ramblin21 Loc: Sharon,Wisconsin

I have been looking for Royalty Free Backgrounds and found many, when viewing them on site it
shows a photo enlarged but only one. So I select my desired size from list and download. I use them as Patterns for backgrounds where the current BG in a photo is rather unpleasing. Now I have all kinds of Patterns and when inserted ( I use PSE 12) into a photo it has from 3-12 smaller tiles
of same photo, so I have to clone out the lines where they intersect-this is a real pain. My question
how to I get only the larger single photo so I will not have to do so much cloning and have a more
consistent background-also is there a setting in PSE 12 that needs to be set to stop this behavior?
Any Help with this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks Hal
P.S. I get these photos from Pixabay.com

Leitz Loc: Solms

Perhaps you could borrow a camera and shoot your own backgrounds.

jdubu Loc: San Jose, CA

I would think the people to ask are at pixabay.com since they will know how the photos should be accessed. It's kind of a shot in the dark to hope someone here uses the same site and will eventually see your predicament. But, you never know...

Sounds like the photos are being downloaded in a tiling format as a background instead of as a full background.

Another thing to do is stockpile photos for use as backgrounds. I will go out and shoot specifically to capture files for backgrounds, whether of skies, horizons, fields, restaurants, textures, etc. Anything that can either replace an iffy background or would help give a sense of place to the story I am working.

Bill_de Loc: US

I just took a quick look at the site. It looks like you have to insert the size you want, in pixels, in the size drop down box.

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lightcatcher Loc: Farmington, NM (4 corners)

pixabay is a great site other good ones is wikipedia and the library of congress..

BillR139 Loc: Cocoa Beach, FL

You might try downloading Photoshop CX2, do not try to register it. Adobe allows this older version as a free download. My local newspaper editor told my about it. Open your photo and adjust the size and pixel count to make it as large as you want.
I use it to resize and adjust shots for a weekly PowerPoint show.
Good luck!

James R. Kyle Loc: Saint Louis, Missouri (A Suburb of Ferguson)

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Personally = I make my own backgrounds and "screensavers" ... Most of the backgrounds that I make use of are clouds. I have a LOT of "bald-sky" photographs that Need a more interesting sky - so I "cheat" and in the aspect of Artistic Photography this is OKay to do. I am NOT a journalistic photographer.

anneabc

I have a question about making my own digital backgrounds. I've bought ones online, and there is a specific way they are shot so as to have a blurred out area, then have the middle area sharp for the subject, and maybe blurred a bit in the back. I love the idea of shooting my own backgrounds but wondered if there's a certain technique for this. Also, say the bg is of flowers. It may have an overlay to put on top of the subject and first bg in order to make it look more real. Is there a video on this that tells how to do it? Thanks

jdubu Loc: San Jose, CA

Shooting backgrounds isn't hard, but it takes some thought and preparation.

You need to be aware of your position so the angle of view of your background is close to the view of your subject you want to place. If you always shoot from a standing height, then your backgrounds need to be from a similar point of view... you don't want to shoot a person from the front and add a background shot pointing straight down on a yard, for an extreme example. If you find promising backgrounds, maybe shoot from different angles and heights to give you choices of use for future post edits.

You need to understand depth of field and focus to answer your question about blur and sharpness and how to utilize it with your camera. There are many videos, books and on-line tutorials (just search youtube) to give you the answers.

If you need to add foregrounds to your composites, remember to shoot for them in mind as you would backgrounds. the process is basically the same. Angle of view, depth of field and focus.

anneabc

Thanks, jdubu.

ramblin21 Loc: Sharon,Wisconsin

Thanks to all who have commented and your suggestions they are very appreciated. So far no luck
from pixabay except they seam to think it is a bug in PSE 12. Contacting Adobe will hopefully find
solution an if I do I will let all UHH members know what resolved the issue.