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Images are often an afterthought in Web Development, whereas Design Imagery is usually in the forefront, for understandable reasons. However, do not let this dissuay you from making your stock imagery stand out and “pop” from your design(s). There is a plethora of design techniques artist use to create ambience from stock images, one such technique is the miniature faking effect that mimics the photographic tilt-focus effect. This post is concerned with post processing of images, but background information on the photograph effect of tilt-shift is beneficial to understanding both.

Tilt-Shift Photography

Tilt-shift Photography refers to the use of camera movements, often for simulating a miniature scene and can also refer to simulating shallow depth-of-field with digital postprocessing. Tilt-shift encompasses two types of movements:

Tilt

Tilt – rotation of the lens plane relative to the image plane, which is used to control the POF orientation using the Scheimpflug Principle. Tilt allows objects in sharp focus to be at different distances from a camera by allowing the pof to be rotated about an axis at the intersection of the len’s front focal plane and a plane through the center of the lens parallel to the image plane. Here, the tilt determines the distance from the axis of rotation to the center of the lens and the focus determines the angle of the pof with the image plane and used togethery, they determine the position of the pof. Effectively, it controls the parts of an image that appear sharp.

Shift

Shift – movement of the lens parallel to the image plane, which is used to adjust the position of the subject in the image area without moving the camera backwards, which aids in avoding the convergence of parallel lines. Effectively, Shift displaces the lens parallel to the image plane, allowing adjusting the position of a subject in an area without moving the camera back.

Selective Focus

Selective focus can be utilized to catch a user’s attention to part of an image while de-emphasizing other parts of the image. Tilt allows for the pof to be nearly parallel to the line of sight, allowing for parts of an image at vastly different distances from the camera, to be rendered sharp. Selective focus can be utilized with tilt and be given to different parts of an image at the same distance from a camera.

Selective focus via tilt is often what is truly used to simulate miniature scenery, not tilt-shift; the term is a misnomer and is derived from tilt-shift lens that are required to produce the effect optically.

Miniature Faking

Miniature Faking describes a photographic process where an image of a life-size location is created to give the optical illusion of a minature scale model. This can be accomplished by blurring parts of the image (typically outer edges), which simulates a shallow depth of field, normally found in close-up photography, thereby making the image’s scene seem much smaller than it actually is. Additionally, most faked-miniature images are shot from a high angle to immitate the effect of looking down on a model scale.

Simulating Tiny-Shift, aka Miniature Faking Digitally

Miniature faking can be accomplished with an image editor by blurring an images top and bottom while keeping the image’s subject sharp. These effects are best utilized in images that have relatively little height and taken at a high angle from the ground.

Simulating Tilt-shift Photography

Simulating Tilt-shift Photography is an extremely creative type of photography post processing, an image editor is used to simulate camera manipulation that creates optical illusions, making the main feature in an image seem miniature. Image editors, like Photoshop, can be used to simulate this affect by altering the images focus, replicating shallow depth of field normally found in macro lenses, which makes the scene seem much smaller.

Simulating brighter imagery via increased color saturation and contrast, developers can add to the focus manipulation effect found in tilt-shift images, or while simulating tilt-shift in an editor.

Note: tilt-shift images create the optical illusion of a model, so it is important to keep this in mind when selecting the image to perform the effect on: try and select an image with an elevated viewpoint, and also an image with little varying heights.

I have not provided a steps to follow list, because while reading about this technique, I found two completely different techniques and am not quite sure which one to promote (if not both). Instead, I highly encourage all who are interested to read and try both, first: How to Use Photoshops Lens Blur Tool for Tilt-Shift Fakery, and second (read both and apply together) Fake Model Photography with Tilt-Shift Photography Photoshop Tutorial.

Below are a few before and after photographs I snagged from Wikipedia of the Hampton Roads, va area. I used a number of different tutorials while researching this technique (listed below), and utilized ideas and techniques from them all while creating these images.

Miniature Faking is not as difficult as I imagined, nor is it only for the creatively-inclined; Follow-ups should include a steps to follow list or lists (if both techniques prove correct), as well as a Photoshop Action for download and much more importantly, implementing Miniature Faking to mimic Tilt-Shift Photography via JavaScript in Photoshop (.jsx).

References and Resources

• Faking Tilt Shift - A Tutorial for Realistic Minaturised Photos
• Tilt-Shift Photography Photoshop Tutorial
• Fake Model Photography
• Tilt-Shift Photography – 80+ Beautiful Examples, Tutorials And More
• Tilt Shift Photoshop Tutorial: How to Make Fake Miniature Scenes
• The Tilt-Shift Miniature Fake Technique in Photoshop CS: A Simple How-To
• Tilt-Shift Photos and Effects
• 50 Beautiful Examples Of Tilt-Shift Photography
• Tilt-Shift Photography
• Miniature Faking
• How to Use Photoshops Lens Blur Tool for Tilt-Shift Fakery