We've already written 2 tutorials for the Light Painting Effect, one for Photoshop, one for Fireworks, and now we will show you how to create this effect using the new version of Pixelmator , the 1.2.

The idea is create some lighting effects and the process is very similar to the Photoshop version. One thing I'd like to mention is that this new version of Pixelmator has some very nice features, which we will be using some of them during the tutorial.

Step 1

Create a new document and place the image of the street, you can download the one we used here, it's is from Marco Arment.

Step 2

Now we need a photo that will be the light painting model. I used a photo from a cover of The Beatles Abbey Road CD.

Step 3

Now this is one of the new features of the 1.2 version of Pixelmator, the Polygonal Lasso Tool is really good for this sorts of selections. So select the Lasso Tool (L), then on the Tool Options box, you will have 2 types the Free Form, and the Polygonal. chose the Polygonal and select the Anti-alias option. Now create a marquee selection for each beatle. Tip: use SHIFT to keep adding selections.

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Step 4

After you select all dudes, create a new layer, then go to Edit>Refine Selection, just increase a bit of the Smooth, to 2. Now go to Edit>Stroke(Shift+Cmd+O). Use 6 for the width.

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Step 5

Create a new layer and choose the Brush Tool(B). Change the diameter of the brush to 5px and 90px for the hardness. Select white for the color and paint more details for the stroke. Add details like hair, hands, feet.

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Step 6

Create another layer and fill it with black. Then move it behind the contour and details layer. After that select these 3 layers and merge them.

Step 7

First thing here is to change the blend mode to Color Dodge, the black will disappear. Then scale the layer, make a bit bigger. Go to Edit>Transform>Scale and use 110%. After that go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian... use Radius of 2px.

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Step 8

With the Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) make a rectangular selection and create a new layer. Then repeat the same thing we did before, go to Edit>Stroke. Now duplicate that layer untill you get 10 rectangles. Now lets use 2 other nice features in this new version of Pixelmator, Rulers and Guides. Just add a guide so we can align the rectangles like I did in the image below.

Step 9

Go to Edit>Transfor>Distort. Then just move the vertices trying to follow the perspective of the street.

Step 10

Again, create a new layer, fill it with black and move it behind the crosswalk layer. Then merge both layers and go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian, this time however use 1px for Radius.

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Conclusion

This is the third program we used to create the same effect. I really like to use Pixelmator and these new features, specially the Polygonal Lasso Tool, really make the process much easier. As I've been writing here, every time I use Pixelmator I get really impressed with how fast it is, using filters like Gaussian Blur and other blurs is much faster and pleasant than Photoshop.

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Below you can download the Pixelmator file

About author

My name is Fabio Sasso, I'm a graphic/web designer from Porto Alegre, Brazil and I'm the founder of Abduzeedo. I hope we can share lots of information, tips, and ideas through abduzeedo.

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