Tutorial 1: Brooke/Lucas
- made in photoshop 7
- includes selective coloring
- intermediate? it definitely requires familiarity with the tools.
Alright, here we go. I'm warning you in advance that I have a tendency to be a bit confusing at times, so if something is unclear or you have a question, please feel free to ask. I would like to say beforehand that this is the kind of tutorial you can't really follow exactly, because it won't work for every image. You will have to play around with it and experiment with some of the steps and try different textures and such. Oh, and I ramble a lot. Sorry in advance! Right, well, on we go.
First, choose a base. I chose a screencap of Brooke and Lucas from One Tree Hill. Resize it, move it around, sharpen it, do whatever you need to do to prepare it. For mine, I just messed with the sizing and placed it on the bottom of a 100x100 canvas.
I had some empty space toward the top, so I used the eyedropper tool to select a brownish-tan from the background and create a new fill layer using that color. Then I moved it to the bottom. You may or may not have to do something like this, depending on your image and what you want to do with it. It turned out that it really wasn't useful at all in the end, for mine in particular.
Now, it's time for some coloring. I used this tutorial (#8) by
paradise_birdie and came up with this.
Alright, the first thing I notice that I disliked was the blue that the background had turned to, and really just the overall background. I felt like it needed to flow better, and I had a few options with my particular base. But I knew really liked the lighting that had been naturally created just from the original cap and the coloring, coming from the light on Lucas' house. There were a few ways that I could have used that to my advantage in the background. Here's what I did.
First, I noticed that it transitioned through three different colors. It started out in an off-white between their heads, went through a greenish color as it banched out and eventually to the tan you see in the bottom corners. So I made a new layer, grabbed the gradient tool. Mine was set to the default black>white and radial. I kept the radial, but changed the black-white to purple-green-orange (you could use any that were 3 colors though). I changed the purple to the offwhite, the green to the greenish-tan in the middle, and the orange to the tan. That's probably really confusing, so if it needs clarifying please ask lol. Anyway, then I hit okay. I made a new layer, then clicked on the spot right above Brooke's head, and pulled it out until it was not quite at the bottom right corner. It covered the entire canvas with a gradient. Using a layer mask, I brushed over Lucas and Brooke so they would be visible and this is how it turned out.
I still wasn't satisfied with the coloring. It just felt a bit monotone and I'm kind of nitpicky, so I tweaked it. I got a new selective color layer, with these settings. I'm not sure if it makes much of a difference, but at the bottom I had the method set to relative.
Reds: -51 / -4 / 67 / 7
Yellows: 88 / -10 / 47 / -89
Greens: 79 / 0 / 0 / 0
Cyans: 100 / 0 / 0 / 0
Blues: 100 / 18 / -8 / 0
Whites: 46 / 38 / -23 / 0
Neutrals: 22 / 6 / 3 / -21
Blacks: 0 / 0 / 0 / 16
And.. I still wasn't happy. Another new selective color layer.
Reds: -45 / 0 / 1 / 10
Yellows: -43 / -59 / 77 / -84
Cyans: 100 / 0 / 0 / 0
Whites: 14 / 3 / -8 / -13
Neutrals: 20 / 8 / 8 / -9
Blacks: 9 / 0 / -12 / 0
Like I said, I'm really nitpicky.. so now a color balance layer. Preserve Luminosity is checked.
Midtones: -19 / -8 / 10
Highlights: 16 / 0 / -12
Shadows: -17 / 0 / 0
It didn't change much, but I think it helped.. anyway. It's looking good so far, however I felt like there needed to be something more. I added this texture byvol4itca and set it to screen at 50%
Okay. For the B&W version, SKIP THIS and go down to where it boldly says Black & White version. If not, just disregard this and keep reading.
I took this texture bytihana and flipped it horizontally, desaturated it using a black > white gradient map, and set it to screen at 50% opacity as well.
Now I snagged this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours, or you know who it's by, please tell me so they can receive proper credit], lowered the opacity and erased some parts that I felt didn't work right.. and set it to multiply.
I used this paper texture by UNKOWN [again, if it's yours or you know who the maker is - please inform me], lowered the opacity a lot and set it to multiply.
And that's it!
BLACK & WHITE VERSION
I added the text 'BeLieve' in Frutiger Linotype, 9 pt in a light grey..
Well, obviously I needed to find a way to make the image black and white. I tried a gradient match, but I thought it gave it a bit too much contrast, so I pulled out this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours or you know who the maker is, please tell me] and set it to Saturation at 100% opacity.
I took this texture bytihana and flipped it horizontally, desaturated it using a black > white gradient map, and set it to screen at 50% opacity.
Then I used a texture by77words to get the white bar on the side. I erased pretty much everything from the red blob to the right side of the texture, but left the left in. Set it to Lighten at 100%.
Now I snagged this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours, or you know who it's by, please tell me so they can receive proper credit], lowered the opacity and erased some parts that I felt didn't work right.. and set it to multiply.
I used this paper texture by UNKOWN [again, if it's yours or you know who the maker is - please inform me], lowered the opacity a lot and set it to multiply.
And that's it for the B&W variation as well.
I hope you found this somewhat useful. Remember play around with different textures. colorings, and settings because every image is so different.
If you have any questions on anything, please feel free to ask me about it!
Other icons made using similar techniques:
EDIT:
People were asking for it, so here it is..
PSD
First, choose a base. I chose a screencap of Brooke and Lucas from One Tree Hill. Resize it, move it around, sharpen it, do whatever you need to do to prepare it. For mine, I just messed with the sizing and placed it on the bottom of a 100x100 canvas.
I had some empty space toward the top, so I used the eyedropper tool to select a brownish-tan from the background and create a new fill layer using that color. Then I moved it to the bottom. You may or may not have to do something like this, depending on your image and what you want to do with it. It turned out that it really wasn't useful at all in the end, for mine in particular.
Now, it's time for some coloring. I used this tutorial (#8) by
paradise_birdie and came up with this.Alright, the first thing I notice that I disliked was the blue that the background had turned to, and really just the overall background. I felt like it needed to flow better, and I had a few options with my particular base. But I knew really liked the lighting that had been naturally created just from the original cap and the coloring, coming from the light on Lucas' house. There were a few ways that I could have used that to my advantage in the background. Here's what I did.
First, I noticed that it transitioned through three different colors. It started out in an off-white between their heads, went through a greenish color as it banched out and eventually to the tan you see in the bottom corners. So I made a new layer, grabbed the gradient tool. Mine was set to the default black>white and radial. I kept the radial, but changed the black-white to purple-green-orange (you could use any that were 3 colors though). I changed the purple to the offwhite, the green to the greenish-tan in the middle, and the orange to the tan. That's probably really confusing, so if it needs clarifying please ask lol. Anyway, then I hit okay. I made a new layer, then clicked on the spot right above Brooke's head, and pulled it out until it was not quite at the bottom right corner. It covered the entire canvas with a gradient. Using a layer mask, I brushed over Lucas and Brooke so they would be visible and this is how it turned out.
I still wasn't satisfied with the coloring. It just felt a bit monotone and I'm kind of nitpicky, so I tweaked it. I got a new selective color layer, with these settings. I'm not sure if it makes much of a difference, but at the bottom I had the method set to relative.
Reds: -51 / -4 / 67 / 7
Yellows: 88 / -10 / 47 / -89
Greens: 79 / 0 / 0 / 0
Cyans: 100 / 0 / 0 / 0
Blues: 100 / 18 / -8 / 0
Whites: 46 / 38 / -23 / 0
Neutrals: 22 / 6 / 3 / -21
Blacks: 0 / 0 / 0 / 16
And.. I still wasn't happy. Another new selective color layer.
Reds: -45 / 0 / 1 / 10
Yellows: -43 / -59 / 77 / -84
Cyans: 100 / 0 / 0 / 0
Whites: 14 / 3 / -8 / -13
Neutrals: 20 / 8 / 8 / -9
Blacks: 9 / 0 / -12 / 0
Like I said, I'm really nitpicky.. so now a color balance layer. Preserve Luminosity is checked.
Midtones: -19 / -8 / 10
Highlights: 16 / 0 / -12
Shadows: -17 / 0 / 0
It didn't change much, but I think it helped.. anyway. It's looking good so far, however I felt like there needed to be something more. I added this texture by
vol4itca and set it to screen at 50%Okay. For the B&W version, SKIP THIS and go down to where it boldly says Black & White version. If not, just disregard this and keep reading.
I took this texture by
tihana and flipped it horizontally, desaturated it using a black > white gradient map, and set it to screen at 50% opacity as well.Now I snagged this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours, or you know who it's by, please tell me so they can receive proper credit], lowered the opacity and erased some parts that I felt didn't work right.. and set it to multiply.
I used this paper texture by UNKOWN [again, if it's yours or you know who the maker is - please inform me], lowered the opacity a lot and set it to multiply.
And that's it!
BLACK & WHITE VERSION
I added the text 'BeLieve' in Frutiger Linotype, 9 pt in a light grey..
Well, obviously I needed to find a way to make the image black and white. I tried a gradient match, but I thought it gave it a bit too much contrast, so I pulled out this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours or you know who the maker is, please tell me] and set it to Saturation at 100% opacity.
I took this texture by
tihana and flipped it horizontally, desaturated it using a black > white gradient map, and set it to screen at 50% opacity.Then I used a texture by
77words to get the white bar on the side. I erased pretty much everything from the red blob to the right side of the texture, but left the left in. Set it to Lighten at 100%.Now I snagged this texture by UNKOWN [if it's yours, or you know who it's by, please tell me so they can receive proper credit], lowered the opacity and erased some parts that I felt didn't work right.. and set it to multiply.
I used this paper texture by UNKOWN [again, if it's yours or you know who the maker is - please inform me], lowered the opacity a lot and set it to multiply.
And that's it for the B&W variation as well.
I hope you found this somewhat useful. Remember play around with different textures. colorings, and settings because every image is so different.
If you have any questions on anything, please feel free to ask me about it!
Other icons made using similar techniques:
EDIT:
People were asking for it, so here it is..
PSD