Lessons
Bootcamp Introduction
16:22 2The Bridge Interface
13:33 3Setting up Bridge
06:55 4Overview of Bridge
11:29 5Practical Application of Bridge
27:56 6Introduction to Raw Editing
11:00 7Setting up ACR Preferences & Interface
07:39 8Global Tools Part 1
16:44Global Tools Part 2
20:01 10Local Tools
22:56 11Introduction to the Photoshop Interface
07:13 12Toolbars, Menus and Windows
25:07 13Setup and Interface
11:48 14Adobe Libraries
05:57 15Saving Files
07:39 16Introduction to Cropping
12:10 17Cropping for Composition in ACR
04:44 18Cropping for Composition in Photoshop
12:40 19Cropping for the Subject in Post
03:25 20Cropping for Print
07:34 21Perspective Cropping in Photoshop
07:11 22Introduction to Layers
08:42 23Vector & Raster Layers Basics
05:05 24Adjustment Layers in Photoshop
27:35 25Organizing and Managing Layers
15:35 26Introduction to Layer Tools and Blend Modes
21:34 27Screen and Multiply and Overlay
09:15 28Soft Light Blend Mode
07:34 29Color and Luminosity Blend Modes
12:47 30Color Burn and Color Dodge Blend Modes
07:43 31Introduction to Layer Styles
11:43 32Practical Application: Layer Tools
13:06 33Introduction to Masks and Brushes
04:43 34Brush Basics
09:22 35Custom Brushes
04:01 36Brush Mask: Vignettes
06:58 37Brush Mask: Curves Dodge & Burn
06:53 38Brush Mask: Hue & Saturation
07:52 39Mask Groups
05:52 40Clipping Masks
04:11 41Masking in Adobe Camera Raw
07:06 42Practical Applications: Masks
14:03 43Introduction to Selections
05:42 44Basic Selection Tools
17:41 45The Pen Tool
11:56 46Masks from Selections
04:22 47Selecting Subjects and Masking
07:11 48Color Range Mask
17:35 49Luminosity Masks Basics
12:00 50Introduction to Cleanup Tools
07:02 51Adobe Camera Raw
10:16 52Healing and Spot Healing Brush
14:56 53The Clone Stamp Tool
10:20 54The Patch Tool
06:38 55Content Aware Move Tool
04:56 56Content Aware Fill
06:46 57Custom Cleanup Selections
15:42 58Introduction to Shapes and Text
13:46 59Text Basics
15:57 60Shape Basics
07:00 61Adding Text to Pictures
09:46 62Custom Water Marks
14:05 63Introduction to Smart Objects
04:37 64Smart Object Basics
09:13 65Smart Objects and Filters
09:05 66Smart Objects and Image Transformation
10:57 67Smart Objects and Album Layouts
11:40 68Smart Objects and Composites
10:47 69Introduction to Image Transforming
04:34 70ACR and Lens Correction
09:45 71Photoshop and Lens Correction
14:26 72The Warp Tool
11:16 73Perspective Transformations
20:33 74Introduction to Actions in Photoshop
09:27 75Introduction to the Actions Panel Interface
05:06 76Making Your First Action
03:49 77Modifying Actions After You Record Them
11:38 78Adding Stops to Actions
04:01 79Conditional Actions
07:36 80Actions that Communicate
25:26 81Introduction to Filters
04:38 82ACR as a Filter
09:20 83Helpful Artistic Filters
17:08 84Helpful Practical Filters
07:08 85Sharpening with Filters
07:32 86Rendering Trees
08:20 87The Oil Paint and Add Noise Filters
15:08 88Introduction to Editing Video
06:20 89Timeline for Video
08:15 90Cropping Video
03:34 91Adjustment Layers and Video
05:25 92Building Lookup Tables
07:00 93Layers, Masking Video & Working with Type
15:11 94ACR to Edit Video
06:10 95Animated Gifs
11:39 96Introduction to Creative Effects
06:08 97Black, White, and Monochrome
18:05 98Matte and Cinematic Effects
08:23 99Gradient Maps and Solid Color Grades
12:20 100Gradients
04:21 101Glow and Haze
10:23 102Introduction to Natural Retouching
05:33 103Brightening Teeth
10:25 104Clean Up with the Clone Stamp Tool
08:07 105Cleaning and Brightening Eyes
16:58 106Advanced Clean Up Techniques
24:47 107Introduction to Portrait Workflow & Bridge Organization
14:47 108ACR for Portraits Pre-Edits
21:27 109Portrait Workflow Techniques
18:46 110Introduction to Landscape Workflow & Bridge Organization
12:17 111Landscape Workflow Techniques
37:36 112Introduction to Compositing & Bridge
06:59 113Composite Workflow Techniques
34:01 114Landscape Composite Projects
24:14 115Bonus: Rothko and Workspace
05:15 116Bonus: Adding Textures to Photos
07:05 117Bonus: The Mask (Extras)
05:18 118Bonus: The Color Range Mask in ACR
04:54Lesson Info
Smart Objects and Filters
Now we're gonna look at smart objects as they pertain to filters. So with this image, what I wanna do is, and I know we haven't talked about filters yet, but I do wanna talk about filters as they pertain to smart objects. So what I'm gonna do with this is I'm gonna create two copies of this. I'm gonna make a background, I'm gonna take this background and I'm gonna duplicate is so we can see what happens between using a filter on a regular layer, a raster layer, and a filter on a vector layer, which is, or a smart object, which is a pixelated then becomes a vector layer. So we'll press command or control J and duplicate this. With this, we're gonna call it Non Smart, and double click this. Oops. We'll call this Smart. When I right click this, I'm going to convert to smart object. So from Adobe Camera Raw, when we pulled it in, we pressed and hold shift and it goes from opening the image to opening an object, here if we wanna turn any layer that we have in our layer stack into a smart ob...
ject, we just say convert to smart object. So now there's nothing different between these two right now. The only difference is happening between these two layers is that this one is a smart object, and this is one is not so smart. It's just a regular pixel layer. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do something, let's just do some type of a blur on here. So I'm gonna go to Filter, go to Blur, go to Gaussian Blur. And I'm just gonna blur this quite a bit for that background area there. Just kinda get that kinda boca kinda look. And press okay. Now what you'll notice is that once I use that filter, that filter is now all over that entire image. And if I wanted to mask on here to get rid of that stuff, the only thing I could do is maybe make a duplicate before I did the filter, and then I could go ahead and mask out. And I'll show you an example of that in a second here. But if I go to the smart object, and I go to Filter, and I use Gaussian Blur, or if I just press Alt Control F, I get the exact same settings that I used before, press enter. You'll notice that now we don't just have the smart object here, we have a bunch of other stuff that happens below it. And the bunch of other stuff that's happening below it is I get all the settings of the Gaussian Blur, and then I get something called a smart filter mask, where anything that happens in here will be masked within this area. It's really cool. So let me go ahead and just double click here on this Gaussian Blur, and you can see here that if I didn't like the settings I had before, I can boost them up, or I can make them less. It happens right there within that Gaussian Blur. Press Okay. If I turn this top layer off first, that probably would help a little bit. The difference here is that if I click here now on this smart filter, and I press B for my brush tool, I get my handy dandy watermark, I'm gonna go ahead and use a soft focus brush, I'm gonna make that brush a little bit larger, and then I'm gonna paint areas on this mask where I don't want that filter to show up. And if I make sure I have my brush tool selected and not my clone stamp tool, that would be another great thing. So I'll press B for the brush tool, right click, there we go. So now, oh, I know what's happening. (laughing) I'm actually, see if you look right here, I keep accidentally selecting the clone stamp tool which was one of the last tools that was used here. So I have to go to a regular brush, there we go. That's a big brush, very big brush. So I'm gonna press my left bracket key and make that smaller. And then I'm just gonna start brushing with black on here, and brush out that area where I don't want that effect to happen. Maybe I'll even do that up here. Now that effect is not happening on anything I want to be in focus, but it's kind of giving me a soft focus view of what's happening on the outside. Make sure my black is selected and paint this area out. Okay, that looks good. So what's the difference between doing it that way and duplicating a couple different pixel based layers? So let's just go ahead and do this. In the history palette, I'm gonna teach you something new. If we press this button right here, this button in the history palette will create a new document from all the stuff that's happening right now within this one. So if I press this button, you'll notice I have all the exact same layers, the only thing I don't have is my history palette. So let me go back here. And I'll go back to the very beginning of this. If I wanted to do this without using smart objects, what I would do is I'd have to press Command or Control J, I'd have to use all of my filter settings I have for that Gaussian Blur on this background layer. I'd have to make a mask on there, and I'd have to brush on that mask to get rid of that. It's the same thing essentially. The only difference that's happening here is that this is happening on two layers, which can easily get convoluted and mixed up, and this is happening on one layer. And at any time on this one, I can't go back to this Gaussian Blur. If I said, you know what, after masking that out, that is just way too blurred, I can't go back. I'm stuck with that. I can go back in history, and I can keep building it up. But then if I go back in history, I have to keep re-brushing my mask. So with this, if I double click on this Gaussian Blur and I say, you know, that was way too much, we just drop that down. You can watch right now how it starts to slowly go down, still contains that mask within it. Pretty cool, huh? Now anything that happens within this smart object that smart mask is going to cover all of them. So let's just do something crazy. Let's go to filter, let's go to distort and do something I never do, but just to show you an example. And I'll use something like Twirl. And if I twirl this, like that, and press Okay, really kinda trippy. What happens here is that this smart filter mask is not allowing that twirl to affect any of the rest of the image because it's all clumped in with that smart mask. All of the things that are happening within that smart filter are being blocked by the smart mask. So if you go, well I'll just Gaussian Blur this, and then I'll get another mask for the Twirl, that's not necessarily gonna be the case. That filter applies to everything that's below, you can see there's a hierarchy here. If at any time you don't wanna see that, you can just click the eyeball off, click the eyeball on, and you don't see what's happening with any of the smart filters that are happening below. If we just wanna turn one of them off, we can just turn Twirl off and not see the Twirl, and if we don't like it, we can right click it and we can delete it and just get rid of that smart filter and we still have the Gaussian Blur one. So this is a great way to take a little detour with your image. What you notice there is I did do the history swap there, so you could see that I took a little detour. So anytime I wanna take a little detour in the process, the workflow process, I'll use that button in the history palette to pop me over, give me a new document, so that I can work between both of them. That was just basically just to show you the example of what's happening with smart objects and non-smart objects and filters. But using a smart object on a layer with those filters just gives you the opportunity to try something new on your image that you might not have been brave enough or bold enough to try. Because you can always go back. After I'm done with this, I'm like, you know what, I really don't like this, I can right click, and I can delete either the filter mask or all of the smart filters that are below. Right click, delete smart filter. Oh, sorry, delete smart filter, not disable smart filter. And now I have nothing in there. And I still that smart object. So if I wanted to start from square one, I'm good to go. Again, if I like that, and I like the way that blur looked, I could right click, and if I rasterize that layer, that smart data that's in there, let me go back here real quick, I disabled the filters. If I right click and I rasterize that layer with all those filters on there, you'll notice that we no longer have the smart object there anymore, and all that data has now been plopped onto that image. And now it's stuck there, forever. We cannot go back. Unless we go back in history. Control Z, Control Alt Z, keep going back. But that can be a really added benefit when you're working with filters, if you wanna just take a little detour, see what's gonna happen with your image, go ahead and hop into those filters real quick with the smart object, that way you can always double click and play around with them. Otherwise, you keep chasing your tail over and over and over again, trying those filters and getting different effects.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
Robert Andrews
Blake Rudis is the absolute best in teaching photoshop. His knowledge and how he presents the instruction is clear and concise - there is NO ONE BETTER. Yes, his classes require some basic skills, and maybe I'd organize the order of (or group) the classes in a different order, but, let me be clear - if anyone is to be successful or famous in the Photoshop world, it should be Blake Rudis. I strongly recommend his teaching. I started photography and post processing in 2018, and because of this class, I'm know what Im doing. The energy you get when you create something beautiful is profound, it makes you bounce out of bed (at 4AM) like a 5 year old, to go create. It's a great ride! Thanks Blake, & Thanks Creative live.
a Creativelive Student
Amazing course, but don't be fooled into thinking this is a beginner's course for photographers. The problem isn't Blake's explanations; they're top. The problem is the vast scope of this course and the order in which the topics are presented. Take layers for example. When I was first learning Photoshop (back when we learned from books), I found I learned little or nothing from, for example, books that covered layers before they covered how to improve/process photographs. These books taught me how to organize, move, and link layers before they showed me what a layer was actually for. Those books tended to teach me everything there is to know about layers (types of layers, how to organize them, how to move them, how to move them two at a time, how to move them two at a time even if there are other layers between the two you're interested in, useful troubleshooting tips, etc. ) all before I even know (from a photographer's point of view) what it is the things actually do. The examples of organizing, linking, and moving mean everything for graphic designers from Day One, but for photographers not so much. Blake does the same thing as those books. Topics he covers extremely early demand a lot of theoretical imagination for a photographer who doesn't already know quite a bit about what he is talking about. Learning about abstract things first and concrete things later only makes PS that much harder to understand. If you AREN'T a beginner, however, this course is amazing. I thought it would be like an Army Bootcamp, taking you from zero and building you into a fit, competent Photoshop grunt. Now I think it's more like Army Bootcamp for high school varsity jocks. It isn't going to take you from the beginning, but the amount you'll get out of it is nonetheless more than your brain can imagine. I've been using PS for years to improve my photographs, and even to create the odd artistic composite or two. The amount I've learned in the first week is amazing, and every day I learn something -- more like many things -- which I immediately implement to improve my productivity and/or widen the horizons of what I can achieve. If you ARE a photographer who's a Photoshop beginner, I'd take very seriously the advice Blake gives in the introduction: Watch one lesson, and practice the skills and principles you learn in that one lesson for two weeks. THEN watch the next lesson. You can't do that of course without buying the course, so it's up to you to decide whether you'd like to learn Photoshop and master Photoshop all from the same course. Learning it first and mastering it later will cost more money, but I think you'll understand everything better and have a much more enjoyable ride in the process. As for me? I'm going to have to find the money to buy this course. There is simply way too much content in each lesson for me to try to take on all at once, but on the other hand I don't want to miss anything at all that he has to share.
Esther Gambrell
WOW!!! I've been purchasing CL classes for several years now and have watched HOURS of "How-To Photoshop" classes, but this is the first one I've actually purchased because of the AWESOME BONUS content!!! SERIOUSLY??!!?!? A PLUG-IN??? But not only that, Blake is SO easy to understand, and he breaks down concepts in different ways to connect with different people's learning styles. I REALLY appreciated this approach because I am a LEFT-BRAINED creative that has an engineering background, so I really connected to what Blake was saying. THANK YOU FOR THAT! There are TONS of Photoshop courses out there, but I found this one to be the most helpful in they way Blake teaches concepts so that you know WHY you're doing what your doing. I feel like he taught me how to fish with Photoshop to feed me for a lifetime instead of just giving me a fish to feed me for one day. This is the BEST overall PS course out there!!! Thank you!!!!