I have been wanting a Lomo camera since about forever. For those who don’t know, it’s a cheaply made Russian film camera notorious for blowing out colors and having other lens aberrations. You can get some cool photos with them, but since they are currently “cool” to own, they are now in the realm of prohibitively expensive for a cheap plastic camera from Russia that I will likely tire of after a few rolls of film (though maybe not). Still … I ain’t paying what they want for one, in other words. :D
Today though I learned how to make my digital photos look like they have been taken with a Lomo using Photoshop (actually, I use PS Elements), so I took a photo I grabbed at Mom’s house last weekend that I just couldn’t get to look the way I wanted, and I Lomoized it. I’m liking the effect.
Behind the cut, I have stashed the instructions for how to reproduce this effect (defect?) … nabbed from a post at Flickr.
How to Lomo-ize a photo using Photoshop or PS Elements.
1.File: Open: the picture you want
2.Image: Adjustments: Brightness/Contrast: increase contrast by 20
3.Image: Adjustments: Hue/Saturation: increase saturation by 20
4.Choose the Rectangular Marquee Tool (your basic selection tool)
5.Change feather amount to 1/12 the width of your picture (if your picture is 600px wide then you will set your feather to 50px)
6.Select your entire picture note: using select: all, will not work
7.Select: Inverse
8.Layer: New: Layer
9.Change your primary color to black. Fill the selection (on the new, blank layer).
10.Change the blend mode of this layer to Overlay
11.Layer: Duplicate Layer
12.Now select your base layer (the one with the picture on it).
13.Layer: New: Layer
14.Change your fill tool to Gradient
15.Change your Gradient Type to Spherical
16.Change your Gradient Shading Style to “foreground to transparent” (I believe this is the default).
17.Change your primary color to white.
18.With the fill tool selected, click in the middle of the picture, and drag the line out to the farthest edge of your picture (if it’s a portrait, use top or bottom, if landscape, use left or right).
19.Change the blend mode of this layer to Overlay
20.Change the Opacity of this layer to 80% (or whatever you see fit)
Cool pic! One thing you might look at, though, is your highlights: they’re a little blown out (meaning, they’re white to the point of having no color in them whatsoever — something you want to avoid). You might try playing with the curves and bringing the highlight point down a bit.
I also really like
these instructions for the Lomo effect.
Yeah, this photo wasn’t perfect for doing this to. In fact, the only thing perfect about this one to start with was the composition and depth of field. Still getting the hang of the manual settings on my camera. :D
It seems to work best with photos that are a little too dark or lacking much contrast. I have now officially wasted my morning playing with photos in PS.
Oh, wow. I have a Lomo (as you know, you jealous girl you). Those instructions copy the (crappy) quality of the pics I take with it.
Tasha, most photos coming out of a Lomo have the most awful white highlights and totally blown out colors. I bought into the craze before it was a craze (didn’t spend hundreds of dollars on the thing), and sometimes I wonder why I even bother using it anymore. It really takes BAD pictures. LOL!
Bad photos as good art, I guess?