Photoshop Madness

Change the color on a sports car

2005-11-19T16:31:00.000+02:00

We'll start by opening a photo of the sports car we want co change the color to. Create a new layer on top of the Background layer by clicking the "Add layer" button on the layer pallete or by using CTRL+SHIFT+N and set it's blending mode to Color.
Start brushing with a color on the body of the car and you'll see the color change instantly. I've chose #e3c91c, but you can choose anything you want. Make sure you use a hard brush. I've used a 20px hard brush. You can paint all over the body of your car and use the eraser on the parts that don't need to be color corrected, like the seats, window, headlights and radiator grill. Just make sure you use a hard brush on the eraser too.If you want to paint your car with a solid color that's about it. If you want to apply a gradient to the car you can select the color you've already applied to the car by holding CTRL and clicking on the color layer on the layer pallete. Select the colors you want and use the gradient tool on the section you've just made. I've used #0084ff in addition to #e3c91c.

Lightning signature

2005-11-13T04:31:00.000+02:00

We'll start by creating a new canvas (Ctrl+N) 500x100 px. Select as your foregroung colour a dark shade of blue and white as your backgroun colour. Now use Filter-> Render-> Clouds.Use Ctrl+J on that first layer to copy it onto a new layer. Then use Filter->Render-> Difference Clouds. Use Image -> Adjustments-> Levels and move the midlle grey slider to the left until you achieve the lightning effect.
Use Ctrl+I on the difference cloud layer to invert it. Then use Ctrl+J again to copy that onto a new layer.
Use Filter-> Pixelate-> Mosaic with a 15 cell size square on the third layer. After that use Filter-> Brush Strokes -> Accented Edges with 3 edge width, 40 edge brightness and 4 smoothness. Use the Overlay blending mode on the third layer, then merge it with the second layer by selecting it then using Ctrl+E.
On the second layer use Overlay blending mode then merge it with th
Use Image -> Adjustments -> Levels to darken the image a bit by selecting the black slider and dragging it to the right.

Neon lights

2005-11-06T23:55:00.000+02:00

Getting to a neon light effect in Photoshop is very easy. But you don't want to use an ordinary Outer Glow blending option if you want to get a good effect. You need a twist. And that's were gaussian bluring comes in. We start with a 400x200 px blank image. We fill it with black so we have a nice contrast with the neon light effect. Use the type tool to write your text. I've used a font called Neon, but you can use any font you like.
Now select the type layer and use Ctrl+J to duplicate that layer four times. Use Filter->Blur->Blur more on the top layer. Photoshop is going to ask you if you want to rasterize the type layer. Click ok. Then use Filter->Blur->Gaussian blur on the second layer from the top with a 6 px radius. On the third layer use 12 px radius gaussian blur and on the fourth layer use 18 px gaussian blur. Obviously you can toy around with this settings, these are just the ones that work best for me.
Now you should merge the 4 top layers. Select the top layer and hit Ctrl+E 3 times. Right click on the layer you just merged and select blending options. Click Outer Glow and select a color from the choose color dialog box. Green, pink and blue goes well with neons but it's ultimately your choice. This is my resulting image using a blue outer glow:

Painting from photo effect

2005-11-02T15:27:00.000+02:00

Today we'll learn how to transform a photo into a painting. First pick a nice photo from a free stock images site or your personal stock collection. This is the image we'll be working on:
Nice shades of green and brown in this stock image. First open it in your copy of Photoshop. This tutorial should work on all versions of Photoshop. We'll use the cutout filter with a twist of blending to provide this image with a little more shading and detail. First duplicate the layer image using Ctrl+J. Then desaturate this top layer using Image -> Adjustments -> Desaturate or Shift+Ctrl+U.
Then duplicate this desaturated layer by using Ctrl+J again and invert this last layer by using Ctrl+I. This last two layers we'll use to provide the shading for the bottom layer. Use the Color dodge blending mode on the top desaturated and inverted layer. Don't worry if nothing is showing yet. We'll use gaussian blur on this top layer to obtain a nice crayon sketch effect. Use a 2 to 5 pixels radius on the gaussian blur filter.
Merge the desaturated and inverted layer with the desaturated layer by selecting the top layer and using Ctrl+E. Use the multiply blending mode to the new top layer. Select the bottom layer an use the Cutout filter (Filter -> Artistic -> Cutout) with the following settings: Number of levels:8, Edge simplicity:0, Edge fidelity:3. Now your image will look like a painting, but with more shading and detail.

Bodypainting with blend modes

2005-10-15T17:49:00.000+03:00

We will start by picking our source images. I've selected a beautiful model (sorry don't have the name or telephone number) and a twirl kinda thing that you can find a tutorial for all over the net. In this tutorial we will bodypaint the girl with the second image using some advanced blending techniques.

The model picture looks a little too bright for me so i'll use the levels command to darken it a little bit.

Open the twirl image or make your own. Select all (Ctrl +A) and copy it (Ctrl + C) in the model image. Use the transform tool (Ctrl +T) and rotate if you have to make sure you cover most of the skin. Double click in the layers pallete on the twirl layer to get the blending options dialog.

We use a normal blend mode on this layer, with a 30% fill opacity and the rest of the "Blend if" settings you can spot in the image. You must hold the ALT key pressed to move the sliders apart from each other.
We use "Blend if" because we want the darker bits of the image (eyelashes and eyebrowns) to stand out.
Feel free to play with the settings to get the results you like the most.

Now add a layer mask to the twirl layer and start painting with a black brush on the parts that you don't want blended in with your image, like mouth, eyes, dress, etc.
After you are satisfied with the image duplicate the twirl layer (Ctrl +J) and set it to the "Color" blend mode and 50% fill opacity to preserve a little more color from the twirl image to the model's skin.

This is the final image.

Zebra flavoured shark

2005-10-09T14:28:00.000+03:00

Using very simple techniques we will be skinning a shark with a zebra pattern. Pick your sources carefully, as they are the most important part. I've picked a zebra and a shark from www.sxc.hu, a very vast resource of free stock photography. You will need Photoshop CS2 to do this tutorial.

Open the zebra image in Photoshop, select a large portion of it, either by using quick mask or by using the polygonal lasso tool and copy the selected portion into the shark image into a new layer.

Using the transform tool (Ctrl+T) on the newly created layer, position the zebra patch so it will more or less cover the shark.

Use Filter -> Liquify. Make sure you have "Show backdrop" checked and only use the Background layer with the "Behind" mode and a 50% opacity to see what you are doing. Start working with a big brush to move the zebra pattern to cover the shark. You can use the bracket keys [] to adjust your brush size as you need it.
With a lot of patience and trial and error you will soon have an image that looks a lot like this one.

Using the Levels command I've darkened the zebra layer a little to give it a more aggresive feel.

Hope you've learned something from this.