A Basic Tutorial plus Image Pack Modification
Alrighty, the first tutorial in this here batch is something I made up because the picture was kinda plain. So I will be teaching "Brush Modification and Colorification". Oh, and I use PaintShop Pro 6, so follow along in your bookses....
Topher's Gone Green!
This is a picture I found that was new to me. It's kinda cool, he's doing that thing that only Topher does, but... there was nothing else going on in the picture! Boring. I didn't even like the damn background. So first thing to do was to erase the background, crop him down, duplicate his ass, set it to a light blur on Screen blend mode. Basically you play with your base until you get it workable, mkay? I went over all that in the Mila Butterfly Tutorial about editing bases and stock images.
Before:
After:
So let's skip ahead to where I play with Topher's balls.
Eyeballs, perverts. I wanted them greener!!!!
So what I did was made a new blank layer and zoooooomed in real close and scary like, and used the paintbrush on tiny to paint green over his balls. I did a bit of a blur to them so they weren't zombie eyeballs, then duplicated the layer TWICE.
First layer of color is set to Color blend mode at 41%. The layer on top of that is also set to Color blend mode at just 16%, and the third layer on top of all this is set to Overlay blend mode at 21%. That looks like this:
Add that to the base and we go
+ = 
At this point I also played with the Retouch tool. Softened his face, sharpened his hair, sharpened the strings on his shirt. The editing of the base in the first place didn't cover this, because I didn't know where I was going with the icon yet, you see? Once you decide a route, then you can oversharpen, blur, smooth, etc. But a base is plain. Basic. Hence, "base".
Anyway. The boy still needed a little ooomph, so I added a gradient and set it to Soft Light at 70%...
+ 
= 
Then it sat in my folder for a while. A couple days. I wasn't inspired, it wasn't really speaking to me yet. I cruised my brushes folders looking at things, wondering if I should put some splatters in, or some splats, or something weird like a condom. Noooooo. CIRCLES!
Unfortunately I saved this image pack years ago, it's called "Targets", and it's probably one of my regular people who make brushes, but it's not labelled who. They were sets of circles. Just circles!
EDITING TO ADD: It's
amiableicons's from here! Thanks to 
kawaiimae for the help!
I picked out three sizes and went to find a nice Gradient to lay overtop them. This is how you make plain image packs pretty without having to install brushes.... These are the Sooper Seekrit Seekrits of icon making. Ahhhh, not really.
Needless to say, I pulled open about four or five different types of green gradients and played with them all until I found one I really liked. Then I went and erased everything I'd done and just used it. Essentially, you CTRL C (copy) the gradient file and CTRL L (paste as new layer) over your Circle file. It covers it up, obviously. You do this until all the black lines are covered, then head up to your blend modes and change it to Overlay.
Go'head. I'll wait. See? Ooops. Now, on some pictures, like this one, you can't really see the green, because it's a solid black image. But here's another Sooper Seekrit Seekrit - use your damn eraser. Set the opacity on the eraser to a low number, set the size of the eraser medium sized, and click a few times across your circle layer (not the gradient, duh). As you do, more of the color shows through. Nifty.
So once you've done that, you click, you erase, you blend your gradient if you've had to use more than one so you don't have harsh edges. You can duplicate the gradient for a more dramatic color, set it to another blend mode, play with it, massage it to what you want it to be.
Then you go up to your Layers Palette and right click on a layer and select "Merge - Visible". That way you can CTRL C your new pretty "brush" and paste it onto Topher as a new layer (CTRL L, there'll be a test at the end of the semester on this stuff). Set the Blend mode to Overlay so you can see the guy.
+ 
= 
Normally that circle would go right over Topher, obviously I've erased the part that overlaps him. No one wants to see that. So you do this for all your circles, adding them on a NEW LAYER each time. Don't forget to set it to Multiply on the blennnnnd moddddde!
+ 
+ 
= 
+ base = 
Artistic license had me setting ONE circle "on top" of Topher (ie not erasing it at all) instead of setting it "behind".
It's cool, but it's not done yet. It needs.... a SHRUBBERY! No no no. Just a border.
I'd like to say I was all hip and immediately picked the right frame, but... I can't. I tried a cool square one first, but it didn't "go" with the circles, so I went looking for a roundish frame... Scrolling.... scrolling.... scrolling... STOP! Round Frame! It's byisabellecs except again, it's too big. So I slapped the gradient I was using earlier on the circles over top (set to Overlay), merged visible layers, then biggie sized it by 110% Resize.Twice, I think.
becomes 
Lay that puppy on top of everything three times, ie duplicate layer of border, set it all to multiply, and you get the finished result.
+ 
=
To recap the Layers from the top down:
Copy of Border 2 - Multiply, 100%
Copy of Border 1 - Multiply, 100%
Border - Multiply, 100%
Gradient - Soft Light, 70%
Circle Little - Multiply, 50% (the only one that's less opaque)
Circle Medium - Multiply, 100%
Circle Big - Multiply, 100%
Copy of Eyes 2 - Overlay, 21%
Copy of Eyes 1 - Color, 16%
Eyes - Color, 41%
Base - normal except for previously mentioned editing
Topher's Gone Green!
This is a picture I found that was new to me. It's kinda cool, he's doing that thing that only Topher does, but... there was nothing else going on in the picture! Boring. I didn't even like the damn background. So first thing to do was to erase the background, crop him down, duplicate his ass, set it to a light blur on Screen blend mode. Basically you play with your base until you get it workable, mkay? I went over all that in the Mila Butterfly Tutorial about editing bases and stock images.
Before:
After:
So let's skip ahead to where I play with Topher's balls.
Eyeballs, perverts. I wanted them greener!!!!
So what I did was made a new blank layer and zoooooomed in real close and scary like, and used the paintbrush on tiny to paint green over his balls. I did a bit of a blur to them so they weren't zombie eyeballs, then duplicated the layer TWICE.
First layer of color is set to Color blend mode at 41%. The layer on top of that is also set to Color blend mode at just 16%, and the third layer on top of all this is set to Overlay blend mode at 21%. That looks like this:
Add that to the base and we go
At this point I also played with the Retouch tool. Softened his face, sharpened his hair, sharpened the strings on his shirt. The editing of the base in the first place didn't cover this, because I didn't know where I was going with the icon yet, you see? Once you decide a route, then you can oversharpen, blur, smooth, etc. But a base is plain. Basic. Hence, "base".
Anyway. The boy still needed a little ooomph, so I added a gradient and set it to Soft Light at 70%...
Then it sat in my folder for a while. A couple days. I wasn't inspired, it wasn't really speaking to me yet. I cruised my brushes folders looking at things, wondering if I should put some splatters in, or some splats, or something weird like a condom. Noooooo. CIRCLES!
Unfortunately I saved this image pack years ago, it's called "Targets", and it's probably one of my regular people who make brushes, but it's not labelled who. They were sets of circles. Just circles!
EDITING TO ADD: It's
amiableicons's from here! Thanks to kawaiimae for the help!I picked out three sizes and went to find a nice Gradient to lay overtop them. This is how you make plain image packs pretty without having to install brushes.... These are the Sooper Seekrit Seekrits of icon making. Ahhhh, not really.
Needless to say, I pulled open about four or five different types of green gradients and played with them all until I found one I really liked. Then I went and erased everything I'd done and just used it. Essentially, you CTRL C (copy) the gradient file and CTRL L (paste as new layer) over your Circle file. It covers it up, obviously. You do this until all the black lines are covered, then head up to your blend modes and change it to Overlay.
Go'head. I'll wait. See? Ooops. Now, on some pictures, like this one, you can't really see the green, because it's a solid black image. But here's another Sooper Seekrit Seekrit - use your damn eraser. Set the opacity on the eraser to a low number, set the size of the eraser medium sized, and click a few times across your circle layer (not the gradient, duh). As you do, more of the color shows through. Nifty.
So once you've done that, you click, you erase, you blend your gradient if you've had to use more than one so you don't have harsh edges. You can duplicate the gradient for a more dramatic color, set it to another blend mode, play with it, massage it to what you want it to be.
Then you go up to your Layers Palette and right click on a layer and select "Merge - Visible". That way you can CTRL C your new pretty "brush" and paste it onto Topher as a new layer (CTRL L, there'll be a test at the end of the semester on this stuff). Set the Blend mode to Overlay so you can see the guy.
Normally that circle would go right over Topher, obviously I've erased the part that overlaps him. No one wants to see that. So you do this for all your circles, adding them on a NEW LAYER each time. Don't forget to set it to Multiply on the blennnnnd moddddde!
Artistic license had me setting ONE circle "on top" of Topher (ie not erasing it at all) instead of setting it "behind".
It's cool, but it's not done yet. It needs.... a SHRUBBERY! No no no. Just a border.
I'd like to say I was all hip and immediately picked the right frame, but... I can't. I tried a cool square one first, but it didn't "go" with the circles, so I went looking for a roundish frame... Scrolling.... scrolling.... scrolling... STOP! Round Frame! It's by
isabellecs except again, it's too big. So I slapped the gradient I was using earlier on the circles over top (set to Overlay), merged visible layers, then biggie sized it by 110% Resize.Twice, I think. Lay that puppy on top of everything three times, ie duplicate layer of border, set it all to multiply, and you get the finished result.
To recap the Layers from the top down:
Copy of Border 2 - Multiply, 100%
Copy of Border 1 - Multiply, 100%
Border - Multiply, 100%
Gradient - Soft Light, 70%
Circle Little - Multiply, 50% (the only one that's less opaque)
Circle Medium - Multiply, 100%
Circle Big - Multiply, 100%
Copy of Eyes 2 - Overlay, 21%
Copy of Eyes 1 - Color, 16%
Eyes - Color, 41%
Base - normal except for previously mentioned editing