A step-by-step instructional tutorial for seamlessly combining images onto one canvas

I get a lot of people asking me how I make the images I make. Well, I have different techniques, but this one is good for beginners. Here I will walk you through the “blending” process. I use Photoshop 6.0, so these instructions should be good for all those using some version of Photoshop. Here are the two pictures I will be using:

Now to begin, we need to open up a new canvas. Go to “File >> New”. I am sizing mine to be 800×600 pixels. I use RGB mode and the transparent selection:

Now, get acquainted with tool bar because I will refer to it often:

If you hover the icons, then it will tell you what they are. So if you are unsure of what I am referring to in this tutorial, hover until you find the tool I mention.

Okay, now that we have a new canvas, we need to get our two images onto it. Open up the first one and use the rectangular marquee tool to select the portion of the image you want. I am going to select the entire image. Now got to “Edit >> Copy”. Close the image and then go to “Edit >> Paste”. Now your image should appear on the new canvas. Do the same with second image. Here’s what I now have:

Next we want to resize the image a little bit. They are a bit too large for our canvas. You can do this by selecting the move tool. When you do this, at the top of your screen will appear this:

Make sure this box is checked. When it is, you will see a box surrounding your image. Now we can adjust it’s size. Place the cursor at the corner of the bounding box until you see a diagonal double arrow. To keep the image in proportion when we resize it you need to press “Shift” while you move the arrow cursor inwards. Do this for both images. The Layers palette on your right will show you both of you layers:

Anyway, the canvas I have now looks like this after I have resized my images:

Now we want to blend the images. The way I am going to show you how to do this is with the lasso and feather tools. The feather is not so much a tool as an option. You can find it at the top of screen. It look like this:

What you want to do is enter in a number. Depending on what number you enter, you will get a different result as to how much of the image is taken away. The feather actually cuts part of the image by making it fade. Usually, I use a number between about ten and forty. For this example, I am going to use twenty [20]. So enter in the number 20 next to the box by “Feather”. Then run the lasso around the part of the image you want to get rid of:

Now that we have the lasso tool selecting the image, we can get rid of it. You do this by going to “Edit >> Cut:. Now look at what yuo should have:

Now you have an image ready for filters, effects, etc. It may take a little practice, but in time, it will all be easy. Practice, practice, practice.