Is there a simple way to place a photo in a new background? (Page 2): Photo manipulation really is not so easy, even when you know how to do it. The worst part of it is how much time...

SusanFromVermont Loc: Southwest corner of Vermont

jerryc41 wrote:

Sad, but true, as with most photo manipulation. For those who know how, it's a snap. For the rest of us, not so much.

Photo manipulation really is not so easy, even when you know how to do it. The worst part of it is how much time it can take! Using LR & PS was a steep learning curve at the beginning, now the slope has leveled off a bit. But sometimes I want to kick myself for taking on the challenge of pictures with a lot of detail to deal with... I guess for me the time-consuming aspect is the most negative aspect of editing! But I still love doing it!!!

brent46 Loc: Grand Island, NY

The attached image was done in Paintshop Pro. The original photo was taken in a park in Niagara falls. I also took a picture of the sky. In PSP I converted the original to BW. I selected the mother and daughter and pasted them on the sky. It is pretty easy to do and only takes a few minutes.

Paintshop Pro can be purchased for a very reasonable price.

lroman61 Loc: San Antonio, TX

You can extract an image from an image using Preview and paste it somewhere else. See: https://support.apple.com/kb/PH20228?locale=en_US&viewlocale=en_US. It's not as precise as a "real" post-processing program, but it simple, it's part of MacOS, and it works fine for well-defined objects.

CPR Loc: Nature Coast of Florida

Once you've done some work with software to replace backgrounds you WILL start to take the original photo in such a way as to minimize the efforts to select the foreground object you want. You'll move and shift around to get a solid background or a background that is not the same color.

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

inbigd wrote:

Hello

I don't have any image programs except the standard ones that come with Mac and Windows.

If I take a picture of the moon let's say and want to change the background or cut and paste the moon into a new background, is there a simple way to do this?

thanks

What you need is a proper post-processing application. We used to use Kodalith line film masks to do this, and it was a pain in the patoot. Now, we use something like Photoshop.

It helps if you understand CHROMA KEY photography, which is sometimes called "green screen" or "blue screen" photography because solid primary color canvas backgrounds are used to "drop out" the color in software, which also creates a PNG file with a transparent background. The PNG allows you to place that image on top of another.

Sinewsworn Loc: Port Orchard, WA

mborn wrote:

There are many options the easiest ones are with a clean background like the sky. In PS use a selection tool to outline the object The new refine and mask feature on PS CC works well place the object on a new the object on a new layer and a layer with the new background But read about how to do this there is a learning curve

I took the 2nd image and PP into the 1st image

Beautiful! Must spend more time with PS!

Fotoartist Loc: Detroit, Michigan

Send the two images to me and I'll do it for you, no charge.

mrmal Loc: Saskatoon, Sask, Canada

I use either "Affinity" or "Pixelmator". Available on the App store and both do a good job. There are instruction videos available on how to do this. Much much less expensive than Photoshop and these are made for a Mac so they work very well.

Billy Bob

I use this every day.
http://www.photography-lighting.com/green-screen-wizard-free-download.html
I'm going to get this one.
http://www.layercakeelements.com/blasts/Summer-Sale.2016/index.html

Harvey Loc: Pioneer, CA

I truly enjoy doing this with certain photos - this is my suggestion about what works best for me. first off there are dozens of tutorials out there both in video and written/printed form. My self I like the printed form as you can easily walk thru the steps one at a time checking them off as you go - understanding that each step is not carved in stone and can be reworked quite easily till you have finished a project that is satisfying to you.

As for the video tutorials they are good to watch how the process works but I find them too hard to follow at the speed they work thru.

Like Jerry said some of us find this easy and others find it difficult - I found it quite easy after many many practice efforts.
If you have a PS program the "extract" tool/process makes this a snap.

Harvey

inbigd wrote:

Hello

I don't have any image programs except the standard ones that come with Mac and Windows.

If I take a picture of the moon let's say and want to change the background or cut and paste the moon into a new background, is there a simple way to do this?

thanks

Billy Bob

I been trying for years to remove backgrounds from photo. Green screen wizard is the best if you use green screen. I seen the video for laycakes removal of backgrounds and it looks good to me. But at $200. maybe. I do a lot of digital background work it will be worth it. I buy a lot of backgrounds and templates on ebay. I have files of about every thing there it 1000s. I take day to go photograph this and that to go in a file. Been doing this most of my 78 years. Norman Rockwell got me into photography back in the 50s. Its EZer to take a photo then them modeling for you to painting them from life. A little more of my bull.
www.bbnpb.com

Billy Bob

youtube

JimRPhoto Loc: Raleigh NC

I learned how to do this through this forum (experienced people) and "Elements 15 for Dummies." Basically, you have to use the layer technique. I had a perfectly exposed group photo at the beach, with a totally blown out sky and ocean. I was able to put the good group photo on a new background layer, and you would never know.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

inbigd wrote:

Hello

I don't have any image programs except the standard ones that come with Mac and Windows.

If I take a picture of the moon let's say and want to change the background or cut and paste the moon into a new background, is there a simple way to do this?

thanks

It's quite easy - but you need to use On1, Photoshop, Corel, Topaz, etc to do the selection for copy-pasting one image into the other.

sterrill Loc: missouri

I don't think there is an easy way. Photoshop will do it but the learning curve is steep.