Photoshop: Masking techniques

Todays tasks revolved around the masking tools in photoshop and different ways they can be used.

The first task/technique was to use a layer mask and select the subject, to change the background for a picture of dog. I had done this sort of thing before so I found this task quite simple, however I did learn about the select and mask tool which helps to refine a mask layer.  

The images for these tasks (unless stated otherwise) came from Beautiful Free Images & Pictures | Unsplash.

The second task involved using alt to apply a picture (of some tropical leaves) to a text layer. 

We then added a second copy of the picture layer (under thge text layer), made the layer a smart object?, changed the colour of the image so that the text was still visable. We then used the pen tool to outline some of the leaves to create an out of bounds effect by masking them.

The third task we did was creating a poster using an image of a man in a hoodie, we used the pen tool to mask out shapes. We also used the clone stamp tool to replace the wall behind the man, where we had cut out parts of the image.

The last task was to create a poster of our own. The first two ideas I had for this didn't really work out, but the idea I went with was inspired by this poster :  Moe. gig | Behance

I took the idea of this poster and recreated it in my own way using the masking techniques and including the out of bounds effects. As well as textures from TexturePalace - textures for photoshop free!. 

These are my results:

First version

I recreated a background similar to the poster I found, and included 'planets' with flower images in them. I cut out an old picture of one of my cats using a layer mask and made it so some smaller parts were in front. I also added some green to the eyes to make them stand out more. 

Second Version

I added a paper texture to the shapes and added some of the background in the foreground in front of the cat. 

Third Version 

I fixed the black shadow thing which was happening in the second version. Moved the cat so it was more centeral and added some out of bounds elements to some of the circles. 

Fourth version (Third version with foreground pattern hidden)

Overall, I think I could have done a better job with the background and maybe experimented with different colours.