Dipstick...

... triptych

[finished version on my [url=http://www.blipfoto.com/entry/1373058]Kinda Horrigans[/url] journal]

This is a third of the final image, to be honest - for the first time on blipfoto, I decided to do a triptych (three images in one), but it's hard to show the 'before' on that!

Editing was a bit tricky. First, I took my three images and opened them in photoshop. Then, copied two images and pasted them onto the remaining one - so the three images existed as three layers in a single file (still with me?). You then drag one of the top two layers to one side, and the other to the other side - dragging them until they just disappear from view. Click on Image > Reveal all and all three images can then be seen. However, there's no space between them that way, so click on the middle layer and move that to the right by pressing the right cursor five times. Then, the top layer to the left, by pressing the left cursor five times. This gives a nice 5 pixel white gap between your images. Again, click on Image > Reveal all to make sure that you can now see your widened triptych.

Then, flattened the layers - and did a bit of fiddling. Namely using Silver Efex Pro and doing a full spectrum (harsh) conversion to black and white - however, it didn't stay black and white because I changed the blend mode from 'normal' to 'soft light' which means it acts as a kind of dodge and burn on your colour image. After that, a tiny bit of additional dodging and burning using a 50% grey overlay layer and a white brush to bring out some detail on his face. Flattened. Sharpened. Saved.

Tip of the Day:
If you fancy making a triptych, then there's a useful tutorial from Adobe which shows you how to do just that in Photoshop. Have to say, I find this stuff fiddly and I'm not great at it - but it's always good to force yourself out of your comfort zone, right?