Reverse 3D

[M1Forty]

How do I make an image look like it's coming out an image.

I've got an image of a person and CG flame heart image that I want to make it look like it's inside the person.  I'm not having any luck.

Thanks in advance.

[davescm]

There are many ways to achieve that with masking and painting. Are you able to post the two images - so we can have a go and show you how?

Dave

[M1Forty]

[M1Forty]

[M1Forty]

Those are the images I want to use. The heart photo ive used is just the comp version from a stock site. Im going to buy the real version if I can get it to do what I want.

[davescm]

Depending on the exact effect you are after you could try surrounding the heart with shadow ( I used a masked copy of the main image set to multiply) and add some painted glow around the heart. I also shaped it slightly with a displacement filter using the main image as a displacement map.

If that is nothing like what you are trying to achieve - let us know and I , and others, can have another go.

Dave

[M1Forty]

That looks great.

[davescm]

OK. I showed the blending modes on the layer names. Shout out if you get stuck

Dave

[M1Forty]

I was able to recreate some of what you did, but I couldn't figure out how to combine them all.

I could use a use a more detailed description.

Thanks.

[davescm · Accepted solution]

Hi

Sorry for the delayed reply - New Year celebrations got in the way

It may help if I describe each layer in turn starting at the bottom.

1. The lowest layer is just your image

2. I added a curve to lighten the white slightly (the curve is shown below)

3. The next layer is a duplicate of the background layer but with blend mode set to multiply and opacity reduced to 84%.  This darkens the image so by adding a mask to hide all then painting with white on the mask with a soft brush I was able to introduce a shadow around the heart.

4. The fourth layer is the heart and there are three things going on there

a. The layer blending mode is set to linear dodge

b. A mask used to help the edges blend

c. A displacement filter. I used Filter > Distort> Displace and used a copy of the girl image as the displacement map (I saved it as a separate PSD file). This just helped the shape to sit in the image.
Note : Ignore the Gaussian blur - I used it whilst experimenting but then turned it off

5. I clipped a curve adjustment to the heart layer (Alt -Click on the border between the adjustment layer and the heart layer) so that I could balance the brightness of the heart with the image.

6. Finally I used a soft brush on an empty layer to add some blue glow around the heart. I set the blend mode to Lighten and reduced the opacity to 32 so that it was only just visible. I also used a mask to prevent any spill on the white clothing.

That was it

I hope that helps

Dave

[M1Forty]

That's what I was able to come up with, I'm not sure why it looks that much different from yours.  Any ideas?

I was also wondering what your settings were on the Displace and the second curves layer.

[M1Forty]

This is what I had.

[davescm]

Hi

The main differences that I see are a much softer edge on the multiply layer mask (shadow)

The top layer has more of a blue glow painted on it on my version.

I'll PM you a link to the file I made so you can download and see the settings directly.

Dave

[Silkrooster]

Highlights and shadows are your friend for making image extrude or recede over another image. To see how this works, play around with bevel in the layer styles.