Photoshop Masking Lessons
There are lots of ways to select objects and do cut outs. Do
Right click on the following image and "View Image"
Masking and Replacing a background with a COMPLEX foreground
When the foreground is difficult to separate from the background, it is necessary to use some very special steps. Review the following tutorial for the steps necessary to complete a background replacement on your photo.
Great thanks to Sam Briggs, a fellow DPReviewer from Idaho, for developing the following tutorial!!
1. I started by duplicating the background layer. Then I used the Pen Tool to select the entire Bride, veil and all (refer to the Paths palette to see the paths). I then Ctrl + left clicked on the Full Body And Veil path to turn it into a selection. Next, I went to the Channels palette and created a new channel by using the “Create New Channel” button at the bottom of the channels palette. After that I made sure I had white as my foreground color and hit Alt + Backspace to fill the active selection with white.
2. I next used the Pen Tool to select the veil in front and behind her (refer to the Paths palette to see the paths).
3. Next I opened the new background photo. Using the move tool I moved the background photo into the bride’s photo. In the Layers palette I dragged the new background (now Layer 1) in between the Background & Background Copy layers.
4. Go to the Paths palette and Ctrl+left click the Veil Only path to turn it into a selection. Feather the selection a small amount (1or 2px). Look at the separate channels and see which one has the best detail in the veil. In this case it is the Blue Channel. Choose Image>Calculations, and set Source 1 channel to Blue and Source 2 channel to Full Body. Set Blending mode to Multiply, place a check mark in the Mask checkbox. Under Mask… set Channel to selection and for Result: select New Channel.
5. Your mask should now look like this:
6. Go to the Channels palette and click on the new channel (should be Alpha 1). It should look like the B&W pic above. Hit Ctrl + A to select all, Ctrl + C to copy that to the clipboard, and then Ctrl + D to deselect. Return to the Layers palette and Alt + Click on the Background Copy layer mask. This will change the view so you see just the current mask. Hit Ctrl + V to paste the new mask (which you copied to the clipboard earlier) and replace the current mask. Alt + click on the mask to return to a normal view.
7. The veil appeared too transparent at this point. Making sure that the Background Copy layer mask is targeted I went to the Paths palette and reloaded the Veil Only paths as selections (ctrl + clicked on them) and returned to the Layers palette. I then ran Levels and increased the brightness of the veil part of the mask. It looked like this after I was finished:
8. After lightening the veil area of the mask the dress below it was too bright. I used the Pen Tool to select the area shown in the photo below and converted into a selection. With the selection active I held down the Alt key and added a Levels Adjustment layer by selecting it from the bottom of the Layers palette (the half black – half white circle icon). In the New Layer dialog box choose “Use Previous Layer To Create Clipping Mask” When you have an active selection and add an adjustment layer, it will automatically create a mask from your active selection so your adjustment will only affect the selected area. In the Levels dialog box I used the middle slider to darken that area. Having it on the adjustment layer will allow you to adjust layer later if needed.
9. The veil appeared to have a color cast so I reselected it (with the Veil Only path) and ran Hue/Saturation on it (Ctrl+U) and move the Saturation slider all the way to the left.
10. I decided to add some blue color to the veil. I reselected the veil (Paths palette) and then entered Quick Mask mode (Q) and used the Brush Tool (with black as foreground color) and painted over the back of the veil so it would be de-selected. Hit Q to return to normal mode and only the front of the veil should be selected. I then held down Alt and added a Hue/Sat adjustment layer and in the New Layer dialog box chose “Use Previous Layer To Create Clipping Mask” . In the Hue/Sat dialog box I chose the Colorize checkbox. My settings were Hue: 216, Saturation: 9, Lightness 32.
11. I repeated the same steps as in Step 10 but made it so the rear of the veil was selected instead. Settings for it were Hue: 216, Saturation: 12, Lightness: -16.
12. The final Layer stack looked like this:
Final Product:
Here is another set of steps used on this pic:
1. Duplicated the background layer.
2. Created an empty layer for the new background.
3. Went to the channels palette and duplicated the Red Channel (by grabbing & dragging the Red Channel over the New Channel icon in the channels palette). Used dodge & burn tool to clean up mask.
4. Returned to layers palette and chose the New Background layer and created my
new background.
5. Placed New Background layer between Background layer and Background Copy layer.
6. Went to channels palette and Ctrl-left clicked on the Red Copy channel to turn it into a selection. Then returned to the layers palette.
7. I chose the Background Copy layer and then chose the Add A Mask icon at the bottom of the layers palette (square icon with circle in it).
8. After that I used the polygonal lasso tool to select just the parts of her hair that had fringing and feathered it (4 or 5 px).
9. Then, while holding down the Alt key I chose a Hue/Sat adjustment layer from the layers palette (the half black/half white circle icon) and then checked the box that says "Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask". Make sure you have the Background Copy layer chosen before you create the Hue/Sat adj. layer.
10. Then adjust the Blue & Cyan sliders to remove the fringing.
Another variation of the steps above:
- Using Smaller PSD file for there is no Background copy. I started with the Luminosity selection instead of the red channel to create a mask
- Place new background on top of image
added layer mask
- added empty layer between the two layers and painted the fringe away and cloned out the text.
Yet another variation to create the following:
New background: 
From the original: 