Expert: LizaL - 9/30/2004

Question
Hello again,

I'm sorry for not introducing myself properly. Not that it matters, but it's kind of strange to speak in somebody else's name. Dejan is my collegue, he wanted to ask you the question regarding the reflection effect that we were trying to pull out for some time now. I wrote the first letter, now I'm writing the followup.
I want to thank you for the references regarding the problem, but I'm affraid it's just not what we were looking for. They all explain how to create the reflection on the object that has a almost straight under line to the surface, and we already knew how to create that illusion. What we have is a picture of a car that is in some kind of perspective, and most certainly does not have a straight under line to the surface.
So, you see our problem. We can send you the picture itself if you are willing to help us. Just tell me in what file format (type) should I send the picture and your e-mail.

Anyway, thank you very much for trying to help
-------------------------
Followup To
Question -
Hello,

I'm using the Adobe Photoshop 7 and CS version of the software, and here is my problem:

I want to create a glass surface effect on the picture of a car.
The picture itself is scanned, imported in Photoshop, and cleaned of the the background that surround's it. I'm trying to create an effect as if like the car is standing on the glass surface so that the surface image can be seen as car reflecting.
I duplicated the layer and turned and twisted it around but what I just cannot do is to create the real impression 'couse I can't match the corners of the real car layer with the corner points of it's reflection.

Please help me if you can.

P.S. I'm contacting you from Serbia&Montenegro, so I'm sorry for my bad English.
Answer -
Hi Dejan,

I tried sending this answer several times this morning, and I think something was wrong with this Web site, because I kept getting time-out errors. I apologize for the delay in answering.

Rather than try and duplicate a bunch of steps here in this little Web form, I'm going to give you some links to what I think are good tutorials for Photoshop. These might help you figure out how to match the corners of the car and the reflection, or even show you a different, easier way of doing it altogether.

1. Here's a good "reflections in water" tutorial on the Mac Design online site:
http://www.macdesignonline.com/tutorials/photoshop/novdec02_water.html

Notice that they say the basic steps can be adapted to work with any image, and that's where you substitute your car for the image they've used here.

2. This is probably too basic for you, but it does give you good pointers on reflecting type, which could apply to your background:
http://www.80four.co.uk/tutorials/reflection.html

3. Here's another one where the image casts a reflection on a glassy surface:
http://www.tutorialman.com/tutorials/index.php?tutorial=reflection

4. This site has some good reflection tutorials, too:
http://www.teamphotoshop.com/photoshop/tutorials/techniques/reflect/reflect.php


Please let me know if these work for you and if they don't, maybe you can send me the image and I'll work on it and tell you what I come up with.

Hope this helps!

Lisa


P.S. And your English isn't bad at all!


Answer
Hi Vladimir,

I'd be happy to look at the image and give you my opinion. But since I'm not crazy about posting my email address here online, why don't you post yours and I'll write to you, so you'll then have my email address? That way you can send me the image.

Thanks!

Lisa