Superimposing a Background on a Portrait

[cshahar]

I have a question. I want to superimpose Renaissance paintings on my portrait work, using the landscapes in the paintings as the background. I transfer the image of the painting to my portrait and obviously work with layers. For the painting I use the "multiply" mode. I then use a white brush to eliminate the painting wherever it overlaps with the original image of the portrait. This is not so bad, except for the hair of my subject. I can't figure out what to do about that. It would require such painstaking precision!

Is there an easier way of blending the portrait with the painting? Please let me know if you can think of something.

Thanks for your help!

-Charles

[iDad]

Hair is always the toughest can you post both images you are trying to blend? It may ring a bell with some thoughts.

[cshahar]

xxxabJohanna2c.jpg

f32E0030a.jpg

[cshahar]

I think I found a solution using the Blend If in PS. It isn't perfect, but I think I can work around the limitations!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/olwizard/5 ... hotostream

[Crapaud]

If I'm reading your post correctly, cshahar, why not simply extract your portrait and place on another layer above the landscape?

There are plenty of tutorials on extracting hair on the web. Lots of different ways to do it too.

It takes a bit of practice, but it's worth it, IMO.

[iDad]

open landscape image add a layer of black (only where the girl will be) make the layer mode overlay add girl (layer mode,lighten) I think that will; give you the result you want...... maybe a bit of tweaking but it'll get you closer