A new Junior Member to the Photoshop 911 forums sent samples and asked...
Can anyone suggest a technique, tutorial or plugin that can help me create realistic mirror surface reflections of an isolated image in photoshop.
Many people these days are enamoured with the latest craze of photographing products on a glass surface with the product reflecting a very smooth, liquid reflection. Apple made it popular with their iPhone imagery.
In the old days, we had to go to some fairly lengthy set building in order to accomplish the look, but today you can do it in mere moments.
The object itself has a lot to do with the relative success of this technique. Best case scenario is a good, straight-on product shot. This eliminates the need for oblique reversals which take a lot of time, and need to have a perspective slant in order to look convincing. (See reader's example.)
Creating the reflections
Let's use this shot of a Pentax camera.
Note I've carefully cut it out of the background so no slivers of white are showing. Mistakes in removing the background will be glaring once we build the illusion.
To make the illusion, we need a much larger expanse of background.
Here, using the Crop tool, we can drag the handles beyond the image area and visually estimate the size we'll be needing. Once you commit the crop, the canvas will be expanded to fit the size indicated.
Since any reflection into glass or a liquid is a 'mirror' image of the original, we have to create that copy.
The easiest way is to merely float a copy (Cntrl/J or Cmd/J) and with the Move Tool (Tap V) drag the top, center handle down below the bottom. I'm going to leave the dragged image just a bit compressed. This lends a bit more realism to the scene.
Next: we'll create the background to reflect the image
For ongoing original content about Photoshop, painting, color and image retouching visit DTG Magazine's Photoshop Content areas at: www.Graphic-Design.com/Photoshop
Use the SUBMIT BUTTON to enter your favorite Photoshop resource or tutorials site. It will be added to the Photoshop 911 directory database for caller referrals, as well as the Photoshop911 Blog.
Understand that a volunteer will visit, and validate the link. Please do NOT add front pages or empty content pages like lists of tutorials or other links. Please add ONLY one resource per submission, and make sure the link goes directly to the referenced resource. Let us know if you wish to be a Photoshop 911 volunteer
Please REGISTER YOUR SERVICES with Photoshop 911 so you can be called upon when emergencies require a professional in the field who is available to take on new clients. Once you register you will be contacted for particulars. Please be patient, there's already a long list.
from the Editor:
I was delighted that day back in 1989 when Peggy Killburn called to ask if I could handle one more speaker in my "Great Graphics Tips & Tricks" session scheduled for the 1990 Macworld Expo. "Yes" was my response to her request to add Russell Brown to my panel. After all, we loved Adobe's young "Illustrator" program, and were quite anxious to try out their upcoming new product called "Photoshop." After seeing his demo, I was convinced Photoshop would be big. So the next month we added "Photoshop Tips & Tricks" to our regular DTG Magazine uploads to Compuserve, GEnie and AOL. The rest is history.
I only regret that I didn't trademark the name.