BENJAMIN IDOKO – M00478134
In the past, I had a view of Adobe Photoshop and other design tools as very complex. I also
thought design software shouldn’t be meddled with by a none-creative-expert like myself until I
was asked to come up with an idea for a science and technology themed banner, create and
edit the banner as my CMT3331 coursework. Going through the process of this coursework has
improved not only my confidence in design software, but has also improved my confidence in
the ability to learn something new, quickly and implement what I have learned in a fairly short
space of time. Successfully coming up with the idea for the banner was fairly easy. The harder
part was representing my visual thought on a banner with photos and text, considering I had no
software design skills before my CMT3331 course started a few weeks ago.
I had always been fascinated by the way very tiny components all piece together on a circuit
board to form a bigger component, and ultimately a machine which would not function perfectly
if one of the many tiny components were to be removed from the machine. I thought about how
the circuits play a big role in the world of science and technology and how the future relies
greatly on the complex circuits. I decided to represent this on my banner which would have the
photos of a circuit board and a robot in action. I wanted a futuristic look and feel so I chose a
metallic style for the banner. I also wanted the pictures and text on the banner to look as if they
could be touched, even though not designed in 3D. I achieved this with camera angles while
taking the photos, the background for my banner which was black with a look of protruding
metal edges, and the use of blending options appropriately to emboss my text.
First I needed to get a photo of a circuit board which wasn’t very easy to come across. I finally
found one at a repair place. I took a photograph of the circuit board with my Samsung Galaxy
phone, but I realized that after I loaded the photo into Photoshop and zoomed in, I hadn’t
zoomed in too close before the picture became pixelated. This made me realize that I needed a
camera with higher megapixels. I also needed a better camera to attain the depth of field effect
which I wanted the edges of the wires on the circuit board to have. I went on to get a Cannon
EOS 650D camera. I took the picture with the Cannon and realized that the 18 Megapixel
camera had fixed the problem of my picture getting pixelated before zooming in too close, giving
the picture an overall good quality on the large sized banner. I was also able to get the shallow
depth of field on the edge of the wires of the circuit from the correct angle. Another thing that
looked better was how the bright flash of the camera bounced off the edge of the circuit board
which will eventually contrast with the darker background I had in mind and give the 3dimensional effect I wanted for my banner. I also needed the photo of a robot. I found a Thermo
Electron CRS F3 Catalyst Robotic Arm in the robotics lab of Middlesex University, but I had to
go back to the lab for a few more days to catch the picture of the robot in operation. It was being
used to pick up little square boxes. I took a landscape photo of the lateral view of the robot.
I went on to creating the banner in Adobe Photoshop after watching a couple of Photoshop
tutorials on YouTube, Lynda.com and Adobe.com to add to the skills I had already learnt from
my CMT3331 Lab tutor. I created a new project with the specifications, which created a plain
white background. I loaded both photos into Photoshop on 2 separate layers to be edited
independently. I went on to working on the background for the banner. I searched online for
metallic background textures and found one that will suit my futuristic look after some editing. I
loaded it into Photoshop and used the rectangular marquee tool to cut the texture to a smaller
size and then used the move tool to expand the texture to the size of the banner, making the
metallic hexagonal shapes bigger and pop out a little more. I realized that doing this gave the
background a deeper 3-dimensional effect as I wanted. After some critical observation, I
realized that the bright photos I had taken with the camera didn’t blend very nicely on the very
dark background. To fix this, I used the adjustment layers to increase the brightness of the
texture. I used the adjustment layer to do this because I wanted a none-destructive edit just in
case I changed my mind after I had closed the project. This looked good, but made me lose a
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BENJAMIN IDOKO – M00478134
little of the 3D feel the texture had. I realized that also increasing the contrast a little bit brought
back the 3D feel. I also wanted the banner’s focus to be on the images of the robot and the
circuit in the middle, so I used the motion blur filter on the banner after converting the layer for
smart filters to make sure the filter effect was a none-destructive edit. After blurring the texture, I
used the gradient tool on the filter mask to keep the blur effect only on the left and right sides of
the banner, thereby keeping the focus on the center of the banner. At this stage, my background
looked good and it was time to cut out the original backgrounds of the photos I had taken with
the camera to have the metallic texture as background.
Initially, I used the background eraser tool to cut away the background of the circuit board which
worked, but came out with rough edges where there were cuts. I undid the changes and
subsequently used the quick selection tool to select the circuit and then delete its background.
This looked good at a 25% zoom level, but I noticed that at 100% zoom it still had rough edges
that weren’t as bad as using the background eraser tool, but it still wasn’t a neat enough cut.
After that, I learnt that relying on the computer to select and cut out the background based on
color differences was quick, but it wasn’t the best option when trying to achieve a very neat cut.
Alternatively, I used the pen tool to cut out the background. It was a process that took hours to
complete, but I was able to achieve the neatness of the edges of the photo even after zooming
in really close. I realized that zooming in really close just before the picture gets pixelated
makes it easier to cut neatly. I also learnt that cutting the background off in small portions at a
time made it easier for me to achieve neater edges. After cutting the background off totally, I
used the blur tool to smoothen some of the edges of the wire where the cut was really sharp.
This made the circuit look more realistically placed on the metal background. I had also cut out
some of the edges of the wires because some edges were a little transparent on their original
background. I fixed this by using a soft brush to paint back the cut out edges of the wires after
selecting the exact color of the wire using the eyedropper tool. I also increased the saturation of
the image from the adjustment layer so that the colors of the wires pop against the black metal
background.
After successfully editing the circuit, I had learned so much practically that I completed cutting
away the background and editing the photo of the robot in less than an hour. The banner looked
good now and it was time for text. I wanted the text to have the future effect too, so I searched
for digital fonts and found the “digital tech” font on dafont.com. I downloaded it and installed it
into the font book and used it to write my text. I used the “bevel and emboss” and “stroke”
blending options to give the text a 3D look with rounded edges. After placing the text, I used a
soft black brush to darken the edges of the banner, keeping the focus on the brighter center of
the banner. This brought my banner design to a satisfactory conclusion.
Having gone through the process of learning and applying the knowledge learnt in designing
and editing my banner, I now feel more confident in the world of design and image editing.
Additionally, I have learnt that a very important step in design is getting a good quality photo that
will make editing less tedious. Furthermore, I have theoretically and practically learnt how to use
the tools of Adobe Photoshop to successfully bring a visual thought to graphical representation.
This skill I have learnt will be very important to me in the world of information and
communications technology. As a next step, I will need to learn how to draw lines, shapes and
vectors in design software, so I can create my background textures on my own, without having
to search for textures that match the graphics I have in mind.
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