Visual Autobiography Digital Self Portrait

How to Use Adobe Photoshop for Beginners

Back in 2020, I moved to a new state and started teaching Digital Art for the first time. While I had 20 years of experience using Photoshop and Illustrator in my own work, I had only worked with students on digital skills individually due to limited resources at my previous school. Excited by the opportunity, I developed a project-based curriculum to teach both basic and advanced tools for photo manipulation, illustration, and simple animation. This curriculum guides students through a series of projects that build on each other, helping them master Photoshop's menus, panels, and tools. Students use Wacom tablets and styluses, and projects are inspired by current digital design trends and contemporary artists.
​A key part of the curriculum includes beginner Photoshop tutorials, to teach students to manage their workflow and problem-solve both individually and collaboratively. For an introductory project, I designed a lesson I call Visual Autobiography which teaches students to create a layered self-portrait. This project provides students the opportunity to introduce themselves, reflect on creative expression, and learn the basics of Photoshop

Key Photoshop Skills and Techniques

The Visual Autobiography project introduces a variety of basic skills, keyboard shortcuts and tools. It is also a great way for students to introduce themselves to the class and for me to get to know the students. 
The skills covered in this lesson include: 

• Bringing image into Photoshop/ Adjusting Size/ Cropping
• Understanding Resolution dpi and ppi 
• Selection Tools/ Creating and Saving Complex Selections 
• Creating Layer Masks
• Smart Objects vs. Rasterized Layers
• Nondestructive Editing 
• Layer Management 
• Resizing Images (transform/free transform)
• Color Adjustments and Adjustment Layers
• Gradients / Background Layers
• Fair Use/Copyright ethics when using found images

IB Art Exhibition 2020, student work that inspired this digital portrait project

Digital Portrait Project Inspiration

This lesson was inspired by an IB (International Baccalaureate) Art project created by a student for his exhibition a few years ago. (To see this students full exhibition check out this blog post)
His digital self-portrait told the story of an inoperable brain tumor he had since birth, requiring periodic treatment to maintain his vision. These treatments were physically challenging and left him drained of energy. As an active outdoorsman and mountaineer, he used the metaphor of a wildfire in the mountains to express the challenge of his tumor.
The portrait shows his silhouette filled with a mountain landscape. Above his ear, smoke from a wildfire rises, and a helicopter is shown responding to the fire. An MRI scan of his brain is faintly visible in the silhouette. This image poetically tells his story, and I found it so moving that I wanted to develop a lesson around visual storytelling and metaphor.

Victorian "Spirit" Photography used darkroom double exposures to create ghostly effects

Photographic double exposure art by Gjon Mili, 1945

Portrait Double Exposure

I have always been fascinated with darkroom double exposure art and liked the idea of introducing this art form digitally to my students for this project. 
Double exposure art, where two images are blended to create a single, visually striking piece, has evolved from traditional darkroom photography to modern digital art. In darkroom photography, this effect was achieved by exposing the same piece of film twice, overlaying two separate images. This required precise timing and a lot of trial and error to get right.
In Adobe Photoshop, creating double exposure art is much more accessible. Artists can blend images easily using layer masks and adjusting the opacity. The use of  blend modes and adjustment layers offers the possibility of fine tuning the resulting images to create focal points and cohesion of color scheme. Overall this digital process allows for more control and creativity compared to the old darkroom techniques and impressive results can be accomplished by beginners.

Contemporary Double Exposure Artists

I like to incorporate Contemporary Digital Artists into my curriculum for students to explore and be inspired by. The artists I share for this lesson include: Barett Biggers, Alexis Folliot, Antonio Mora, and Jenya Byguzou. 

Meeting the Bear King by Barrett Biggers

​Barett Biggers creates dreamy portraits by blending faces with nature elements like forests and flowers. His use of vibrant colors and smooth gradients makes his work pop. For students, studying Biggers' highly detailed compositions (which have a lot of elements) demonstrates how important it is to balance colors and contrasts to make both images in a double exposure stand out while still looking cohesive.

Downtown by Alexis Folliot aka Nevessart

Alexis Folliot who goes by nevessart online, combines faces with landscape and architectural elements, creating an intriguing mix of the organic and the structured. Her work demonstrates how negative space (white space) can add visual interest and depth to portraits. Using mostly black and white with low-saturation pops of color, she shows how subtle use of color can draw the eye throughout the composition. Teaching students to play with negative space in Photoshop can help them learn how to effectively guide the viewer's eye.

Photo Collage by Antonio Mora

Antonio Mora’s work has a mysterious, dreamlike quality. He often merges faces with abstract textures and landscapes, using high contrast and dramatic lighting to create depth. Mora's portraits are great examples of how contrast can set the mood and make key elements stand out. Students can learn to use contrast to add drama and focus in their own double exposures.

Art by Jenya Vyguzov

Jenya Vyguzov is known for his detailed and intricate double exposure portraits that combine photography, nature, and fashion. His use of fine textures and patterns creates rich, complex images. Students can draw inspiration from his work, especially his influences from fashion and album art, to experiment with layers and blending modes in Photoshop, adding texture and depth to their own projects while tapping into pop culture.

Mind Mapping Activity

Since the focus of this lesson is visual storytelling, I wanted to guide students through reflective activities to help them develop their ideas. One of my favorite pre-work activities is mind mapping. This technique allows for structured brainstorming and encourages non-linear thinking, where even seemingly peripheral ideas can become the foundation of a project.
We start with a partner activity where students discuss synonyms for "autobiography" and choose the one that resonates with them most. This chosen synonym becomes the center of our mind map, and we explore the associations that branch out from it. I love mind mapping because it often leads to unexpected paths and helps students push beyond their initial ideas to find something truly intriguing.

Gathering Photographic Elements

After developing a direction for their projects, students gather photos for their project, either from their own camera rolls or from copyright-free online sources. These photos will be layered into their portraits to tell their story. They also need a base photograph of themselves. Students can pose however they like, and we discuss how different poses convey various messages and moods. I encourage them to use accessories if it fits their story (e.g., sunglasses, goggles, helmets, hats) and to take their photos against a solid background to simplify creating the selections in Photoshop. I've seen students get wildly creative with their portraits, from hanging upside down to make their hair look like it's floating upward, to using a fan to add movement.
Some students may struggle with being photographed. I address their concerns individually and offer solutions, such as taking their photo during a private session or using a different photo from their past. I reassure them that the portrait is just a base for the double exposure techniques and that their face will be obscured in the final piece, making the portrait more of an "outline" than a dominant element in the composition.

Each tutorial breaks down a technique, tool or skill, each video is less than 5 minutes

Beginner Photoshop Tutorials

To teach the technical skills in Adobe Photoshop needed for this project, I use a series of pre-recorded video tutorials hosted privately on YouTube. This allows students to learn at their own pace. While I use the SmartBoard to demonstrate simple techniques to the whole class, students find video tutorials more effective for complex tasks because they can pause and practice as needed. I also provide a handout highlighting key tools in the Photoshop toolbar to help students memorize the icons and understand tool grouping.
Students access these Adobe Photoshop beginner tutorials through EdPuzzle or Google Classroom. Each class begins with a “warm-up” to review or re-teach skills covered in the videos. I created these tutorials during virtual learning and continue using them because they've proven successful. Having my own tutorials ensures that students receive consistent, step-by-step instruction tailored to their needs, rather than relying on existing YouTube or Adobe content.

Screenshot of Virtual Sticker Awards and comments on the group Google Slides critique presentation

Art Reflection Activity

What I love most about these portraits is how expressive they are. Students become deeply invested in the stories they tell through imagery, often using their own photography. This project is a perfect start-of-the-school-year activity to get to know your students and for them to get to know one another. Students choose a variety of stories to tell, and sometimes they are quite personal. It's important to build a supportive classroom environment to encourage sharing these expressive artworks.
Throughout this unit, I include several opportunities for partner discussions where students share their progress and offer constructive feedback. We also do gallery walks where students leave their files with the layers panel open on the screen, and classmates leave post-it note encouragements and questions. By building community along the way, students are ready for a reflective and constructive critique discussion by the end of the unit.
To prepare for the critique, students write a reflection about two of their artistic choices and how these choices support their narrative. We present their work in a group Google Slideshow, and students verbally share their reflections with a small group of 4-6 peers. After the small group discussion, students view all the portraits (I teach multiple sections, so it's fun for students to see their friends’ work) in the slideshow and offer Virtual Award Stickers. They are limited to 3 awards and must justify their selection in a comment on the slideshow, explaining why the artist received this award.
Students always enjoy this part of the critique, but it does require oversight to ensure the comments are appropriate and use artistic vocabulary. Students are graded on these comments, which helps maintain focus. Additionally, I monitor to ensure students stick to the 3-sticker limit.

Digital Art for Beginners

I hope you feel empowered to teach digital artmaking tools, as they are wonderfully accessible to beginners and allow students to engage with their own photography. If you're looking for more Adobe lessons for beginners, check out my Digital Art Lesson Bundle (this lesson is included). This resource includes a variety of projects and tutorials designed to help students master digital art techniques while expressing their creativity.