Basic effects and layers tutorial for Photoshop

Posted on February 23, 2009 at 5:27 am

Photoshop’s layers allows you to work with images stacked on each other. This means you can work with them individually so you won’t have to manage multiple complex filters and effects on a single layer. This is why the basic knowledge of layers is a Photoshop fundamental. To illustrate how layers work, I outlined the steps below on how to create layers and apply effects to them.

Open your preferred digital photo in Adobe Photoshop. Next, create two (2) duplicate layers by doing a right click on your original layer and choose Duplicate Layer. Just hit the OK button in the box that will pop-up. Do this twice so that you will have 2 duplicates.

You will have 3 layers visible in your layers palette. Rename each of the layers so that you will not be confused in doing your work in each of the said layers.

Work on Layer 1 by choosing or left clicking the layer.

In the Filter menu, choose Artistic then Film Grain.

A control panel will appear. Since you already chose the Film Grain effect, it is already selected in the dropdown. You can also try other effects listed in the control panel. You can adjust Grain, Highlight Area and Intensity to enhance the effect of the image according to your preference. Click the OK button to finalize the changes made.

Select Layer 2.

In the Filter menu, choose Pixelate then Color Halftone.

A control panel box will then appear. Adjust only the Max Radius field then Click OK.

Choose from the blend mode options in the upper left side of your layers palette.

In the Layers Control panel, select Layer1 and Layer2. Right click and left-click on Convert to Smart Object.

Before:

After:

You may try to use other filters and parameters to achieve effects. The idea is to be more organized with your layers so you can easily alter effects as you use more and more of them.