Search WebCrawler
Navigation
Featured Equipment
Photoshop Advertisements
Note: This section uses Adobe Photoshop for Picture Editing
Find all current special offers on Adobe products.

Advertisement is the art of presentation and perceptual direction, using imagery and a some choice words to make a product or service relate to the viewer. In the advertisement section you will learn a lot about layers and will be using masks, if you have not already read the basics now would be a good time to, these skills can be easily applied to a freelance photography or advertisement job. So mostly an ad or advertisement contains imagery and words, the person absorbs the imagery and reads the words presenting the images, making that person click on the ad or condition that person to think of that product when ever that said imagery comes into their mind.



The world of advertisement is a difficult one to get into but, to make a good ad isn't all that hard say if you were just trying to make a internet ad banner, a band flyer, a newspaper ad, or a private business ad would be a good start. And soon you can develop the skills to make ads for magazines and billboards, or whatever you fancy. You can also turn your digital pictures into advertisements and find a program to help you sell them over the web, Try this one! it can help get your freelance job started.

  Jump to a Advertisement Subject  
-Concepts-    -Background Layers-
-Foreground Layer-    -Text Layer-   
-Ad Reflection-    -Masking-   

Advertisement Concepts

As I said in the introduction a big part of an ad is imagery, in other words catching someones attention is key. So you have to think of a ton of details like font, color scheme, platform, and all these variables are judged by the type of person you are trying to market. Let me give an example, if you are trying to sell a really expensive computer maybe 4000 dollars, then you would not want to appeal to a person that is a minor computer user. You wouldn't want to make an advertisement showing a sexy girl using the computer because obviously a person willing to spend 4000 dollars isn't going to be appealed by a hot girl, instead make an ad directed toward the cold cut facts showing a sleek, powerful operating machine. To give the antithesis, if you are trying to sell a pair of fashionable jeans don't try to appeal to the jean facts (if there are any???), but try to make people think they would look a ton better in those jeans.

So far it's pretty cut and dry, try selling computers to people who love computers, try selling jeans to people who love fashion. But it isn't always that easy sometimes you have to think of a concept that you want to convey to your audience. Something as vague as moisturizing soap can't just be sold to people who love soap, you need to pick up on what the soap is actually selling. In this case moisture seems to be the key ingredient, so behind the bar of soap it could be a picture of a waterfall (which probably has been done a thousand times). A waterfall would represent moisture but it may be a bit too trite which is why half the battle is thinking of concepts for a good advertisement. That is also why using catchy or clever phrases helps deliver the point on top of the imagery.
Onward! to the next big seller subject!

Layering Your Background

Don't worry we will get to the foreground, but first we need to talk about something important. Using layers is a key aspect in a good advertisement, although not all advertisements have a ton of background layers, internet focused ones almost always have a ton of detail surrounding what they are trying to sell. Let me specify what we mean by background layers, these are the decorative or baroque sequences around the frame or behind the main pictures or objects. For example take a look at the links to the Featured Equipment, it appears to be on a several pieces of torn paper, giving it a decorative look to fit the theme of the site.

This concept might still be vague so I will give some ideas to what you could do for background decoration, to formalize, stylize, fashionize or any other ize your ad.

Advertisement freelance job example

Having diagonal, vertical or horizontal lines is a formal background that would look great for a piece of technology or online service. It is kind of a complex process to do something so simple but...
DRAWING LINES TUTORIAL
  • draw a line using the shape tool (click and hold down on the shape tool to choose a different shape), remember hold shift in order to keep a perfectly straight line
  • After you have drawn your line go to LAYER - RASTERIZE - SHAPE, this will turn the shape into a regular line
  • Drag the layer into the create new layer icon to copy it
  • Select the move tool (top right arrow tool in your tool bar)
  • On your keyboard tap left or right to move the line
  • select the top line layer and Hold CTRL + E, to merge the two layer together, now you should have two lines on one layer
  • Once again drag the new line layer into 'create new layer icon' and once more move it left or right with the keypad.
  • Merge those two layers again by again pressing CTRL + E, and do this until your workspace is filled
  • I'm not done! Now after your workspace is filled if you want to add some depth then go to SELECT - COLOR RANGE and select the color of the lines
  • Now that you have the lines selected go to the gradient tool under the paint bucket tool
  • Choose a color and use the gradient 'Color to Transparency' and drag the gradient tool through your lines and they will have a 3D look to them
I know that is rather difficult but there are other ways but that is the way I use and it works best for me, so mess around with and you might invent your own method.

A more casual look is the classic gradient which most of the time behind things having to do with beauty, fashion, and hygiene products. This is very simple to make, start out by putting two colors in your palette, and click the gradient tool. I recommend using the circular gradient option, after you make your gradient go to IMAGE - LIQUIFY and use the tools in there to pull different designs into the gradient. Now you have a nice flowing background giving a warm look to your ad.

Besides making designs from scratch you can take a picture and turn it into a design like so... This picture could act as a background or border for any girly related product to instantly attract the attention of a woman (well hopefully). All I did was deleted the background using SELECT - COLOR RANGE and then used FILTERS - ARTISTIC - PAINT DAUBS.

Well I could give ten more examples but I would just recommend looking through a magazine or on a website to get ideas. Geometric shapes, lines, gradients, pictures, solid colors, and whatever platform you can think of will work just as long as you keep it on the theme of the product.

We will show you a complete ad further in this section.

Foreground Objects

Foreground objects or layers are the layers that lay behind the text but in front of the background. They usually show the product and maybe some small piece of imagery to go along with the concept of the ad. Get ready for another one of my classic examples...freelance irish spring adWe have my great irish springs ad, not quite complete because it doesn't have any text but we will talk about that later. This ad will convey the sensation of being refreshed and clean, with all the natural colors of green and moisture on the leaf. Fairly simple concept but it gets the job done, because I am guessing that a real irish springs ad isn't that far from mine. Back to my point though, the foreground layers would be the leaf and the Irish Springs Soap, the background layers would be the slightly blurred picture of the rain forest.

So a foreground object can be something to convey to a particular audience or to finish a joke in the ad, but make sure you do not over do it with the foreground layers or people will lose track of what they are looking at and gain disinterest for the product.

Also something that briefly needs to be touched upon is the rarely used middle ground where there is a three main compilations of layers. The background to give a mood or quality to the picture, the middle ground to deliver a joke or have some meaning, and the foreground which shows people the final product and why they should buy it. On the contrary that isn't always how ads are presented though a lot of the time the middleground and the foreground are switched leaving the product to be looked at secondary on the middle ground and using the foreground to attract someones attention by telling a joke or having a radical image.



Text Layer



Nearly every ad has a text layer saying a slogan, punch line, catchy phrase or simply telling more about the product. Picking a font is pretty crucial to keeping a specific ad style or motif, but keeping a font looking too similar to a product is also a bad idea and will not be noticed by consumers.
which advertisement is betterits all the advertisers perspective
Look at these two examples, the first one conveys a simple look but is very solid nonetheless, and the second gives an old English or Celtic look which would fit the Irish theme quite well. So either one would do as an acceptable font but remember who your consumer is... do you think people are looking for practicality or culture and classic appeal? You have to be the judge of who you are trying to attract.

Besides the font there is other aspects to consider when laying down text, blending effects are effects that apply to text and cause dynamic changes. In order to see what kind of effects I'm talking about... after clicking on the text tool and writing some text on your ad, RIGHT CLICK on the layer inside of the layers tool bar and click BLENDING OPTIONS. There should be several effect open to use, and to apply an effect just click on the check box and then on the button to change the aspects of the effect. I recommend using drop shadow because I use this in almost every ad I do, it adds a little bit of depth and helps the words distinguish itself from the image. But also try the inner and outer glow to add some lighting effects, and gradient overlay in order to give the text some depth.

Ad Reflections

nikon advertisement exampleA neat trick that is common in contemporary advertisements is the reflection. As you can see here I took this camera picture and gave it a reflection once again a dynamic trick that maybe isn't the most noticeable image, but with the combination of other photo dynamics you can get a pretty sleek and swanky ad.

REFLECTION TUTORIAL
This isn't that hard actually and you will find yourself using it all the time in advertising jobs and projects.
  • After you take a picture of or find your product on the internet, duplicate it by dragging the layer to the 'create new layer' icon next to the trash can (you should know this by now)
  • After duplicating... on the duplicated layer delete everything but the product in the picture, if you need help doing this refer to the Superimposing Page for techniques on how this is done
  • Now while the copied layer is selected press CTRL + T to enter free transform mode which will help you bend it into shape
  • Now grab the top of the shape and pull it all the way down so it is now flipped vertically, don't worry if the two objects aren't perfectly symmetrical, nobody will notice (there are other ways of doing this), so now you should have two mirrored objects

  • Now line up the two objects one on top of the other using the MOVE TOOL or your keyboard arrow buttons
  • Lower the opacity inside the Layers tool bar to about 50%

  • Now if you have a flat background such as I did in my Nikon camera ad then use a GRADIENT TOOL, if you have a multicolor or multi object background use the ERASER TOOL
  • Using the GRADIENT TOOL: Select the gradient tool under the paint can and select the color of the matte background and transparency in the gradient options, pull a line through the reflected object to give it a fading look
  • Using the ERASER TOOL: Select the eraser tool and select a very big brush type like 200 or 300 depending on how big the object is , and set the opacity to about 50%, now slowly start erasing the bottom of the reflected object and work your way up until you get a nice faded look
    advertisement bottle water
  • I padded it down with a eraser size of 200 and an opacity of 35% to make it slowly disappear in the water, I also added a FILTER - DISTORT - RIPPLES effect to create more realism, check out the Filters Page to find out more on distort filters.

This same trick can apply to shadows too, just remember to turn the duplicate black by going to IMAGE - ADJUST - LEVELS, and pull the white out, then all you have to do is lower the opacity and use the free transform options to adjust the direction of the shadow.

Masking

Adding a mask means to have two layers: one layer will specify how much the second one will be shown. If you look at my water ad I used a mask on the writing for it to show the water behind it. Masks are used mostly for text but any general shape will work, it is a simply trick that you are sure to use quite a bit.
advertisement bottle water continued
We will show you how to do this:

MASK TUTORIAL
  • First Grab a background or something that you want to show up as your text (text is what we are using but any solid object will work)
  • Write some text and put it under the background layer
  • Hold ALT and click on the line between the two layers in the layers tool bar

  • Now you should have writing with your background as its filler
  • and you now have a mask layer
If you want the same background...
  • Copy the background image by dragging it to 'create new layer' button
  • After putting the layer as the bottom layer (under the mask layers), then adjust the LEVELS, COLORBALANCE or CONTRAST to make the writing show up as the foreground layer