Create a shallow depth of field

1. open a new channel

2. click the eyeball beside the RGB channel at the top to see the photo

3. select the gradient tool and use a black & white gradient

4. drag from the middle of the object to be in focus ( in this case the egret)

5. to get the bottom part of the object in focus, change the blend mode to screen and click and drag the gradient from the middle of the object, down ( in the case I went left and right also)

6. select the RBG channel, use the magic wand tool and shift click to select the entire object ( egret)

7. select the alpha channel and use Alt delete to fill with the foreground color

8. deselect and go back to the layers palette

9. choose filter - >blur -> lens blur

10. change depth map to alpha 1