+ PS: Bright Color/Tiny Text
Someone requested a tiny text tutorial... I know there are others around, but here's another one.
Go from
to 
(how to do tiny text included)
Crop your base. This is a picture of Kate Bosworth from a movie opening. I intentionally cropped it so that there was a lot of empty space.
Bleh, it's so blurry and... bleh. Sharpen once or twice, according to your preference (I did twice) and use the Blur tool to smooth out her skin if it gets too grainy. Now duplicate your base layer four times. Set the first layer to Screen 100%, the second and third to Soft Light 100%, and Desaturate the last layer (Shift + Ctrl + U) and set to Soft Light 100%.
Aaaaah so much better. This is optional, but I like a consistant background to work off of, so... yeah. Use the eyedropper tool to select the color covering most of the background... here it's the lime green, so that's what I selected. Create a new layer, and color the background so that it's a consistant color. You can erase some of the color if you accidentily cover part of your subject. If you want, you can play with Blending Modes on this layer, too. I didn't... I just colored it all a solid color.
Create a new layer, and fill with a black/blue gradient, like the one below (the blue should be bright, not dark). Set to Lighten 100%. Then apply a star/light texture, and set to Overlay 100% (texture here made by me). Use a layer mask or the brush tool to color the subject black if the texture washes them out too much. Lastly, apply brushes of your choice in #8A8A8A and set the brush layer to Color Dodge 100%. I happened to hand-draw the hearts used here, but you can find a billion brushes like them, I'm sure.
Now for the tiny text, yay. First of all, you should locate your Character menu. If it's not located in the upper right-hand corner of Photoshop with the other menus, go to Window ---> Character and it'll pop up. My favorite fonts to use for tiny text are Courier New, Georgia, Sylfian, or Times New Roman. In order to create tiny text, change the settings on your menu to reflect those that I have below. you can play around with the settings according to your preference. I happen to think tiny text looks best when it's Crisp or Sharp.
A quick rundown of the Character menu, from left to right, top to bottom: The upper left-hand corner is where the name of your font will appear, and next to it is whether you want your text Regular, Bold, Italic, or Italic-Bold. The two T's are where you type your font size (2pt, etc). The two A's on top of each other dictate (I believe) how far the space between lines of text will be when you hit enter. I'm not sure about Metrics, but the A V with the arrow underneath is spacing, or kerning. It determines the spacing between letters and words. The next two T's dictate how tall and narrow your letters will be... leave them at 100% unless you want to go for a distorted look. The others are pretty self-explainitory... color, text decoration (underline, strikethrough, etc). The two lower case a's are where you set the weight of your font (None, Sharp, Crisp, Strong, Smooth).
When I write tiny text, I usually just write the lyrics of whatever song I happen to be listening to. The words are really too small for anyone to tell what it says. You could really write "blah blah blah" a bunch of times, and it wouldn't matter. And... that's it. I also added a plus sign in Arial Black, 18 pt, Sharp.
Have fun :)
Go from
to (how to do tiny text included)
Crop your base. This is a picture of Kate Bosworth from a movie opening. I intentionally cropped it so that there was a lot of empty space.
Bleh, it's so blurry and... bleh. Sharpen once or twice, according to your preference (I did twice) and use the Blur tool to smooth out her skin if it gets too grainy. Now duplicate your base layer four times. Set the first layer to Screen 100%, the second and third to Soft Light 100%, and Desaturate the last layer (Shift + Ctrl + U) and set to Soft Light 100%.
Aaaaah so much better. This is optional, but I like a consistant background to work off of, so... yeah. Use the eyedropper tool to select the color covering most of the background... here it's the lime green, so that's what I selected. Create a new layer, and color the background so that it's a consistant color. You can erase some of the color if you accidentily cover part of your subject. If you want, you can play with Blending Modes on this layer, too. I didn't... I just colored it all a solid color.
Create a new layer, and fill with a black/blue gradient, like the one below (the blue should be bright, not dark). Set to Lighten 100%. Then apply a star/light texture, and set to Overlay 100% (texture here made by me). Use a layer mask or the brush tool to color the subject black if the texture washes them out too much. Lastly, apply brushes of your choice in #8A8A8A and set the brush layer to Color Dodge 100%. I happened to hand-draw the hearts used here, but you can find a billion brushes like them, I'm sure.
Now for the tiny text, yay. First of all, you should locate your Character menu. If it's not located in the upper right-hand corner of Photoshop with the other menus, go to Window ---> Character and it'll pop up. My favorite fonts to use for tiny text are Courier New, Georgia, Sylfian, or Times New Roman. In order to create tiny text, change the settings on your menu to reflect those that I have below. you can play around with the settings according to your preference. I happen to think tiny text looks best when it's Crisp or Sharp.
A quick rundown of the Character menu, from left to right, top to bottom: The upper left-hand corner is where the name of your font will appear, and next to it is whether you want your text Regular, Bold, Italic, or Italic-Bold. The two T's are where you type your font size (2pt, etc). The two A's on top of each other dictate (I believe) how far the space between lines of text will be when you hit enter. I'm not sure about Metrics, but the A V with the arrow underneath is spacing, or kerning. It determines the spacing between letters and words. The next two T's dictate how tall and narrow your letters will be... leave them at 100% unless you want to go for a distorted look. The others are pretty self-explainitory... color, text decoration (underline, strikethrough, etc). The two lower case a's are where you set the weight of your font (None, Sharp, Crisp, Strong, Smooth).
When I write tiny text, I usually just write the lyrics of whatever song I happen to be listening to. The words are really too small for anyone to tell what it says. You could really write "blah blah blah" a bunch of times, and it wouldn't matter. And... that's it. I also added a plus sign in Arial Black, 18 pt, Sharp.
Have fun :)