Joker Icon Tutorial
I was fooling around on Photoshop on making icons, and I ended up on accident making an icon that I felt like I just had to make a tutorial for. Or I would regret it. Always.
This is a pretty quick process, as far as icons go, and the results are worthwhile.
> Level: Easy/Intermediate
> Translatable
Turning 
into 
1. I cropped my image and duplicated the layer, to rid the grainy white border the caps tend to get. I googled the original off of Google, under The Dark Knight. It was a poster. ^^
2. I used Image+Auto+Color/Contrast/Levels. For this image in particular, it worked very, very well, and got rid of alot of the blue tones.
3. Hue/Saturation Layer. I didn't write down my numbers, but in essence I didn't just raise the Saturation of the Master. I went to each color, and fiddled with the settings to my liking. For example, I knew the joker card was going to have the color, because it was the focus, so I upped reds and yellows in particular, before adding cyans to the sky because I didn't know which direction I was heading.
For an image guideline, this was my result:
4. Ctrl+Shift+C to copy every layer, and paste over everything (or as always, stop if you like already). Go to Image+Adjustments+Gradient Map. I was going to make it black and white, but from a previous icon I had a color palette that I loved even more as a default - therefore, the following was accidental, but it gave it a comic book look that I adored.
The colors in my palette at the time (you should choose the foreground+background gradient) were:
Foreground: #000127
Background: #ffffff
5. Using a soft round brush, to the appropriate size, erase from the gradient layer over whatever you want to have color. In my icon, I erased over the joker card.
6. Texture time! I grabbed this texture from an older set by
sanami276, and set it to Soft Light at 40%. Erase again over your focus if you find it necessary - I didn't.
7. I then grabbed this texture by ???, but before I set it to anything, I went to Image+Adjustments+Gradient Map again. This time, I selected the black and white option. Then set the icon to Lighten, 100%. Make sure to erase away over the focus here.
You're done! It works best probably texture-wise with a darker image, but feel free to experiment. :]
Comments are cool.
2. I used Image+Auto+Color/Contrast/Levels. For this image in particular, it worked very, very well, and got rid of alot of the blue tones.
3. Hue/Saturation Layer. I didn't write down my numbers, but in essence I didn't just raise the Saturation of the Master. I went to each color, and fiddled with the settings to my liking. For example, I knew the joker card was going to have the color, because it was the focus, so I upped reds and yellows in particular, before adding cyans to the sky because I didn't know which direction I was heading.
For an image guideline, this was my result:
4. Ctrl+Shift+C to copy every layer, and paste over everything (or as always, stop if you like already). Go to Image+Adjustments+Gradient Map. I was going to make it black and white, but from a previous icon I had a color palette that I loved even more as a default - therefore, the following was accidental, but it gave it a comic book look that I adored.
The colors in my palette at the time (you should choose the foreground+background gradient) were:
Foreground: #000127
Background: #ffffff
5. Using a soft round brush, to the appropriate size, erase from the gradient layer over whatever you want to have color. In my icon, I erased over the joker card.
6. Texture time! I grabbed this texture from an older set by
sanami276, and set it to Soft Light at 40%. Erase again over your focus if you find it necessary - I didn't.7. I then grabbed this texture by ???, but before I set it to anything, I went to Image+Adjustments+Gradient Map again. This time, I selected the black and white option. Then set the icon to Lighten, 100%. Make sure to erase away over the focus here.
You're done! It works best probably texture-wise with a darker image, but feel free to experiment. :]
Comments are cool.