Text Portrait

Text Portrait In this exercise you will create a portrait in black and white using an image and text. The text will be related to the individual you have chosen. For example if you chose Dr. Martin Luther King as the person for the subject of your project, you may use the text from one of his famous speeches as the words that will fill the image.

Your teacher will explain in class the details and variety of choices you have regarding your choices of subject matter. Use the following as a guide to the technical aspects of your work. These instructions represent the beginning of the project. Your job as artist is to create your own individual artwork based on this model. (file size 5 x 7 or 8 x 10, 150, transparent)

  1. Use the Internet to find a large body of text which relates to the individual you are using. This text could be a compilation of criticism, review, speech or your own words. Copy all the text into a word document. Be sure text is single spaced with no breaks between lines. Use only one size font (between 3 and 6 points) and one font style for the entire page. You may need more than one source for the text.
  2. Save the word document in your folder.
  3. Find a clear image of the person you will be using as subject for your portrait. Duplicate the layer. Turn off the original layer. Delete the background of the image using a mask. When complete, apply the mask to the image. At this point be sure you have a high contrast image. You may need to use image / adjust / hue and saturation. This will depend on your image.
  4. Go to select / color range / shadows. (This will select the dark areas of the image) Command J (to move selection to a new layer). While the selection is active hold the shift key and press delete. This will bring up the fill dialog box. Fill this selection with black. BE SURE THE PRESERVE TRANSPARENCY BOX IS CHECKED.
  5. Target the image layer. Go to select / color range / midtones. Command / J. Shift / delete. Fill with 50 % gray.
  6. Merge the black and the 50% gray layer.
  7. Make a new layer above this layer and fill it with white.
  8. Make a text box with the text tool and make a selection filling the entire work. Copy / paste your text so it fills your page with the text. You may have to copy / paste a number of times to fill the page. Be sure the text is small and fills the page.
  9. Select the image layer you have created, select / all, edit / copy.
  1. Select the type layer and add a layer mask. Select the layer mask, hold the alt / option key and then paste (edit paste ). The image should be pasted onto the mask! Deselect. Command I to invert the mask. Click on the text layer. Your image will be made up of text. You may need to adjust the type layer to make the text smaller of larger to get the effect you want. Experiment.
  2. You may apply a gradient to the mask. You may apply a gradient color to the mask. Copy

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the layer and experiment with different effects.

12. Select a minimum of 10 words or phases from the text to enlarge or enhance. The words you choose will reflect the ideas or descriptions of the person you have chosen.

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