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What's new is old again
Creating distressed and aged looking photosTonya Doughty
Editorial Deck Crewmember
This month we're headed to Hawaii, home to a very old, indigenous culture. And with the variety of new digital cameras available, everyone is taking great photos! So how can you make your cool NEW pics have that great character that comes from being, well, old? There are many methods to achieve this and searching the web will bring up several ways. I thought I'd show you how I do it. This effect is not the washed out, sepia-looking "antique" effect, but rather the high-contrast, sat-on-the-dashboard-in-the-hot-sun-collecting-dust look that many of the photos from the 1960s and 1970s seem to have. For this tutorial I will use Adobe Photoshop CS2, but you should be able to duplicate it with other raster-based programs that support layering.
1. Open the photo you wish to age, make a duplicate copy and close the original.
2. Press Ctrl + J to duplicate the Background layer. Make sure your Foreground and Background colors are set to Black and White (press D for the shortcut.)
3. Add a layer mask to the Background Copy layer. Render clouds on the layer mask (Filter - Render - Clouds). Change Blending Mode for this layer to Screen. The resulting effect may either be too strong or not strong enough, depending on the content of your photo. To make it stronger, increase the contrast of the layer mask by using Image - Adjustments - Brightness/Contrast. To make it more subtle, lower the opacity on the layer using the Opacity slider.
4. Select the Background Layer and duplicate it (Ctrl + J). Bring up Filter - Texture - Grain. Choose Vertical for type and adjust the sliders for your desired amount.
5. Change layer Blending Mode to Overlay and adjust Opacity slider for a pleasing effect (I used 85% here.)
6. Select the Background layer and Desaturate to remove its color (Ctrl + U.)
7. Bonus: Add the "Polaroid Effect" - flatten image, select all, add stroke (Edit - Stroke with these settings: color: white; size: will depend on resolution of your photo. For 300 ppi images, try about 40 px.; location: inside. 8. Save your file. When you use it in a layout, don't forget to add a slight drop shadow to make it pop off the page.
Extra Credit: What else can you age? Try digital cardstock or patterned papers. Maps look great with this treatment as well (like I used here as a background.)
Have fun and keep scrappin'!
Tonya Doughty
tonyadoughty@ssreflections.com
Editorial Deck Crewmember
S.S. Reflections, Inc.
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