Healing Brush Tool

Main Theme Idea

As I talked about in my last blog post, I want to recreate a meme that is very popular on the internet, only replace the characters in the meme with the characters Jan Levinson and Michael Scott from the TV show The Office. 

My original thought was pretty much to use the original meme as a sort of template, and make my own backgrounds for the new one, but upon learning more about the healing brush tools and other useful icons on Photoshop and also InDesign, I think I can cut out the characters from the original meme and insert the new characters in their place. 

Healing Brush Tool

Since I have now decided to keep the background of the original meme, using the healing brush tool was extremely helpful. It allowed me to cut out the both the woman and the cat so I could insert my new images in their place.

Because I wanted to remove part of the image itself and not the background, I had to outline the background that I wanted so it would cut out the parts inside that I didn't want. 

I kept having to remind myself that if I wanted to adjust or remove my images, I had to "select the layer" (Kabili, 2017) that I wanted to touch up in order for me to be able to adjust/remove it. 

I also used the healing brush tool for the characters I want to insert into the original meme by cutting out the background of the image they're in. After using the healing brush tool I was able to go back and touch up the outline, but this tool helped save me so much time. 

Cloning Tool

When I cut out the person and cat in the original meme so I could replace them, I realized that if I wanted the new image to look like it belonged there I would have to use this tool so I could add more natural background. 

Because I wanted to make the background seem more seamless, it was easy enough to "adjust the size and hardness" (Kabili, 2017) of the brush. 

Since the outline within the image was no where near the same shape as my new image, I was able to use this tool to take from the background, and color in the spots around the inserted image that were white (because of the white Background).

To help with the transition, I made sure to "include a little of the background" (Kabili, 2017) and not just a random part of the image as the background. 

I wanted to keep the head of the Jan Levinson image around the same size as the other woman that I decided to keep in the original meme. If I wanted the new image to completely cover the white Background, it would look super weird, and the cloning tool helped me avoid that. 

Layers

Due to the fact that I decided to insert new images into an original meme, it was important that I use layering. In the meme, there are two women on the left side and one of the women has her arm around the other.

I wanted to keep the arm in there when I added the new image so it would look like the new image would be actually part of the meme and not just something that was placed randomly on top. Creating a new layer was ideal for me so I could place the layer of the woman's arm over my inserted image.