Getting ready for the Christmas spirit

For the December cover of my free monthly eMagazine, Photo Insights, I do something with a touch of Christmas humor usually involving animals. This is my great Pyrenees, Princey, and his siblings when they were 5 weeks old (Princey is the one at the far right -- he now weighs 150 pounds). To make the selections of the puppies and the Santa hats, I used Topaz Remask 5. This is the best software we have for selecting around hair and fur. The foreground snow was actually cloned in from another photograph. In Photoshop, when two images are open at the same time, you can clone from one to the other. In the original capture of the pups, they were very sharp and they seemed inappropriately contrasty and prominent against the misty feel of the snowy background. So, with the dogs selected, I used Edit > fill and filled the selection with white at 15% opacity (white has to be in the foreground color box). If you don't already subscribe to my eMagazine, it consists of articles on photography and Photoshop. You can sign up at the bottom of the home page of my website: www.jimzuckerman.com.