After some Photoshop advice, please!

[Kermit power]

Afternoon all! I'm hoping someone can help me out with Photoshop?

I have a group photo on which I've just about managed to capture the one really recalcitrant person who didn't want to be in said photo. There is a very valid reason for including everyone that she wasn't aware of at the time, that we couldn't explain without ruining a surprise for someone else in the group, so I set out to move the offending person closer into the shot.

I've figured out easily enough how to select and move them using the "Select Object" tool, and it has worked brilliantly. What I can't do, though, is figure out how to then copy, resize and paste the selection, as I want to do another photo with lots of tiny versions of the person hidden around the photo.

Could anyone point me at a tutorial that covers how to resize the selection? I've tried all sorts of trial and error, but nothing actually seems to do anything.

[StevieBee]

Just duplicate the layer that contains the cut out person. Select the new layer, select, the object, position and repeat. If you need to have some of them hidden behind something, rasterise layer and use the eraser tool to remove the hidden part - drop the opacity down so you can see what your doing but pull it back up when done.

[RobbieTheTruth]

Post the pic and an instruction of what you want removing. People will do the exact opposite of what you want and there will be japes.

[Simpo Two]

Kermit power said:

I've figured out easily enough how to select and move them using the "Select Object" tool, and it has worked brilliantly. What I can't do, though, is figure out how to then copy, resize and paste the selection, as I want to do another photo with lots of tiny versions of the person hidden around the photo

Copy is Ctrl/C.

Paste is Ctrl/V. That gives you a second head over the first. See it in the Layers window.

Move it to where you want with the Move tool (top one in the tools list).

Then resize: Image > Transform > Scale, and drag the box to suit.

[Kermit power]

Simpo Two said:

Copy is Ctrl/C.

Paste is Ctrl/V. That gives you a second head over the first. See it in the Layers window.

Move it to where you want with the Move tool (top one in the tools list).

Then resize: Image > Transform > Scale, and drag the box to suit.

Thanks. I'll give the resize a try.

[Kermit power]

I've tried the Image Resize, but I can't figure out how to get it to do just one layer? It insists on resizing all layers at the same time, whether they're visible or not.

[Simpo Two]

OK I've fired up my copy (2020) and I used Image not Edit by mistake... the perils of PS by memory...

Try this:

Select the layer you want to adjust.
From the top drop-down menus, choose Edit > Transform > Scale
Drag it to the size you want.

Owzat?

[WelshChris]

RobbieTheTruth said:

Post the pic and an instruction of what you want removing. People will do the exact opposite of what you want and there will be japes.

This

[C n C]

Kermit power said:

I've figured out easily enough how to select and move them using the "Select Object" tool, and it has worked brilliantly. What I can't do, though, is figure out how to then copy, resize and paste the selection, as I want to do another photo with lots of tiny versions of the person hidden around the photo.

Could anyone point me at a tutorial that covers how to resize the selection? I've tried all sorts of trial and error, but nothing actually seems to do anything.

If you have the person selected, use Ctrl C to copy and Ctrl V to paste it.
In the photo below, I've just used the mag lasso tool to select the cat's head (badly).
Screen Shot 2023-05-15 at 10.15.43 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

After Ctrl C and Ctry V, a new layer (layer 1) is created:
Screen Shot 2023-05-15 at 10.35.31 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Select the new layer, then click on the person (cat's head) with the "move object" tool (top left) - this will select the object and put a square around it with boxes at the corners and the middle of the sides:
Screen Shot 2023-05-15 at 10.35.57 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

You can then click on the object and drag it around to move it. Clicking and dragging on one of the corner boxes allows you to resize it:
Screen Shot 2023-05-15 at 10.36.21 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

If you want to make multiple copies of the object, right click on the layer (layer 1 in my photo), and select "duplicate layer". This will make a copy (in this example "layer 1 copy"), which you can again click on and move/resize using the move tool.
Screen Shot 2023-05-15 at 10.38.14 by conradsphotos, on Flickr

Depending on how good the selection of your person in the photo is, there are several ways of merging the moved object into the overall scene, as often just plonking the object on a different part of the photo can leave jarring/obvious edges.

If you want to integrate it more smoothly, then you want to look at using "layer masks". These are a great way of deleting parts of a photo in a totally reversible manner - I'd never advise using the "eraser" tool as it is essentially non-reversible, as it edits the layer.

If the above is of any use, and you want to know a bit more about layer masks, then I'll happily do a simple example for you.

I learned a lot about moving/resizing/integrating people into different scenes through the " Photoshop Bobbers" thread!

[C n C]

WelshChris said:

RobbieTheTruth said:

Post the pic and an instruction of what you want removing. People will do the exact opposite of what you want and there will be japes.

This

Yeah - definitely do this!

[Kermit power]

Much thanks to Simpo and C n C!

I've finally cracked it. Slightly different with PS 2023, but close enough to get me there.

[Simpo Two]

Hooray!

I first encountered PS when most of my computing experience was word processing. From there, PS makes no sense at all. And then suddenly you start figuring stuff out and learning what bits you need to do what you want. Often there are several ways to achieve the same results, just as your DSLR will be set up quite differently from someone else's. Some people love layer masks but I've never found the need for them.

A common mistake is to try to do something with the wrong layer selected, or before using Ctrl/A on the image, in which case nothing happens. My only gripe with it is the need to 'rasterise' subsequent images - you didn't need to before so it's an extra step.

[singlecoil]

When you've moved your selection onto a new layer, be sure to right click on the layer and 'covert to smart object' before resizing.