I often get asked to explain the steps I use in Photoshop to get from my original capture to the final version I present to my stock agency, a competition, or include in a show. Learn to clean up a photo and add elements in Photoshop with the Photoshop Tutorial below.

I started off with this original capture:



And wound up with this as my final version:



The flowchart of corrections/modifications is such:

 

Step 1: Crop the Image

The image needed cropping for a few reasons. The primary player is centered and he needs to be more to the left. The distraction on the left needs to be cropped out. Part of the distraction on the top needs to be removed. I extended the crop to the right so the subject wouldn't be centered. Note that the crop handles extend past the image boundary. This portion of the image needs to be filled in with pixels - more on this later.



Step 2: Clone the dust and top

To remove the two dust marks, I used the clone stamp.  The spot healing brush set to Content Aware or regular healing brush would also work. I then used the clone stamp to remove the white and tan lines across the top.



Step 3: Clone or Content Aware Fill the players and added canvas

The cloning for this part is a bit more advanced as the areas to cover are much greater. Start with a medium sized brush that’s set to a medium hardness and sample the grass to the left of the players. The important aspect to be aware of is to line up the streaks of light and dark areas of the grass so they maintain a continuous line. If they’re choppy, it’s a dead give away that improper cloning was utilized.  The Content Aware fill command could also be used but I suggest you first break up the large portions of players into blocks by doing some strategic cloning in between them.  Again, be sure the lines on the grass are smoothly maintained. Use the clone stamp tool to paint the grass over the players and extended canvas.



Step 4:  Add The Ball

If it were my goal to create a panning shot, short of doing a basic levels and saturation adjustment, I’d be done. This was my original intent. But when I saw how clean the image looked, I wanted it to tell a story.  Luckily I made a number of images of the kids playing soccer that day and I had one where the ball was spinning nicely. I thought how cool it would be to introduce the ball into the photo.

Use the lasso tool to make a selection of the ball. Be sure to leave some room around it to feather it into the primary file of the panned soccer player. Go to Edit>Copy.

Bring back the primary photo and go to Edit>Paste.  A new layer will appear in the layers palette and the soccer ball will appear on the photo. Use the Move tool to position it where you desire. 

As seen above, the exposure from the two files is different. To try to match them, be sure the top layer of the ball is active and make a levels adjustment to bring the two close.  As you move the mid-tone slider, you can eyeball the blend.



To seamlessly blend the soccer ball and primary image together, add a layer mask to the layer with the ball.  At the bottom of the layers palette, click the icon to add a layer mask. Be sure the layer with the soccer ball is active. 



With the layer mask highlighted, use the brush tool with the foreground color set to black to paint away the pixels around the ball and seamlessly blend the two images together. Be sure the hardness of the brush is set to a low number and use just the edge of it to feather the blend.  Set the opacity of the brush in the Options bar to 50%. It’s better to build up the effect rather than try to paint it away with one swipe. The layer mask will show a black area around the ball that represent the pixels you painted away.



When done, the blend should be smooth.

Step 5: Finishing Touches

To punch up the color and fine tune the exposure, I added a levels adjustment layer so both layers would receive the same adjustment. I brought up the mid-tones and blacks to complete the finished product. The final step was sharpening.



Check TGP for more Photoshop Tips Of The Month. Visit www.russburdenphotography.com for information about his Nature Photo Tours across the US.