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Reader Tutorial: The Voyager Artwork by Moe Pike Soe
The Voyager artwork was created as a Ten Dollar Fonts showcase for a brilliant font designed by Maarten Van’t Wout. I used Cinema 4D and Photoshop to create the atmospheric photo manipulation. The technique is to use different blend modes and adjustment layers as combo to create dynamic lighting for each elements in the composition. I will be showing you these simple techniques to create the artwork. The tutorial includes a part of Cinema 4D but I’ve also included the already rendered pictures for people without C4D to follow. Step 1 We are going to create the 3D text in Cinema 4D first. Create a new motext using the font, type in desired words and change the horizontal spacing to 85 cm with the depth of 35 cm. Step 2 There are two lights being given to the type. The first one is directly above the type at 100% intensity and another light is in front of the type with only 50% intensity. Also make sure you change the shadow mode to area as well. Step 3 Create a new material and change the color to R: 23 G: 23 B: 23 and assign it to the motext. Step 4 Create a new camera and place it along centre of the type. Change the focal length to 76 mm. Step 5 Open up Render Settings > Output and change the resolution to 4500 pixels wide and 3000 pixels high. Also change the saving format to PNG with straight alpha and separate alpha checked. Last of all, add Global Illumination from Effects menu. Step 6 We will be exporting two different renders. One is the full 3D render and another is flat type layer. To get the flat render, change the depth of the type to 0 cm and then render it. Step 7 Open Photoshop and create a new document with 4500 pixels width and 3000 pixels height then fill the background with black color. Place the stars.jpg and change the opacity to 50%. Step 8 Import the two renders and make sure you have the flat type layer on top of the 3D type layer. Also name flat layer Flat and 3D layer 3D. Step 9 As you can see the type is not that popped out enough yet and we need more rim light on the type. To do that, create a new layer above the Flat layer and clip mask it. Then grab a soft brush with white color and paint along the sides of the type. Step 10 Repeat the step 9 again but this time it’s for the 3D layer. Step 11 Group all the type layers and name it Title. Create a level adjustment layer with a clipping mask to the group. Change the values to 0 : 0.83 : 131 . And now we have a pretty dramatic looking type. Step 12 Import the astronaut.jpg and mask out all the white background so that you will be left with the astronaut only. Place the layer below the Title group and move the astronaut so that he looks like he’s hanging on to the ‘A’. Step 13 The astronaut is too bright compared to the type and it needs darker shadows. Create a new Levels adjustment layers and change the value to 63: 0.37 : 225 and clip mask it to the astronaut layer. Step 14 Create a new layer above the astronaut layer and name it Highlight. Make sure to put the highlight layer between astronaut and the adjustment layers. Grab a soft brush with white color and paint into the sides of the astronaut. And change the layer blend mode to Soft Light. Step 15 Create another layer below the highlight area and name it Shadow. Paint inside of the astronaut with a black soft brush with the opacity of 10%. Step 16 Make a group of all the layers except the Title group and name it astronaut. Create a new vibrance adjustment layer. Change the value of vibrance to 100% and the value of saturation to 0%. Step 17 Import earth.png and place the layer above the stars layer. Move the earth to the center aligned with the background. Step 18 Create a new layer and clip mask onto the earth layer. Change the blending mode to Soft Light. And paint in shadows to the bottom part of the earth. Step 19 On the same layer, paint on the top of earth with a white soft brush to lighten up the top half of the earth. Step 20 Create a new layer beneath the Earth layer. Paint along the contour of top half of the earth with a soft white brush. This will create a glow behind the earth. Step 21 Import moon.png. We’re going to repeat Step 18 and 19 to create the similar effect but instead of on top, we’re going to paint it on the left side. Step 22 Group the moon layers and the earth layers. Create a new exposure adjustment layer and a vibrance adjustment layer. Change the value as shown below. Step 23 Now we’ve got a pretty cool atmosphere now but the elements are not cohesive yet. Create a new color balance adjustment layer and a vibrance adjustment layer. Change the values as shown below. Step 24 Create a new layer and name it Top Light. Select a soft brush with the biggest size and change the color to #6d7595 . Paint it along the top of canvas and change the opacity to 40% Step 25 Import flare.jpg and change the blend mode to Linear Dodge. Adjust the position of the flare to the top and centre of the earth. Create a new levels adjustment layer and change the values as shown. Step 26 Find any unwanted highlights or areas that need more shadows and paint above on it by creating a new layer with soft light blend mode. Create a new layer and press shift+cmd+E (shift+ctrl+E) to merge all layers into one. Choose Filter>Sharpen>Unsharp Mask and change the values as below. Conclusion The techniques I’ve shown are simple but they do take time to fine tune depending on the source light in anyway artworks. I hope you’ve learned some new techniques from the tutorial. For more information about me and my work, please visit http://thebeaststudio.com Source Files Download Source Files
Reader Tutorial: Wrestlerish Album Artwork by Chris Valentine
This is a short case study on the album artwork I did for the South African band, Wrestlerish. There were at least 8 different illustrations for this album, so I've decided to focus on the portraits which I combined for the poster design and booklet.Apologies for the low res process pics, but I only had access to my phone during the drawing process. Step 1 My first step when drawing portraits is to make sure all of the elements of the face are accurately positioned. I first block in the rough shape of the head, and then go in and add in rough positional marks for the nose, eyes, ears etc. I always work very closely from my photograph at this point and use my pencil to measure spaces and convert to the page accordingly. I use a Faber Castelle 0.5mm mechanical pencil with corresponding 2B lead and a putty eraser. Step 2 I now begin fleshing out some of the details. Once I am 100% sure that the landmarks of the face are accurate, I can start detailing without worrying too much about likeness. I carefully analyse each element of the photograph & try to reproduce exactly what I see onto my drawing. This takes a lot of practice, but with time you start relating value in the photograph to different pressure levels with the pencil and it becomes easier to get your drawing true to the photograph. Step 3 In this step I started with the beard. This was the most painful part of the drawing as it involved hundreds of tiny little pencil marks with different areas of light and dark. Always remember, the devil is in the details. I try to pick out the dark and light areas of the beard and shade accordingly, using tightly packed strokes for the dark areas and more sparse pencil marks for the light bits. Step 4 Step 4 is essentially the polishing phase where I add in final details and make sure I've got the likeness right. If it doesn't look like the guy by now it's a bit of a problem; so always try and leave your dark shading until you're sure you have the likeness correct! This step is all about adding the finishing details and highlighting the smaller features of a person's face that aren't immediately noticeable. Step 5 As you can see in the image, I like to work on A4 (29.7cm x 21.0cm) paper, normally 200GSM as it's heavy enough to handle acrylic inks without warping. I always use masking tape to attach the page to a hard board working surface to press on. Once I have finished my drawing, I scan it in at 600DPI and bring it into Photoshop. Step 6 This is how a drawing typically ends up looking once it's ready to be integrated into my digital piece. I will normally drag the scan into a new document (with a size relative to the job description), and I'll use the levels adjustment layer to bring the darks out and improve the general contrast. I'll also go around the piece with a soft eraser and remove any marks I may have left on the page. It's also important to note that I set the layer's blending mode to 'Multiply'. This removes the white from the layer and leaves your pencil marks so you can work underneath them. Blending modes can be found in the dropdown menu above your layers palette which will say 'Normal' if you haven't changed it yet. Conclusion Once I had done this for each of the band members, I brought them all together into one huge canvas and messed around with various paint splatters and watercolor scans, as well as the cover artwork of the Johannesburg skyline. I would love to answer any questions you may have, so feel free to get in contact. For more information about Chris Valentine visit his site at http://valentinedesign.co.za and follow his Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/christhecook
Reader Tutorial: Flaming Car in Photoshop by Lincoln Soares
This week’s tutorial we will show you how to create a flaming car. We saw this effect before and it’s quite simple but it’s a good exercise and the result is quite good. You can also apply this effect on other images. So let’s do that. Step 1 Open Photoshop and create a new document. Make the background with a mix of black and red (#160000). Then with the image of a car with no background. For this first step the idea is get the outlines of the car for our image. To do that, it's pretty easy. Create a new layer by duplicating the car's layer. Rename it to "Base" and hide the original. Go to Image>Adjustments>Invert. After that go to Filter>Stylize>Find Edges. Repeat the same thing again in order to have another layer but for the Blend Mode use Hard Light. After that you can merge those 2 layers into one. Step 2 Your image will look like this: Step 3 Now that we've gotten the cars outline we will have to apply the light effect on it so it will look like a flaming car. In the same layer that we created in the step 1, let's apply a Gaussian Blur. Go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. The value will vary depending on the resolution you are working on. In my case I used 1.6 for the Radius. After that change the Blend Mode to Scree. Duplicate the the layer keeping the same blend mode, however let's apply a Gaussian Blur again, go to Fitler>Blur>Gaussian Blur and use 3.6 pixels. Rename this layer to "Top". Duplicate the layer we created in the first step and merge it down with this one. Then duplicate the first layer again and rename it to Red and go to Image>Adjustments>Hue and Saturation. Select Colorize and change the Saturation to 100. The Blend Mode of this layer will be Overlay. Let's repeat this again to create the yellow version. Go to Image>Adjustments>Hue and Saturation and use 40 for the Hue. Do the same again to create an orange version, then for the Hue and Saturation use -22. After that change the Opacity of the yellow and orange layers to 50% and put them inside a folder. You can do that by selection both and going to Layer>Group Layers. Then with the group select go to Layer>Vector Mask and then delete the outlines on the rear part of the car. Step 4 Our effect is pretty much done. Now let's duplicate the original layer that we hid on the step 1. Select it and go to Image>Adjustments>Hue an Saturation. Select colorize and change the Saturation to 100. Put this layer in a folder and rename it to Car. Step 5 Add a new layer and name it "Superior Line" before starting adding flames and other light rays. With the Brush Tool (B) with Hardness 0 add a line following the tires skid marks and go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. I used 4.5 pixels for the radius. After that go again to Image>Adjustments>Hue and Saturation. Use +76 for the Hue. Tip: You will have to do that for the right side tires and the left ones as well. Step 6 Now let's start mixing some images in our composition. Get some flame images ad start adding them in your image. Notice that the flame images I have they are all in black background, that way you can use Screen for the Blend Mode and the black will be transparent. Step 7 Keep adding more flames. Step 8 Here I added another flame image. You can change the perspective of the image by going to Edit>Transform>Perspective. Once again use Screen for the Blend Mode, and if you wan the effect to be stronger, just duplicate the layer. Img8 Step 9 Select one of the flames that you used for the skid mark and move it so it is underneath the car. Do that for the front and rear part of the car. Step 10 Almost done. Let's add a few more details. Add a new layer and then with the Brush Tool (B), use a rounded brush with 0% Hardness to create some little spots of fire following the skid marks. Make sure you use different sizes for the spots like the image below. Step 11 Duplicate the layer and go to Image>Adjustment>Hue and Saturation. Select Colorize and change the Saturation to 100 and the Lightness to -50. After that change the Blend Mode to Overlay. Duplicate that layer again and go to Image>Adjustments>Hue and Saturation. Change the Hue to 76. The next thing here is add an image of smoke like the image below. Conclusion That's it, our image is done. It takes a little time and work but the technique is quite simple. The end result is quite nice as well. I also hope you liked my first tutorial here at Abduzeedo. If you have any questions or want any asset I use here you can reach me at designsoares@hotmail.com I am very happy to contribute with Abduzeedo, a blog that has helped me quite a lot. Download Photoshop File Click here to download the Photoshop file used for this tutorial This tutorial was written by Lincoln Soares, an art director from São Paulo, Brazil. Lincoln has been working for over 5 years and you can check out more of his works at http://behance.com/lincolnsoares. You can also follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/lincolnsoares.
World Collabs 4 Winning Entry Tutorial by Mat Macquarrie
Hello and welcome, this is a quick tutorial on how I created my poster concept for the World Collabs 4 competition. The tricky thing about planning a tutorial like this is, I created the elements with the 3D shapes from Joao Oliveira. As a quick intro to this read, A World Collabs poster begins with one designer supplying some elements and the second designer adding to those elements to create a completed poster. My goal was to use the elements supplied by the collaborator as much as possible in creating my piece. For these steps, all I did was take the shapes, expand and rotate them to start forming my robot and it's environment. Later I pasted a robotic eye that I created for a previous project. A link to a separate tutorial detailing how I made the robotic eye can be found at the bottom of this page. Robot Face I started by trying to frame the environment for the face to hover in. I flipped the shapes around to create what I called a rubber-room effect on the sides. Then I just started layering shapes one at a time until the robot started to take shape. Effects Once the robot was complete, I added a glow effect on the upper left of the skull-plate. I selected a wide circle brush and set the hardness to 0 and 70% flow and threw a quick dot and set it's layer style to Linear-dodge. Final Result I figured the blue/black colour palette would be pretty popular among other entries so I wanted to change it to something else. I opened channel mixer and tweaked it until the dark blues turned to the gold/plum colour that I have now. Then I just layered a quick title and a signature and I'm done. I really hope you enjoyed this tutorial. To learn how I created the robotic eye, I created a tutorial showing the steps in painting it.. Also check out my Web site http://www.matmacquarrie.ca/ Download the Photoshop File Click here to download the Photoshop file used for this tutorial
Flashing Design in Photoshop by Mike Speero
The tutorial of this week is very special, it's from Mike Speero, a graphic designer from Gothenburg, Sweden. Mike has been featured in several books, magazines, done interviews, had a poster up on a fancy Italian galleria and soon he will be selling skateboards as well. So in this tutorial he will show you how he created one the "Flashing" design, one of his works from his portfolio which in he mixes a photo of girl with splashes of milk and light effects to create a beautiful artowork.. We also highly recommend that you visit Mike's website and check out his portfolio, it's really cool. Step 1 Mask out the girl. Push the button in the circle, so you get the white field in your layer next to your image. Then use pen-tool or a brush with black color to erase the background. (Make sure you draw on the white field and not the picture itself) Step 2 Make the model grey by going to Image>Adjustments>Hue/saturation. Drag the middle anchor to the grey field. An easier way is to hit cmd+shift+U. Create a new white layer and place it in the bottom. Layer>New fill layer>Solid color. Then size your model up or down. In this case, I shrunk her a little bit to fit the picture better. Use cmd+T to change the size. (When in use, you can always experiment by holding down shift, ctrl and cmd sometimes to get different results.) Step 3 Time to duplicate. Go to Layer>Duplicate Layer or press cmd+J. Then go to Layer>Create Clipping Mask. The top layer should now point down to the layer beneath. Step 4 This treatment is for the top layer. Image>Adjustments>Shadow Highlights. Click in the box "show more options". Then change Shadows: Amount to 100 and Adjustments: Midtone Contrast to -100. Step 5 Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. Approx 3.0 blur. Then in Blending Mode change the status from Normal to Lighten. Next to the blending mode there's the Opacity box. Make sure it's says 70%. Also, in the clipping mask field, paint over the face so it's not that blurry. If you did everything right, it should look something like the picture below. Step 6 Duplicate the bottom layer and place it on the top. Then place it in the clipping mask. Then for the top layer Image>Adjustments>Shadow/Highlights. See below for the numbers. And last Blending Mode>Lighten. Step 7 Make a new duplicate from the top layer. This time only use the right hand. Mask away the rest. Then go to Image>Adjustments>Curves. If it's not that white as you wanted it to be, go to Blending Mode and change to Lighten. Duplicate the hand. Mark both hand layers and merge them by Layers>Merge Layers. Keep the layer in the clipping mask. Step 8 Make the background Black. Double click on the layer and go to Color Overlay>Double Click on the red rectangle and choose the color black. Time for some splashes. Open up your splash picture in a separate window. Then go to Select>Color Range. Get as much of the content you want and press OK. In many cases the selection is for the things you don't want. To fix that go to Select>Inverse. Now copy the splash into the window we work in. Make the splash grey by cmd+shift+U. Repeat Step 7 to make it more white. Step 9 I never use the eraser, only the mask. Use the mask to fix with the splash so it fits the boot. This layer should be on top and not be placed into the model mask. Next. Play around with a spray brush. Do however you want here. Change the opacity on some for a good mix of light. Add some special brushes as well. These should be in the mask. Keep in mind: The 2 model layers in the mask should always be on the top. The things we put in there from now on, shall be placed in the bottom. Step 10 Now we add the splashes again. Bring in new ones or just duplicate the one from before. Step 11 Use the spray brush to paint in some colors. One layer for each color. Step 12 Time to fix with the background. Create a new layer above the background layer. Use the Lasso-Tool and draw a triangle shaped form. When it's active, use a brush to paint outside the selected area to get this cool effect. Step 13 Back to a white background again. But with a little extra grey in the middle. Double-click on the layer and follow the picture below. Step 14 More splashes, but this time, put them behind the model and not in the mask. Make some Triangles and Circles. I used purple for the triangles and white for the circles. The Opacity is lowered on both symbols. You can find them in your shape-tool options palette. Create a shape with Lasso-tool that is in line with the previous lines in the background and move it up a little. Then you get an extra effect. I used purple color and lowered the opacity to 5%. Step 15 Throw in some balls or whatever you like. I made mine in Illustrator and added some effects with the mesh tool there. Then I pasted them into photoshop and in Blending Mode changed them to Screen. Use the brush to paint some shadows in the back. You can also use white to mix it up. Step 16 Light effects. I'm gonna show you how to do them. This is a quick lecture. You gonna have to practice a little to master it. Step 17 Make some bling bling stars and brush up the white parts so they really shine. Just some simple finishing stuff. Create 2 new layers and place them on the very top and do like this: Step 18 Check over your image for weird stuff. The hand looks a little strange so far. Create a new layer and place it in the model mask. Pick a white brush to paint the edges of the hand so it looks sweet. And here's the final picture! Download the Photoshop file Click here to download the Photoshop file used for this tutorial
Reader Tutorial: Wind Blow by Francesco di Pietro
Francesco di Pietro is an illustrator from Italy and he has created this really cool video tutorial or a sort of time-lapse video showing you how to draw a cool face illustration in Photoshop from scratch. The tutorial is called "wind blow tutorial" and it's definitely worth checking out. For more information about Francesco, visit his DeviantArt profile. His portfolio is full of really cool illustrations. Final Result Video Tutorial wind blow tutorial from francesco di pietro on Vimeo.
Reader Tutorial: Easy Way to Create Light Effects in GIMP in 9 Steps
Following our Reader Tutorial series we have a GIMP tutorial from Maximilian Dirkmamn, a 14 years old boy from Munich Germany, that design on his free time. The idea of this series is give opportunity to the readers to show their work and, of course help the design community sharing tips and opinions. If you want to contribute, just let us know. My name is Maximilian Dirkmann and I'm 14 years old. I come from Munich, Germany. In my free time I do designing. Check out my German website (GIMP tuts ) http://milian-web.byto.de/ and my DA http://milian-web.byto.de/ . Also I want to thank the whole http://gimper.net members for always giving me criticism and comments. Step 1 Start the GIMP application and create a new image with 1024 x 768 pixel. Make sure, that the background is black. Step 2 Now we will add a light. Use the paintbrush (shortcut [P]) and open up the "brushes" box (shortcut [Shift] + [Ctrl] + [B]) create a new brush, edit it and apply those settings: Step 3 Create a new layer (Layer ->New Layer). Call it "Light" and click one times into the middle (make sure that your foreground color is white). Adjust the opacity to 60. Step 4 Now we're going to add some color. Create a new layer (call it Color) and apply Filters ->Render ->Clouds ->Plasma with the value 0.1 at Turbulence. Set the layer mode in the layer dialog ([Ctrl] + [L]) to Divide. Adjust the opacity to 65. Step 5 In this step we will add light rays. Create a new layer with the name Light Rays. Go on Filters ->Render ->Clouds ->Solid Noise. Set the X and Y size to 16.0. Go on Filters ->Blur ->Pixelize with the width 5px and the full hight of the picture (768px). Apply Filters ->Distorts -> Polar Coordinates with the values 0 | 0. Now set the Layer mode to Grain extract. Step 6 Pick up the text tool and type a letter for example A standing for Abduzeedo. I chose Sans as the font and a size of 490px. Now go on Filters ->Light and Shadow ->Drop Shadow with the values 0 | 4 | 30 | white | 80 | and uncheck Allow resizing. Step 7 Now we are adding a gloss to the A. Go on Layer ->Transparency ->Alpha to Selection. Use the Eclipse Select Tool and hold down [Shift] + [Ctrl]. Create a new layer (call it Gloss). Pick up the Blend Tool. Set the gradient to FG to Transparent (make sure your foreground color is white) an drag a Gradient from the right bottom to the left top. Now select all [Strg] +[ A]. Step 8 The reflection of the A. Go twice on Layer ->Merge Down. Duplicate the Layer, Layer ->Duplicate Layer. Tarnsform it: Layer ->Transform ->Flip Vertically. Move the transformed Layer to the top of the A. Now add a layer mask (Layer ->Mask ->Add Layer Mask; with white full opacity). Pick up the Blend tool again but now with black as the foreground color. Drag it just like this and you will get a nice fade out effect. Conclusion Finally we are going to add a lens reflection. Create a new Layer, call it Lens Reflection and fill it with black. I want to place it on the top of my letter so I need the position. Just move your mouse to the top of the image an on the left bottom of the gimp window you can see the position. Mine is 540;190 so go on Filters ->Light and Shadow ->Lens Flare with the values 540px and 190px. Set the Layer mode to Screen an you are done! Download the GIMP file Click here to download the GIMP file used on this tutorial.
Reader Tutorial: Fake Desaturated HDR in 5 minutes
We have accepted some tutorials from readers and we think it's really good to open the blog, so anyone can share their skills with the community. Because of that and this tutorial is part of our Reader Tutorial series. If you have or want to write a tutorial and publish it here on Abduzeedo, just send it via email to us. This will teach you how to give a kinda of hdr desaturated look to your photos, it's really simple and easy, it only takes 5 minutes and will give a totally different look to your photo, so try it out. This is something you can try on your photos to see if the result is positive, it's quick and give an extra style to your work if you like. To begin with I got a photo from sxc stock Now our first step is to duplicate the background layer twice, so we will have 3 layers with the same image. On the top layer (background copy 2) I will apply Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur just enough to get the image a little blur, in this case I used the Radius 3.0 Now I will change the layer mode to Soft Light, this is what I got so far. I'm done with this layer, lets work on the middle layer (background copy). First we are going to Image > Adjustments > Desaturated that will take most of the color away now this is very important, a lot of times when you do that, the image comes out too dark, so to solve that problem we are going to Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlight ( amount of shadow 50% | highlight 0% ) as you see, the image is not that dark anymore. To give some of the color back to the image I will set the layer fill to 70%, and after that I got to the point I want to so I will Layer > Flatten Image. Now that I only have one layer again, I will duplicate this layer, and on the top layer I will apply Image > Adjustment > Threshold that is not a exactly number to apply, this will vary depending on your image, try to get to a point that you have good lines and details, as you see here: Here is the tricky part that will give a twist on the final look, go to Image > Adjustments > Invert , that will invert the colors that you have, after that just go Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur ( or just Ctrf + F ) and apply the same amount of blur you did last time. Change the layer mode to Soft Light, and you will see part of the result already there. Now a very important part to give the final touch to your image, go to Image > Adjustment > Brightness/Contrast and set the Brightness to +25 and the Contrast to -50 ( you can play around with this to get a better result for your image) And here is the final result: The most important thing is to understand what you doing so you can adapt the steps to the photo that you working with to get a better result. Hope everybody liked it, and if you try please post your results, and make sure you leave your comments.
Reader Tutorial: Zombie transformation in Photoshop
Step 1 To begin my zombie I choose these three photos (Portrait, Skull,and Texture): Step 2 Ok, to start we are going to open the portrait photo and with the Smudge Tool (R) we are going to cover the girl's nose and mouth, you can use the Stamp Tool (S) too if you like. Step 3 After we do that we are going to bring the skull photo in here and adjust to fit her face. I lower the opacity on the skull layer (after you done go bring back the opacity of the layer to normal) just so I can see her face on the back so I can re size the skull using Edit>Transform>Scale and fit right over her face as you see here: Step 4 Now that the skull is over her face we are going to take off the excess by creating a layer mask on the skull layer and painting black all around the skull living only the main part of it as you see bellow: Step 5 Now that we have the skull exactly where we want to, we are going to put the texture right over her face with the skull. Step 6 We are going to add a layer mask to the texture layer and paint the layer mask to leave only her face and parts of the skull with the texture as we see here: Step 7 Now that we have the skull and the texture where we wanted we are going to work the layers a little bit so the image will look better, first on the texture layer we are going to set the layer mode to Overlay and set the Fill to 48%. Now on the skull layer we are going to desaturate the layer by Image>Adjustments>Desaturate now that we did that we will set the Opacity to 65% and Fill to 80%. The result should look like this: Step 8 You notice her face looks a little weird, we have to change the colors to make it look better and for that we are going to duplicate the first layer (the portrait layer) after that we are going to desaturate the layer, notice that it looks really good now that all the colors blended, but I don't want the image to be black and white so I will create a layer mask on the portrait copy layer and I will only leaver her face showing on black and white: Step 9 This is what your layers should look like: Step 10 Looks good but we want to put some color on her face, we are going to create a layer on top of all the ones we already have and paint it dark brown, we only want to apply the color on her face so we are going to put a layer mask on the color layer and leave only her face (this time is easier because we already selected her face before on the portrait black and white layer, so hold ctrl and click on the portrait black and white layer mask that the selection will show) The result should look like this: Step 11 Now all we need to do is change the layer mode to Soft Light and the Fill to 58%, here is the result: Step 12 Ok, We got her to look like a zombie, now we want to make this a better composition. Starting from the background, we are going to select the girl and create a layer mask on the portrait layer, leaving only her body on the image, now we are going to create a new layer, move this layer under the portrait layer and paint in a dark way to make the background look better as you see here: Step 13 Now let's add some atmosphere effects. Create a new layer on top of the others and go to Filter>Render>Clouds. Your colors should be black and white. Then with the Eraser Tool(E) delete the area covering the face of the zombie. After that, change the Blend Mode to Color Dodge. Step 14 Duplicate the Zombie Layer and go to Filter>Other>High Pass. Use 3 pixels for the Radius. Then change the Blend Mode to Hard Light. Step 15 First paint some blood on the zombie. I used a blood brush, you can download it here. The just apply some Layer Styles. Use Color Overlay with a very dark red and Multiply for the Blend Mode. Then add a Bevel and Emboss. Use Inner Bevel for the Style, Smooth for the Technique, 100% Depth, Up, 1px Size, and 2px Soften. Step 16 Duplicate the Zombie Layer again and go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. Use 5-10 pixles for the Radius and change the Blend Mode to Soft Light. Conclusion You can add some new effects like Adjustment Layers with Hue and Saturation reducing the Saturation and make the image darker. Also you can add more blood stains, or simply whatever you want. As it is a zombie, there'r no parameters of what is right or wrong. Download the PSD File Click here to download the Photoshop file used for this tutorial
Reader Tutorial: Typography Wallpaper in Photoshop
We have accepted some tutorials from readers and we think it's really good to open the blog, so anyone can share their skills with the community. Because of that, we will start the "Reader Tutorial" series. If you have or want to write a tutorial and publish it here on Abduzeedo, just send it via email to us. Thank you very much and enjoy our first tutorial from Jonathan Connolly. Hey guys this is Creative Volition, an advertising and design agency based out of South Florida. Just a quick thanks to Abduzeedo for being such a great help to the design community. Also a special thanks to everyone at Creative Volition for making our design agency what it is today. Here is a quick tutorial from one of our latest designs. Hopefully this tutorial can benefit in your pursuit of becoming a better designer. Step 1 Create a new document at 1200 x 800 pixels with a resolution of 72dpi. Start off by importing all of your vector designs separately into a Photoshop canvas. In this case we divided our vectors into 3 separate smart objects and dragged them into the Photoshop canvas. Step 2 Hide all vectors and create a new text box. In this case I typed out the name of our company, "Creative Volition Inc.". The font we chose was "ITC Avant Garde Gothic". Keep your font in full caps, especially if your using this one! Continue to copy/paste your text across the text box. Step 3 Text settings: 16pt font, Regular, 16pt height spacing, Color #404040. Step 4 Continue to copy/paste the text until it fills the entire canvas. Stretch the box out using the text tool until it expands beyond the canvas size. Step 5 Once the text box is filled completely with the copy begin to rotate the box clockwise in about a 45 degree angle. Step 6 Make one of the smart objects visible. Command/Apple click the preview box on the layer panel to create marching ants around your object. Step 7 Once the marching ants appear, hide your smart object so you can see the selection. Step 8 Rasterize the type layer and with the marching ants active on your rasterized layer click Edit > Cut. Step 9 Then click Edit > Paste and align your new layer so all the words connect. Open the Layer Style box and change the "Color Overlay" to white. Step 10 Continue to do the same procedure with your other smart object layers but make sure to always cut from the rasterized layer. Step 11 Lastly create a new layer and fill it with any color. Place this layer on top of all other layers. Drop the fill down to 0%. Open the Layer Styles box and change the inner glow to the following settings and click OK. Conclusion Thats it! You should now have a beautiful design in front of you. Please drop us a comment and let us know what you think? Thanks again guys.