Polaroid

The picture above is an example of an 'Polaroid' image that I did on Photoshop and below is a demonstration of how I did it step by step. 

Step 1

Create a new file with these dimensions or similar: 
500 width 
600 height

Step 2

Go to file>place and place your image. 

Step 3

To get image to a 'old school' feeling, you first have to duplicate the picture layer and this will be your working layer (don't edit the original layer). 

Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation>Saturation -40

Image>Adjustments>Photo filter> Warming filter>Density: 50% 

In the bottom of your layer palette, there is seven buttons (the bin, mask, etc.). 

Go to the adjustment layer button, click on it and create a gradient map. By adding this layer, you can't play with the blending/opacity options because it's already on your picture. 

Once you have gotten your gradient screen on, search for the orange/purple gradient and press ok. Go to your blending options and change it to 'screen' with a opacity of 80%. 

Step 4 

For this step, I worked on the Polaroid by going to filter>New>Layer (or press cmd/ctrl + shift + n) and call it 'Polaroid'. Fill the layer with the colour of: fff7e7. 

Use the rectangular 'marquee' tool and create a nice square on the Polaroid layer and press delete and it will begain to look like a Polaroid. 

Select your photo group and move it until you have a the best piece of the picture in the square. 

Select your Polaroid layer again, go to blending options and click on drop shadow and put the following numbers in: 

We still have that hard line next to the drop shadow so create another square with your rectangular marquee tool, just a bit bigger than the square we have now but like 2mm bigger on all sides and the go to filter>blur>Gaussian blur>0.6 and press ok and the hard line should be gone.














Step 5

To make the Polaroid have the 'old' feeling, add the old paper texture and set the blending mode to 'multiply' with an opacity of 10%. 


Step 6 

I haven't done this step but if you would like your image to look even older and you want to vignette the edges of the picture then create a new layer (cmd/cntrl + shift + n) and take out your brush tool with an opacity if 25%. Drag the the layer beneath the Polaroid layer and brush around the inside edges of the Polaroid and you're done.