Photoshop Tutorial
Flying book pages have become a pretty big staple on my account recently with many of you lovely lot asking me how I do it. It’s actually really, really simple to do so I thought I’d write a little blog post about it. Please note that there are many different ways in which you can achieve this. None of them are wrong and none of them are ‘more right’ than the other. This is just how I like to do it!
Fun fact: I actually use the same photos of book pages in all of my flying pages photos! I just can’t be bothered to take unique photos every time – it’s a lot of hassle and once you have them you have them! To take the photos all I do is literally hold up pages in different positions in front of the camera (preferably against a darker background so they’re easier to cut out in editing) Try to have as little of your fingers in the photo as possible, but it doesn’t matter too much if they’re showing because you can always edit them out. I have around 7-9 different photos of book pages in different positions which I use in my photos.
All of the magic of making them fly is done in Photoshop. Unfortunately, I don’t know of any mobile apps that you can use but I’m sure you’ll find plenty when you search in the app store.
In Photoshop, you’ll need to open up the photo you want the book pages on and the book page photos (obviously). Then on the book page photos, you’ll need to unlock the background so you can start erasing all of the bits around the pages! I like to use the feathered eraser tool and have it on small size (around 10-15) when going around the edges of the book pages.
You can use the magic lasso tool if you want to, but I find that it leaves behind a harsh line that can look really fake. For the rest of the background, I use a normal eraser and have it on a big size.
Once you have your book pages cut out, you just have to click and drag them onto your desired image and resize them.
Then it’s duplicate, duplicate, duplicate! Duplicate the book page layers until you have as many as you’d like.
Now you have to make them all look different, but you can easily do that by rotating and flipping. If you have a mac you can also hold down the command button when resizing, which will warp the pages. I do this to make them look ‘flatter’.
So it really is that easy! Flying book pages is a really fun photo to do, but it does take a look of time to create, sometimes it can take me up to three hours! There isn’t a cheat to doing it quickly if you want it done well, you just have to put in the time and effort.
Also don’t expect to be perfect right away, everything requires practice! Any questions please ask.