In the last post, I showed how to turn a photo into a stencil. This time, we’ll be adding a lace effect to this photo.
Wedding Kiss – Courtesy Pixabay and Peter Klaus
Using this photo:
Chrysanthemum from Windows 10 default photo set
After inserting the photo and changing the background colour, go to Picture Tools>Format>Picture Corrections. Set Sharpnessto 100%. The picture may look worse at this point, but don’t worry.
The photo has had Sharpness applied to the maximum
Now, set Contrastto 100%. Yep, it definitely looks worse.
Photo with 100% Contrast applied
Select Picture Color and adjust Saturationto 0%
Photo with Saturation reduced to zero
Things are looking up again. Select Picture Tools>Format>Color>Set Transparent Color. Click on a black portion of the picture.
The photo with black portions removed
Now is the time for a little cropping and copying that will make the lace effect stand out.
Cropping and mirroring the photo, makes it look more “lace like”
And finally, layer the lace over the Wedding Kiss photo for the result.
The combined photo
Next week, I show how a variation of these techniques creates a duotone photo.
Duotone photos are the current thing online and you can buy software or use a service to convert your photos into duotone photos. But did you know that you can easily create duotone photos in PowerPoint?
Along the way to this technique, I’ll show you how to make stencils and lace out of your photos as well.
Stencils
Windows 10 default penguin photo
I’m going to use this photo of penguins to make a stencil type image. I’m using Office 365, but this can be done in PowerPoint 2010 as well. I’ve also changed the background colour of my slides. This isn’t necessary, but will make the images easier to understand.
After inserting the photo and changing the background colour, go to Picture Tools>Format>Artistic Effects. You can use either the Photocopy effect or the Cutout effect. The main difference will be the amount of small detail retained by the photo. I like the Cutout option with this photo.
The first step in creating a stencil, applying the Cutout Effect
Reduce the number of shades to 1
The Cutout now has a the number of shades reduced to zero
Select Picture Corrections and adjust Contrastto 100%
The contrast on the picture is now 100%
Select Picture Color and adjust Saturationto 0%
Saturation on the picture is now set to zero, removing the small blue highlights that were visible before.
Even if you are on Office 365, you’ll need to use the Ribbon. The Set Transparent Color command is not on the Picture Color Tab. Select Picture Tools>Format>Color>Set Transparent Color. Click on a black portion of the picture. Voila! A stencil of Penguins that takes on the colour of the slide background.
After the black portions of the picture have been removed, the slide background is visible.
Next, I’ll show a variation on this technique to make a “lace” overlay.
For those of you who haven’t had one of my seminars on using PowerPoint to create powerful image quotes for your social media feed; now’s the time to get out into the garden with your camera phone and take a few photos.
Chrysanthemum
You need to create a stockpile of good background photos that you can use for fresh quotes. And summertime in your garden is a great time and place to do this.
Closeups of plants and flowers make a great background for a variety of quotes – like this one I found on the Olds Municipal Library Facebook feed.
A wonderful quote from Jo Walton.
You can see how they use a transparent overlay over part of the picture to help the text stand out.
You may not have an immediate need for those pictures, but you can set them aside for later use, like this image of purple pink chrysanthemums (my chrysanthemums are looking particularly lovely this year, due to the fact I’ve just bought them).
The colour of these flowers, will do nicely for a different Valentines’ Day image quote.
You don’t need a fancy camera to get these pictures, the camera on your phone will do just fine. But do make sure you take your pictures in both horizontal and vertical orientations to make sure you have more layout options later on.
When you don’t know how you’ll be using those photos, options are very good.
Don’t just focus on flowers (hehe, see what I did there), leaves and foliage are useful too.
Hey! I think I see a face in there!
Don’t forget that the same picture can be used multiple ways, once you start throwing colour filters and special effects at it.
Left is original photo – the right has the saturation cranked up.
Oh, and that image has been flipped, since I like the leaves appearing on the right side of the photo better.
A final tip, when saving your image quotes, use the PNG format, it creates fewer artifacts (small jiggly lines that make text harder to read) than JPEG.
Finally, be sure to create your image quotes in the right dimensions Facebook, Twitter etc. I have have some pre-sized templates that you can use.
