Bee and Flowers (138 of 365)

Bee and Flowers (138 of 365), originally uploaded by lighthack.

This was a quick snapshot out in the garden that, once I looked at it on the monitor, I kind of liked, so I went with it. Since the shot is not all that interesting from a technical standpoint, I'll talk about how I did the framing.

I did this in photoshop, I'm not sure how to do it in other programs.
1) Finalize your picture, crop it for the entire scene and flatten it into one layer.
2) Duplicate that layer (ctrl+J) (shortcuts are for PC).
3) Select the duplicate layer and turn it to black and white (i.e., desaturate) (ctrl+alt+u).
4) Add a layer mask to the duplicate layer and select the layer mask.
5) Use the marquee tool to select a box for your "color subject" area.
6) Making sure that black is your background color in your palette, hit delete (this should delete the selected area from the b&w layer to allow the color area).
7) Select the color image layer.
8) Use the stroke command (edit->stroke) and set it to 15pixels, inside the selection area, and white. (this will draw the white part of the frame).
9) Hit ctrl+d to get rid of the marquee selection.
10) Select the b&w layer again and, using brightness/contrast, lower the brightness of the b&w area taste.

That's it!