Step 1.
Open up your photograph in photoshop, here is the photo I will be working with throughout this tutorial:
Get out the magnetic lasso tool (
) set the frequency of this tool to around 80 or 100, and select the person or element you'd like to apply this accent effect to. To do this by simply tracing around the person or element while holding down the mouse.
Once you are happy with the selection, press Enter on your keyboard to select the section with a marquee.
Step 2.
Press Ctrl + J on your keyboard to duplicate this selection onto a new layer. Here's how your layers pallet should look after doing this:
Using the Lasso Tool (
) clean up your duplicate layer a bit, by removing anything that the Magnetic Lasso tool missed.
Step 3.
Finally click on the background layer (bottom most layer) and go to: Filter->Blur->Gaussian Blur.
Now depending on the size of your picture will determine how much accent you'll want to use. Here I've used a blur of 5 pixels:
Result:
And there you have it, an easy way to accent your photos or pictures. If you think the background has to much light or not light enough, you can change the brightness and contrast to give it a little more of an accent.
