Fading Photos

Feathering is today's software term for the conventional technique known as vignetting: a soft edged border around an image, which blends into the background which appears to be tiny feathers. The more motion, the foggier the edges are. It's analogous to "burning in" an area of the photo.

It should be well remembered that selecting the right photo is important to your montage. Size, shape, tilt and attitude are all important considerations when choosing photos.
First you can use a Feathered Selection in the Photoshop then simply delete - or fill with White. You could also use a Layer Mask. Click the "Add a Mask" button at the bottom of the Layers Palette (Gray square, white circle) and observe the addition of the Mask icon to the active layer.
Also remember that black masks and hides the image and white opens the mask and allows image to show through. Adjust your Gradient by changing the starting point, ending point and distance you drag the tool across the window. Drag out gradients as many times as you like until you have it the way you want it. To Modify the actual image, click on its Icon in the layer, and to re-edit your mask, click on its Icon in the layer.

Once you're satisfied you can commit your vignette to file. First, click the New Layer button in the Layers Palette so your vignette won't disturb the original photo. Now, set the foreground color to the desired color you want. The background fills with white, and the photo becomes nice and softly vignetted or feathered.

For photo montage, there are a number of ways than we can experiment with feathering for similar effects in variation with shapes. We just have to take the expert’s advice that a bit of raggedness makes your art more human and friendlier to the viewer!

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