Photo Effects: Create A Photo Within A Photo

So far in this tutorial, we started out with our original Background layer, duplicated it, renamed it "Smaller version", then used a little-known trick to create a new layer below it and renamed that layer to "Clipping mask". In this section, we'll be letting that layer live up to its name by using it to "clip" the layer above it into our smaller, cropped version of the photo. Before we can do that though, we need to define the shape of our smaller version, and for that, we'll use a vector shape. Why use a vector shape and not just drag out a selection with the Rectangular Marquee tool? Simple. By having our smaller photo drawn as a vector shape, we're free to resize and rotate it as much as we want without worrying about causing the edges to become soft or jagged, a definite possibility if we were using a pixel-based shape which is what the Marquee tools would create.

Step 3: Drag Out The Shape Of The Smaller Photo With The Rectangle Tool

With the "Clipping mask" layer selected in the Layers palette, select the Rectangle tool either from Photoshop's Tools palette or by pressing U on your keyboard:

Photoshop Photo Effects: Select the Rectangle tool.

The Rectangle tool draws rectangular vector-based shapes, and with it selected, I'm going to drag out the approximate shape and location of my smaller, cropped photo. I want to bring focus and attention to the subject of the photo, which in this case is the guy in the kayak, so I'll drag out a rectangular shape around him:

Photoshop Photo Effects: Drag out the approximate shape and location of the smaller version around your subject.

With the vector shape drawn, notice what's happened in the Layers palette. The "Clipping mask" layer, which was a normal, blank layer a moment ago, has now become a vector shape layer:

Photoshop Photo Effects: The "Clipping mask" layer has become a shape layer.

Step 4: Use The Vector Shape To Create A Clipping Mask

Now that we have the shape of our smaller, cropped version of the photo drawn out, we can use this shape as a clipping mask, which will "clip" the layer above it to the dimensions of the shape. To do that, hold down the Alt key (Win) / Option key (Mac) and move your mouse cursor directly between the "Smaller version" and "Clipping mask" layers, until you see your cursor change into the clipping mask icon (circled in red below):

Photoshop Photo Effects: Hold down Alt (Win) / Option (Mac) and move your mouse directly between the two layers until your cursor changes to the clipping mask icon.

Once your clipping mask icon appears, simply click with your mouse to create the clipping mask. It won't seem like anything has happened yet in your image, but in the Layers palette, the "Smaller version" layer will indent to the right, indicating that it's now being clipped by the vector shape below it:

Photoshop Photo Effects: The Layers palette now showing the "Smaller version" layer clipped by the vector shape layer below it.

Nothing much has happened yet to the image, but we're about to change that. We're going to create the appearance of our smaller, cropped photo around the subject by adding a couple of layer styles to the vector shape.