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Topic: Tutorial: how to Make a Montage (Read 2947 times)
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Gadget
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I have given some workshops/tutorials in this but not sure about online help without a great deal of time.
The first thing you need to do is to pick some images that you think might be suitable. Have some ideas in your mind's eye. Do some sketches and mock-ups. Then get a blank 'canvas' and play around with various arrangements until you have something you like.
It's really a matter of artistic composition andf ability and a personal aesthetic. No one can teach you this in a few words. Practise, look what others have done, etc.
Gadget
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« Last Edit: Wednesday 16 August 06 09:58 BST (UK) by Gadget »
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dennford
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As Gadget says,
It is not easy to explain on here, however I shall run through the basic steps without going into great detail.
First sketch out your idea either on paper or in your mind. Then collate all the pics that you think you want (and some extras). Make a new file in my photo's called "montage", make another file inside that one called "individual" pics and put all your collated pics in there.
Now one by one open each of the pic's and double click on the background layer (in your layers pallette), in the dialogue box that pops up click ok - this changes the background layer into an ordinary layer. Next select the part of the picture that you don't want and press delete - you should now have your image without any background (a chequered pattern). Make another file inside your individual pic's folder and call it "cut outs" and save each of your cut outs in here. Remember work on only one image at a time, then save it and close, this will prevent overloading your computer memory.
As said this is only an outline of how to do it, the finer points I shall leave out, otherwise it would become far too complex.
In the next day or two I shall post the next stage.
Denn
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Ford, Baines, Dixon, Platts, Peat, Proctor, Rotherforth, Dakin/Daykin, Sales, Beech, Hall, Parkin, Nightingale. ----- Harthill, Waleswood, Woodhouse-mill, Whitwell
South Yorkshire/Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire
Torremocha, Candog, Ramos, Reyes, Rodrigueus
-------Philippines --- Bohol
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dennford
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Joy once you have the above done you are well on the way. I shall make suggestions that prevent memory overload - because that is the biggest problem with a montage
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Ford, Baines, Dixon, Platts, Peat, Proctor, Rotherforth, Dakin/Daykin, Sales, Beech, Hall, Parkin, Nightingale. ----- Harthill, Waleswood, Woodhouse-mill, Whitwell
South Yorkshire/Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire
Torremocha, Candog, Ramos, Reyes, Rodrigueus
-------Philippines --- Bohol
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Gadget
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Valry - While you're creating your montage, you will need to preserve the layers so save in psd or tif. Once you are sure you have the final composition, you could save in jpg but this will reduce the image to a one layer one - with or without compression.
Joy - there are lots of photomontage/collage images around to give you some ideas of what you might do - in fact most newspapers and magazines use these techniques. The most important thing is to think about what you want to say visually -
do you want a simple statement or something more complex?
how do you want to use colour ?
are you going to use different sized images?
do you want to include text?
are you going to use parts of image?
do you want hard edge or rough or mixture?
with layering - are you going to use different levels of opacity so that different images show through?
what background effect do you want ? - in aesthetics/art, the space between the images is as important as the images/objects themselves
Once you have some idea of these issues, you will also probably have some ideas in your minds eye. It's then really a matter of what I like to think of as 'playing' with the images - grouping them, moving them apart, taking them back, bringing them forward, making some brighter, subduing others,making some smaller/bigger, etc, until you get to a total effect that is near to what you want - your message.
Den will take you through these stages technically but it is vey difficult for us to show you how to achieve your own personal aesthetic.
Think that's my input for the time being.
Feel free to ask anything about what I've said.
Gadget 
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dennford
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Hi Denn
I too am trying you instructions - I now have a picture with a chequered background is that correct? Also, should I save in psd or jpeg?
Thanks Valry
You MUST save as a layered file otherwise when you re open it you will have a white background instead of clear (chequered). I save as psd for convenience.
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Ford, Baines, Dixon, Platts, Peat, Proctor, Rotherforth, Dakin/Daykin, Sales, Beech, Hall, Parkin, Nightingale. ----- Harthill, Waleswood, Woodhouse-mill, Whitwell
South Yorkshire/Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire
Torremocha, Candog, Ramos, Reyes, Rodrigueus
-------Philippines --- Bohol
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dennford
RootsChat Aristocrat
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Posts: 2075
just resting for a while
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Step 2 Cleaning up the images
Open the first of your images and create two new layers and fill one with black and one with white. Now drag your image to the top of these layers and try hiding first the black then the white so that you can see which one shows all the dags left on your cutout.
Go around the edges of your cutout erasing any major dags (don’t worry too much about a couple of pixels showing – there is an easy way to deal with them).
Once you are satisfied that you have done as well as possible go to layer on the menu bar and go down to matting and click on defringe. Experiment herewith the settings – 3or4 pixels will normally do the trick of removing that halo.
If you have no text to go with this image you may now delete those two extra layers otherwise leave the for the time being.
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Ford, Baines, Dixon, Platts, Peat, Proctor, Rotherforth, Dakin/Daykin, Sales, Beech, Hall, Parkin, Nightingale. ----- Harthill, Waleswood, Woodhouse-mill, Whitwell
South Yorkshire/Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire
Torremocha, Candog, Ramos, Reyes, Rodrigueus
-------Philippines --- Bohol
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Gadget
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Posts: 18184
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Hi Joy
There as masses of examples out there. Perhaps the best thing might be fro you to do a Google image search on photomontage. I came up with thousands when I did it.
Some are surrealist - in fact that's how they started with Heartfield and Grosz, German Dadaists, and Man Ray, etc - some are more, what one might say, ordinary.
It's up to you
Gadget
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Gadget
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Hi Joy
I've been searching around for an example of an 'arty' montage with a Family History theme for you. This is one I did earlier this year for my pal Keith Bateman, based on images from his website.
It started as a joke and only took a short time. However, it does show you some of the features that I mentioned in the earlier posting - soft and hard edge, re-sizing, different levels of transparency, spacing, inclusion of text.
Much of my own art is concerned with history themes and I now use different levels of transparency to convey this sense of time. In the old days, I used to have to print up each photograph on Kentmere Art paper and use bleaches, paint washes, wax, glues, tissue paper and abrasion to get the effects - now we have Photoshop
I printed this image on Epson A3+ Watercolour paper and Keith has it in his hall!
Gadget
PS It took me lots of visits to his website to choose the images that I wanted to use, so his high 'hit rate' reflects this 
http://batemans-history.rootschat.net/
also mine
http://some-ancestors.rootschat.net/
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d.weaving
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Posts: 265
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Nice composition Gadget,quite effective
Derek
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Batemanmontage003.jpg