Adding Focus to your Photo

Sometime you might want your main character in your Photo to pop or be more prominent than others, "Lens Blur" is always the tool to go to. It is simple too use but yet again under-utilized for many Photoshop users. Well, let's get started.

1. Open any image that u want. Most preferably image that has two objects that are apart in distance(eg. in front and behind).

2. Next Duplicate this layer and hide the original layer. Just in case you screw up ;p

3. Click on the "Channel" tab and Create a new Channel. This would create a alpha channel and your image would turn black.

4. Still staying in the "Channel" tab, make the "RGB" layer visible by clicking on the eye beside it. This is so that you can see where you are brushing on. Make sure your Alpha Channel is active by clicking on it.

5. Make sure your foreground color is white. Use a soft brush(ard 14%) with size 15 and start brushing around the edges of your object that you want the focus to be on.

6. After the edges are done, use a hard brush(100%) with size 50 to fill up the inside of the edges.

7. Hide the Alpha Channel by clicking on the eye. Make "RGB" layer the active layer by clicking on it.

8. Go back to the "Layer" tab. With the duplicated layer selected, go to Filter > Blur > Lens Blur. Make source: "alpha 1". Click "Invert".

9. Adjust the radius til your liking. For me, my radius would be 15. Next add some Gaussian Noise to make the blur more realistic. Adding a small amount of noise would do. my noise level is "3".