Question about some of Photoshop's Features

[BatKid]

Well, I've been looking at Bruce Timm's Site (http://www.popcultureshock.com/bt/) and I wanted to save a lot of his pics into my file. But, some of the pics are small and I wanted to know if with Photoshop, if I could make the images larger and w/o the pic to be blurry and the lines to be straight and not jagged-like when some pics are enlarged. I also wanted to know if I can duplicate black and white pics and make it into colored pics and make it look new and to make all the colors blend in together to make the shadows. If you don't understand what I'm saying, here's an example:

http://www.popcultureshock.com/brucetimm/xxfull/1413.jpg

TO

http://www.popcultureshock.com/brucetimm/xxfull/1414.jpg

As you can see, some extra details are added in the colored pic, and all the colors are blended to make a good shade that makes it look like a shadow.

If there's a way to do such a thing, I would be thankful if you could tell me step by step how to do the process. You could also just e-mail me the steps here (DEX47@aol.com)

[Alaskanbullworm]

You can do almost anything with Photoshop. Those things you want to know can be done. I don't have Photoshop at home, but I have it at my school.

[BatKid]

Nice to know that you can do that, Patrick Star, but do you know anyone that might know how to do this, because I would really like to print these pics out to drool at :).

[Nightflower]

I've been CG-ing pictures for a few years now (CG is short for "computer generated", and it just basically means using Photoshop to make pretty pictures), and I think this is one of the best tutorials out there:

http://www.howtodrawmanga.com/tutorial/cgmain.html

I also have more bookmarked, and if you need help, PM me. (I'm no expert though, but I think I have the basics of Photoshop down)

As for resizing images, the only thing I can think of is a resize and putting it through the sharpen filter. I rarely expand pics.... I usually shrink them.

[Nightflower]

Just some more tips:
the tutorial mainly deals with "cel-style" shading, which is flat shading on flat colors. So I'll tell you how I shade my pictures.

The airbrush has different settings. I mainly use "multiple" for darkening, and "screen" for lightening areas. Experiment.

The smudge tool is irreplaceable. You can also set the smudge tool to "lighten" or "darken", but since you're doing these things while smudging at the same time, I wouldn't recommend it unless you have a drawing tablet, or a really steady hand.

Burn and Dodge give great results and they're really easy to use. The burn tool darkens and the dodge tool lightens. However, they have a tendency to screw up colors and make your pictures look "metallic", so be careful.

Using this as an opportunity to shamelessly self-promote:

http://www.toonzone.net/incoming/newland_cg.jpg

Here's a drawing my friend did and I colored. Examples of dodging can be seen on the clouds and on the tuffs of grass. Examples of burning can be seen on the leopard's cheeks. I usually smudge a lot to blend the colors better.

[killercroc]

Yeah, like Nightflower said run them through the sharpen filter. I also blur them a little. The problem is that there's just so much information in that little picture. You can't blow them up alot and have as sharp of a picture.

Having said that, there is so much to Photoshop there might be other techniques that I have no idea about.

[BatKid]

Whoa, Nightflower, that thing is really confusing the hell out of me :)! All I want to do is something very simple, and remember I'm new to Photoshop and I know I'll mess up if there's too many directions. Maybe if their were more pics to accompany the steps, then maybe I'll do it right.

If there's any other site out there that might help me, I would be really thankful.

[Nightflower]

Well... the very bare minimum you could do is make a new layer and set it to "multiply". This way, you can color the picture as if it were a coloring book, and not affect the black lines. Then you can use the polygon tool to select the area where you want to color, and use the fill tool to color it. I'll look for more tutorials.

[BatKid]

Well, since I don't think I can do it, is anyone willing to do the enhancement of the pics for me?

Please, I really need these pics, so if anyone here knows how to deal with Photoshop, I would be in debt to you if you could do this task for me. You can reply in this thread, PM me, or you can E-mail me here (DEX47@Aol.com)

[BatKid]

Please, somebody, I need someone to do this for me...PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE?!?!?!? :(