yes, so this is like a super cool fun way to put on this. So that one is my key sculpture for this show.

And last one is the polar bear melting away, I don't have to explain too much for this. I probably could do a better design 'cause a lot of my friends got confused what's on the butt area but there's a little boat in there, you can see when it's like super huge but there's a little boat iceberg melting but you can tell a polar bear, global warming, there's not enough ice for them to survive on there so this is my way to show that because some cool artists along my journey, they do environmental conservation project with their artworks. So this is my way to join them, raise awareness and do all the fun things with my art. And so here's the other sculpture over there. You can see his little leg swimming and there's a tiny boat in there. I don't know if you can see it on this video. Yeah, there's a tiny boat. So it's very cute. Yeah. So this is the fourth piece. There's like two more is going to be there. Conclusion. Having fun creating art, so you never feel burned out. A lot of inspiration keynote artists talk about it today, so I feel totally relatable. Learn from others, if you become my friend, you will get a text 2:00 AM from me asking about art, so just be prepared of that. But always learn from others. I love to connect with all of you and then there's something you'll probably get a written email from me. It's like, "Hey, what do you think about that? What do you think about my presentation?" Right? Never too late to-- Never too late to try new things. I've been doing Photoshop concept for the past nine to ten years, but this is the first time for me to do sculpture and I don't know if it's going to sell. I don't know who's going to buy it but I want to do it. So I'm just going to try it, right? I'll figure out that next week when the closing party is happening. And share your story. Always, I'm encouraged to always share your story. You never know who's listening. You never know who's watching. So it's always fun to share your story, share your art, so don't feel shy to do that. And thank you, come to my Ted Talk. Yeah, so. No. Thank you. Yeah, so feel free to scan the QR code. It will take you to my Instagram and then there's a whole bunch of information you need to find.

[Music]

In-Person On-Demand Session

Creating Surreal Dreamscapes with Photoshop Composites - S6310

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ON DEMAND

Closed captions in English will be added in early November.

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Speakers

  • Ted Chin

    Ted Chin

    Digital Artist, TedsLittleDream

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Session Resources

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About the Session

Join artist Ted Chin, aka TedsLittleDream, as he shares his ongoing journey and evolution as an artist. Ted, whose exquisite composites exude a dreamy and surreal quality, will discuss how he began his journey, how he found his unique voice, tips and tricks he wishes he had learned sooner, and the importance of daydreaming and pushing your imagination to new limits.

In this session, you’ll learn:

  • The importance of storytelling
  • How to ideate concepts for your projects
  • Key elements of photo blending, including lighting, perspective, and color
  • How and when to use generative AI
  • The importance of having fun in creating art

Technical Level: General Audience

Category: Inspiration

Track: Graphic Design and Illustration

Audience: Art/Creative Director, Graphic Designer, Photographer

This content is copyrighted by Adobe Inc. Any recording and posting of this content is strictly prohibited.


By accessing resources linked on this page ("Session Resources"), you agree that 1. Resources are Sample Files per our Terms of Use and 2. you will use Session Resources solely as directed by the applicable speaker.

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