Discover Digital Textile Printing for Fashion & Textiles Photo montage and engineered prints

Task one Photo montage on Photoshop

Stage 1. Finding appropriate imagery  Find at least 4 or 5 appropriate images of flowers (it doesn’t just have to be flowers) using Google images Make sure you use large images  Save images onto desktop ready to open in Photoshop  You can also use any photographs you have taken yourself for this task

Stage 2. Open files in Photoshop  Open all your photos in Photoshop  Click on Edit in Quick Mask Mode at the bottom of the tool bar  Select the paintbrush and soften the edges by reducing the hardness

Stage 3. Use quick mask to select flower  Use the paintbrush to colour in the flower that you want to select. It should appear pale red.

 Zoom in to paint more neatly using cmnd +  Use the box bracket keys to make the brush bigger or smaller  Go back a stage using history if you go out of the lines

 When you have coloured the entire flower click on edit in standard mode (same button as before)  The background will now be selected by marching ants select the inverse to select the flower

 Open a new A4 page and copy and paste your flower onto it

Stage 4. Use the quick selection tool to select another flower  This tool is not always effective for every selection but is very quick!  Choose the quick selection tool and click on areas you want to select until entire flower is selected  Copy and paste onto A4 page

Stage 5. Use polygonal lasso to select flower  This tool is best for when it is a hard selection to make  Select polygonal lasso tool from tool bar  Change the feather to 1 pixel  Slowly click around the flower  To finish the selection click back to your start point

Stage 6. Add or removes parts of selections  When making any selections to add or remove any parts of the selection use the polygonal lasso tool  Hold down alt and then select areas you want to remove from the existing selection  Hold down shift and then select areas you want to add to the existing selection

Stage 6. Select the rest of your flowers  Use the most effective selection technique to select the rest of your flowers  Copy and paste them all onto the A4 page

Stage 7. Arrange flowers into montage  Cmnd T to transform  Ctrl click for options (scale, rotate, flip)  Duplicate layer to repeat same flower

Stage 8. Arrange flowers into mirrored montage  Try creating mirrored design by arranging motifs on one side of page. Then select all layers by holding shift and duplicate them  Free transform and flip horizontal then drag onto other side of page

Stage 9. Add a coloured background  Click on the background layer  Create new fill or adjustment later by clicking on middle icon at bottom of layers palette  Choose solid colour  Select a colour which works with your design. Use eyedropper tool to choose colours from your existing motifs

Stage 10. Experiment with the filter gallery  Select layers individually and experiment with different filters in the filter gallery to create different effects in your design filter – filter gallery