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My friend loves snapshots. She'll shoot a whole
roll of 36 at the most mundane event, get double prints made and
then pass every single pair of prints around to everyone who'll
gather in a circle.
Me, I hate snapshot circles. As a digital
photographer/inkjet printer, I employ a lot of techniques to cut
down on the number of snapshots on our refrigerator door. One of
these is the snapshot montage.
Let's examine the typical snapshot. It contains
two or more people standing in front of a wall mirror, grinning
inanely at the camera. It is followed by the same pair, joined
by two more folks (who have said, "oh, I want to get in the
picture."). Half of these people suffer from redeye. The
mirror's reflected flash burns out 70 percent of the background.
OK, so I'm being a little harsh. Or am I?
Vacation snapshots are the same people looking at the camera
while various scenic backdrops are flashed behind them. Or so it
seems.
So a snapshot montage is one answer. In
Photoshop, I open a new file at 222ppi and 8x10 in size. The
background can be white or any other color (or image) you
choose. I selected black. Then, from my collection of images, I
open the first one and using the Move tool, drag it over to the
snapshot montage. Close the image file.
Using free transform, resize the image and move
it to the position it will occupy in the montage. Now, perform a
Save and name the montage. Since it contains layers, it will
have a .psd suffix.
Continue adding images by opening them and
moving to the montage until your montage page is filled. Since
each image occupies its own layer, layout can be tweaked and
adjusted. Individual layers can be cropped by using the
rectangular marquee tool and erasing excess imagery.
Cropping is usually necessary as most snapshots
contain lots of wasted background. Finally, adding a type layer
with a title such as "Christening of Rhonda's Wolverine," will
help you remember the event years from now.
Captions were added and then rasterized and
flattened to a single type layer. Finally, I added the "Tuscany"
headline and larger type and gave it a drop shadow. The last
step was to run an Outer Glow layer effect on the photo layer.
Print the montage as a single page for passing around to your
circle of friends.
Next week, we'll examine Photoshop's automatic
Picture Package feature and learn how to make a second type of
snapshot montage. |