Hello! I just started getting interested in making icons, and I've been lurking around here looking for tips and such for a couple of weeks. I don't know enough to even begin to start thinking about calling myself skilled, but I was messing around in PSP7 the other day trying to come up with something, and decided to document it in case it turned out alright.
So I made a simple tutorial for the icon I made. This is my first. It is pretty much just a compilation of techniques I've learned here, plus maybe a few random things I tried.
From this:
To this:
(Oh and please let me know if this looks too bright or "washed out" [I think that's the term? :\]. I have this feeling sometimes that my monitor is too dark [I often find my self taking pictures people post and adjusting the brightness so I can see them], but it's set as bright as it can go.)
First, start out with your base image. Resize and crop it to your liking:
Then duplicate this layer twice, and desaturate both layers. Set the middle layer to Overlay. Put a Gaussian Blur on the top layer (blur radius of 2-ish) and set it to soft light.
Make a new layer and add a gradient similar to this:
(I just made it up – a sort of slate gray for the outside and a lightish purple on the inside. But use whatever you'd like.)
Set the layer to Soft Light.
Now for some brushes! I added this brush by
teh_indy on a new layer and set it to Luminance (70% opacity):
Then add some nice swirly brushes in the corner (sorry, I have no idea where I got these, I haven’t been keeping track until now. You can find brushes like these just about anywhere.)
Add this border byteh_indy in white, and set it to Dodge at 80% opacity.
And then this one, also byteh_indy and also in white, at 65% opacity:
And you’re done! Yay! I honestly had every intention of adding some text, but none of it looked right, so HERE I AM.
So I made a simple tutorial for the icon I made. This is my first. It is pretty much just a compilation of techniques I've learned here, plus maybe a few random things I tried.
From this:
To this:
(Oh and please let me know if this looks too bright or "washed out" [I think that's the term? :\]. I have this feeling sometimes that my monitor is too dark [I often find my self taking pictures people post and adjusting the brightness so I can see them], but it's set as bright as it can go.)
First, start out with your base image. Resize and crop it to your liking:
Then duplicate this layer twice, and desaturate both layers. Set the middle layer to Overlay. Put a Gaussian Blur on the top layer (blur radius of 2-ish) and set it to soft light.
Make a new layer and add a gradient similar to this:
(I just made it up – a sort of slate gray for the outside and a lightish purple on the inside. But use whatever you'd like.)
Set the layer to Soft Light.
Now for some brushes! I added this brush by
teh_indy on a new layer and set it to Luminance (70% opacity):Then add some nice swirly brushes in the corner (sorry, I have no idea where I got these, I haven’t been keeping track until now. You can find brushes like these just about anywhere.)
Add this border by
teh_indy in white, and set it to Dodge at 80% opacity. And then this one, also by
teh_indy and also in white, at 65% opacity:And you’re done! Yay! I honestly had every intention of adding some text, but none of it looked right, so HERE I AM.