In this tutorial, I will show you the processes I used to Tidy Up and Smoothen Skin, and Do Eye Makeups in Photoshop. Along the way, I will also explain the steps you can use to effectively produce smooth skin and get rid of black spots on face.

Previously I posted an interesting (well, at least I think it’s intersting) showcase displaying 30 Stunning, Absolutely Magical Photo Manipulations Focusing on Human Eye. A lot of people asked if I could produce a simple tutorial show the steps you can take to do eye makeups. Well, here it is :)

This is a faily basic tutorial and it’s designed for beginner. Tools we will be using included Spot Healing Brush, Dodge/Burn Tool, layer blending, and adjustment layers. Have a try!

Here is a preview of the before and after effect of the eye:

Before

After

Ok let’s get started!

To complete this tutorial, you will need the following stock:

Eye

Step 1

Load the “Eye” stock image into Photoshop, now let ’s take a look at the original image and here is the analysis I came up with:

1. The image has a lot of black spots, and bits of hair that really disturbs me
2. The skin is OK, but if we can make it smoother would be bettter
3. The eye colour is perferably better in Blue, and those bloodlines in the white part of the eye can go.

After you’ve done the above analysis, duplicate the background layer once and name it as “face skin”let’s grab the Healing Brush tool (J):

Set the brush size to 15px, and hold down the Alt to define a source point as shown below:

Gently work you brush around the spots you wish to heal:

And clean up the lower part of the image as well, until you reach the following effect:

Step 2

Now we have a fairly clean face, let’s tackle the eye. Firstly duplicate the previous “face skin” layer once and name it as “eye”. Firstly we want to get rid of the bloodlines in the eye. To do this, again we use the healing brush tool, define a new source point on this layer as shown below:

Adjust the brush size accordingly to around 10-12px, work your way around the white of the eye until you reach this effect:

Step 3

Now we onto the smoothening of the skin. We have used the healing brush tool before however, for the overall effect, it’s really handy to apply the dodge/burn tool (O):

So duplicate the previous “eye” layer once and name it as “dodge and burn”, use the dodge tool with the following settings:

The secret here to to set exposure level to a very low amount.

Work your dodge tool around the area you want the skin to become smoother and lighter, until you reach the following effect:

Please note, you will have to adjust the brush size for different area, for the best result possible. Practice with it!

Step 4

Ok we can tweak the image a bit by adding some image adjustment layers:

Black and white (Set to blending mode to “Screen”)

Duplicate this Black and White adjustment layer once, and change the blending mode of the duplicated layer to “Hard Light”, you will have the following effect:

Now we’re on the interesting part of changing the eye colour. I simply created a new layer called “eye colour” on top of all other layers, grab a soft, round brush with a light blue colour and paint around the pupil:

Change the layer blending mode to “colour” and you will have to the following effect:

We can now add a shining reflection on the pupil. To do this, create a new layer called “reflection” on top of all other layers, grab a small white brush and paint on the centre of the eye, as shown below:

Step 5

Now we can add some dotty effect around the eye. Firstly let’s make this dynamic brushset:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Other Dynamics

and make sure you tick “Airbrush” and “Smoothing”.

Create a new layer, use this brushset to paint around the eye: (Set brush flow to around 40%)

and we can add a curve adjustment layer to bring some depth into the image:

and you will have the following effect:

We can add some final effect onto our eye. How about some colours?

To add some colour around the eye, simply create a new layer on top of all other layers, set its blending mode to “overlay”, and grab some nice markup colour you like and paint around the eye:

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it, drop me a comment if you have any question, I will try my best to help you out.

Cheers and have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the process I used to create this super delicious, shining and glossy text effect in Photoshop. In fact, I once again accidentally discovered this interesting effect while playing with Photoshop filters this afternoon and thought I could share it with you guys :)

Along the way, we will be using techniques such as layer blending options, filter effects, adjustment layers and a few photoshop tools. It’s a very simple tutorial, have a try!

Meanwhile, I have received a few enquiries about how to add colour effects onto a plain image from my past tutorial – and I decided to include the method I use to achieve the colour effect along with this tutorial. So read on if you’re interested!

Here a preview of my final result for this tutorial: (Click to enlarge)

Alternative versions:

Ok let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200px * 800px and fill the background layer with Black. Duplicate the background layer once (Always a good habit) and grab the Gradient Tool (G) fill the duplicated layer as shown below:

After applying the gradient effect, duplicated this layer once and on the second duplicated layer, go to Edit > Transform > Flip Horizontal and change the layer blending mode to “screen”.

You will have the following effect:

Step 2

We can make the background a bit brighter and fresher. So go to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance and apply the following settings:

Shadows

Midtones

Higtlights

And you will have the following effect:

OK that’s for our background! We can now add our text effect onto it.

Step 3

Download this font and type some text onto it, resize and position it as shown below:

I typed Susan Boyle because I was so touched and inspired by her performance on Britains Got Talent show :) Wish her all the best!

Apply the following layer blending effect to the text layer:

Drop Shadow

Inner Shadow

Outer Glow

Inner Glow

Bevel and Emboss

Contour

Gradient Overlay

And you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Load the selection of the text layer (ctrl + left-click the thumbnail image of the text effect on the layer palette):

Then create a new layer called “fibre” (make sure you maintain the selection) and fill it with White colour:

Then go to Filter > Render > Fibers and apply the following settings:

Then go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur and apply the following settings:

Change the layer blending mode of this “fiber” layer to “lighten” and you will have the following effect:

To add some lighting variation onto it, we duplicate the “Fiber” layer once more and change the blending mode of the duplicated layer to “overlay”:

Step 5

Now we can add some colour onto our text! To do this, load the selection of the text layer using the method described previously, create a new layer called “colour” on top of all layers:

Maintain the selection of the text layer, grab a soft brush with colour of your choice and simply paint over the layer. You will see because we have a selection of the text, you will paint only within the selection not any other area:

Change the layer blending mode of this layer to “color” and you will have the following effect:

To add a bit more shining effect to finish off the text, duplicate the “colour” layer once and change the blending mode of the duplicated layer to “overlay”.

Here is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

Ok that’s it for this tutorial! You can of course add some of your own texture or filter effect and see what the end results are!

I added some textures on the background just to decorate it a bit: (click to enlarge)

Alternatve Colour

Hope you enjoy this tutorial, drop me a comment if you have any question, I will try my best to help you out.

Cheers and have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create a realistic nebula scene from scratch in Photoshop. We will be using technques such as the Pen Tool, various filters for texture rendering, layer blending and some dynamic brushes.

I would also like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a very happy new year and all the best for 2009! Thanks very much for visiting my blog and hope to see you again next year!

Here is a preview of the final result:

OK let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200×800, fill the background layer with black colour. Make a new layer on top of the background layer and name it “Nebula Outline”.

Hit the “P” key to select the Pen Tool and make sure the “Paths” option is selected. I won’t go into explaining how to use the Pen Tool in this tutorial, but if you haven’t used it before, I have a post here with some links of the basics of Pen Tool.

Draw a random, irregular shape as shonw below on the “Nebula Outline” layer:

Step 2

Still on the “Nebula Outline” layer and the Pen Tool selected, right click on the path and choose “Make Selection”:

Apply the following settings: (I used 25 pixel feather radius because I would like the selection to be as smooth as possible)

Your path will now become a selection with 25 pixel feather radius:

Step 3

Go to Filter > Render > Cloud and render some cloud, with White foreground colour and Black background colour.

Hit Ctrl + L to bring up the level tool, apply the following settings:

Using the level tool we can adjust the input level of different colour channels. Your image will now look like this:

Step 4

Now we can some depth the Nebula. To do this, create a new layer called “nebula overlay”, use the Clone Stamp Tool with the following settings:

Hold down the Alt key + Left Click to define a Clone Source, cloud some cloud from the previous layer.

Because we used a reletively lower opacity and flow, you will see the difference between each cloud:

Merge the two layer together and name the merged layer “Nebula”.

Step 5

Nebula doesn’t only consist of cloud, there are also some small particles and dusts inside. Now we’re going add them in.

Duplicate the “nebula overlay” layer once and name this layer “particles”. Go to Filter > Sketch > Photocopy and apply the following settings:

Then go to Filter > Sketch > Chrome and apply the following settings:

Change the layer blending mode to “Color Dodge” and set the opacity to 80%.

The result so far will look like this:

Optional: you can duplicate this particles layer a couple of time if you feel like add more paricles onto the cloud.

Step 6

Now we can add a bit motion into the image. Duplicate the “Nebula” layer once and put the duplicated layer above the “Nebula” layer. Go to Filter > Blur > Radial Blur and apply the following settings:

Then go to Filter > Distort > Ocean Ripple and apply the following settings:

Change the layer blending mode of this layer to “Overlay” with an opacity of 30%. You image will now look like this:

Step 7

Create a new layer called “Star”, grab a 9px round circle brush, and apply the following brush dynamics:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Noise

Paint over the “Star” layer as the image shown below:

Optional: To add some light glow and softness, you can duplicate the “star” layer once, and go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian blur and apply the following settings:

Step 8

Create a layer called “Colour Overlay” and set the blending mode to “Color”, then simply grab a big round brush (300px) and choose some nice, space-feeling colour and paint!

You can also adjust the opacity and the flow of the brush for some colour depth. Hint: after painting colour, try duplicate this layer a couple of times and see what result that brings you.

Here is my result so far:

Ok that’s it for this tutorial! The rest is left upon your own creativity.

Here is my final image for this tutorial: (I simply erase some portions of the nebula cloud and add a shining planet to it!)

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and if you have any questions, just drop me a comment.

Thanks very much and have a wonderful and colourful new year!

In this tutorial, I will show you how to bring colour and light out of an ordinary image through simple layer blending and image adjustments. I also would like to introduce the idea of “non-destructive” photo editing, which I think will be beneficial for you as a designer.

The techniques used in this tutorial includes various image adjustment tools, layer blending options and the surface blur filter.

Here is some helpful tips I would like to share with you guys:

1. The purpose of duplicating layers is to achieve non-destructive editing, which means the original image is not affected and you will have greater flexibility when it comes to retouching your image.
2. Make use of various image adjustment tool (Curve, Level, Black and White, Hue and Saturation), they are the tools to boost your image colour and lighting constrast.
3. Layer blending mode such as “Overlay”, “Soft Light”, “Color” are always useful for bringing out extra light and colour for your image.
4. Use Dodge/Burn Tool to give certain portion of your image additional lighting contrast.
5. Use Surface blur instead of Gaussian blur for image blending.

Some info I found on the web about Non-destructive Photo Editing:

The great advantage of non-destructive editing in Photoshop is that you can easily adjust image effects or adjustments, even weeks or months later. They also allow quick editing and increased flexibility. Everyone who uses Photoshop should know these techniques, because they really make Photoshop so powerful.

- http://www.lunacore.com/photoshop/tutorials/tut013.htm

Here is a preview of the final result:

Step 1

Load a photo of your choice into Photoshop. Alternatively, you can download a copy of this image if you want to follow this tutorial precisely according to each step.

After loading your photo, duplicate the background layer five times:

Then hide the top 4 layers and leave just the “Background copy” layer visible.

Step 2

On the “Background copy” layer, hit Ctrl + M to bring up the Curve Tool and apply the following settings:

Then change the blending mode of this layer to “Overlay” with an opacity of 60%, and you will have the following image:

Step 3

Un-hide the “Background copy 2″ layer and select it, hit Ctrl + Alt + Shift key to bring up the Black and White image adjustment tool and apply the following settings:

(Please note the settings may be different if you use your own photo, but the idea is to put more emphasis toward certain colours in the image and bring them out a bit more)

Change the layer blending mode to “Soft Light” with an opacity of 70%.

The effect so far will look like this:

Step 4

Now we can some more exposure to the image. Un-hide the “Background Copy 3″ layer and select it, go to Image > Adjustments > Exposure and apply the following settings:

Then change the layer blending mode to “Color” and you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Un-hide the “Background copy 4″ layer and select it, go to Image > Mode > Lab Color and change the image mode to LAB.

The go the Channel Palette and select the “lightness” channel:

Then hit Ctrl + L to bring up the level adjustment tool, apply the following settings:

Change the image mode back to RGB mode. When you’re prompted to flatten the image, choose “Don’t Flatten”.

Change to layer blending option to “Soft Light” with an opacity of 50% and you will have the following effect:

Step 6

Now we can add some extra soft light onto the image.

Un-hide “Background layer 5″ and select it, go to Filter > Blur > Surface Blur and apply the following settings:

Change the layer blending mode to “Screen” with an opacity of 60% and you will have the following image:

Step 7

This is an optional step. As you can see after several layer blendings, the mountain on the right has become a black spot without any tree to be seen. We can bring the trees back by using the dodge tool.

Duplicate the background layer once more and put the duplicated layer just above the background layer, but beneath any other layer.

Hit “o” key to select the dodge tool, apply the following settings:

Brush over the mountain until the trees are back.

You can reduce the layer opacity a bit to get a better result, also adjust the brush size for the dodge tool if necessary.

And here is the final effect:

Ok that’s it for this tutorial! Remember you can always use the layer blending modes, curve/level tools and blur filter to bring out light and contrast for your image.

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and if you have any questions, just drop me a comment.

Cheers and have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to make a grassy and flowery soft drink can in Photoshop. I know it sounds weird but I actually found the inspiration from seeing a soft drink can lying on the lawn in my backyard!

Together we will be exploring various layer blending methods, image adjustment tools and methods of adding colour depth. Have a go!

Here is my final result for this tutorial:

Ok let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1000×1600px, leave the resolution to 72 pixel/inch and hit Shift + F5 to fill the background layer with black colour.

Let’s donwload the image below, which will be used as the starting point for this tutorial:

After downloading this image, load it into Photoshop and hit Ctrl + A to select the entire image, copy and paste the entire image to our new document, this will automatically form a new layer, name it as “Soft Drink Can”.

The postion of the can is shown below:

Step 2

On the “Soft Drink Can” layer, use the Eraser Tool with a brush size of 200px and the hardness to 100%, gently erase the white area around the can:

Duplicate the “Soft Drink Can” layer twice and merge them together: (To select multiple layers, hold down the Ctrl Key while selecting)

After selecting the layers, right-click on any of three layers and merge the layers:

So far the effect looks like this:

Step 3

Now we will add some contrast to the image. Hit Ctrl + M to bring up the cuver, apply the following settings:

Then hit Ctrl + L to bring up the Level tool, apply the following settings:

RGB Settings

Red Settings

You will have the following image so far:

Step 4

Download this image from CG Texture and load it into Photoshop, select a portion of the image, copy and paste it on our document. See below for position details:

Name this layer “Grass”, right-click on it and go to “Blending Option”, set the blending mode to “Overlay” and set its opacity to around 85%.

You will have the following image so far:

Step 5

We can now add some of more depth for the grass. To do this, duplicate the “Grass” layer and keep the blending mode of the duplicated layer as “overlay”.

Then Hit Ctrl + Alt + Shift + B to bring up the Black and White image adjustment tool and apply the following settings:

Here is the effect after:

Step 6

The image looks a bit boring just with the grass texture so I decided to add some flower onto it :)

Download this image and load it into Photoshop, use the same method as described in the previous to select a portion of the image, copy and paste it onto our document:

Name this layer as “Flower”, then hit Ctrl + L to bring the Level Adjustment Tool and apply the following settings:

Then right-click on this layer and set it as a clipping mask:

Then use the Eraser Tool to get rid of the flower texture around the top of the can.

You will have the following image so far:

Step 7

This is an optional step if you would like to add some more colour contrast and depth onto the image.

On the “Soft Drink Can” Layer, Hit Ctrl + Alt + Shift + B to bring up the Black and White Tool and apply the following settings:

And you will have the following result:

Ok that’s it for this tutorial! I will leave you with some room to expand your own creativity!

Here is my final result for this tutorial: (I used some brushes downloaded from Qbrushes.com and further adjusted the colour contrast of the image)

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and find it useful and inspirational!

As usual, if you have any question, just leave me a comment below. Thanks very much and have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I am going to show you the steps I took to create this awesome starry text effect in Photoshop. The inspiration of this text effect comes from the EA game “Dead Space”.

Together we will practice some brush techniques, layer blending options, selection techniques and applying various filter effects.

Below is a previous of the final result:

All right let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1000×400px, you can adjust this ratio to suit your computer screen. Fill the Background layer with Black.

Choose a font you like, I use this font from dafont.com. Type some texts onto the document and position the text as below:

Name this layer as “Text”.

Step 2

On the “Text” layer, apply the following layer blending options:

Inner Shadow

Outer Glow

Inner Glow

Bevel and Emboss

Gradient Overlay

Stroke

This effect so far will look like this:

Step 3

Ok here comes the tricky bit :)

Use Ctrl +  Left Mouse Click the select the text, then create a new layer on top of the “Text” Layer and call this layer “Star”. Fill the “Star” layer with Black colour and position it according to the image below:

Keep the selection alive and go to Filter > Noise > Add Noise and apply the following settings:

Optional: if you feel there is way too many star/noise, hit Ctrl + L to bring up the Level Adjustment Tool and apply the following settings:

When you finish everything with the “Star Layer”, change the layer blending option to “Soft Light” and you will have the following image:

Step 4

Create a new layer and name it “Star 2″, grab a 9px round soft brush and apply the following brush settings:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Texture

Dual Brush

After applying the brush settings, use it to paint gently over the text (see below image):

Step 5

Now we’re gonna add some nebula effect on the text.

To do this, create a new layer and name it “Nebula”, use the Lasso Tool with a 20px feather, select the surrounding area of the text (Tip: you can hold down the “Shift” Key while selecting and this will add to your existing selection)

Fill the selection with black colour. Go to Filter > Render > Cloud (choose white as foreground colour and black as background colour) and render some cloud.

Then hit Ctrl + L to bring up the level tool again, apply the following settings:

Drag the “Nebula” layer below all previous layers (but above the background layer) and set its fill opacity to around 80%.

The effect so far looks like:

That’s it for this tutorial! The rest is left upon your own creativity! You can add some more textures in, or create another layer with some colour over it. That’s totally up to you!

Below is my final image for this tutorial:

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and as usual, if you have any question, feel free to drop me a line!

Cheers and have a nice day!

Welcome to the first volume of the “Seeking Inspiration” series! This series is aimed to provide inspirational contents in terms of graphic and web design, and to give you a boost for your creativity. This series will be divided into parts and each part will focus on a specific topic from the graphic/web design field.

The first part – “The Power of Colours”, will take you into a world of colours and see how they will impact on the images you are creating. Hope you enjoy it!

As a web and graphic designer I constantly seek design inspiration from all sort of mediums. I always find it interesting to take a look at other people’s work and see how they construct their designs and how they form their ideas.

Unfortunetely I lost track of the URLs of the original authors for those work. If you happen to be one of the designers whose work is posted here, please leave me a comment and I will add your URL on immediately.

This concludes Part I of the “Seeking Inspiration” series! I hope you enjoyed them and you’re more than welcome to leave some comments and tell me what you think of those works.

Cheers and have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the processes I used to make a shining, colourful Computer Case in Photoshop. You can apply the same technique to pretty much any object you like.

We will explore the use of various tools such as dodge/burn tools, brush tool, image transform tool, blur filters and more.

A lot of my friends are computer fanatics and they love putting all sort of fancy gadgets on their computer to make it look cool. Sometimes I saw they have some shinning fans or heat-sinkers lighting up from inside the PC Case – that’s where I got the inspiration from for this tutorial!

Below is a preview of the final image:

Let’s get started and light up your PC case – In Photoshop :)

Step 1

Find an computer case image on the web or take a photo of your own computer case. I used the image below for this tutorial, you can use it if you like:

Step 2

Create a new document, size doesn’t really matter, i chose 800×600px. Press Shift + F5 to fill the background layer with black colour.

Load the case image you just downloaded into Photoshop and outline the case (using any selection tool you feel comfortable with, but I would suggest you do some practice with the Pen tool), then copy and paste it onto the newly created document, name the layer as “case”

Step 3

Use the sponge tool to kill some colour and lighting, because this way it’s easy to add some of colour of our own later on. Detailed setting see below:

After that, you a big circle brush with overlay mode enable, set the opacity and flow to around 30 percent, gently brush the surface of the case.

Step 4

It looks a bit bored with just case standing there, so we can add some reflection for it. Firstly duplicated the “case” layer once, name it “reflection”, put it under the “case” layer, use the flip vertical tool to flip it, and apply a gradient overlay blending to it. Tip: you can hold down left mouse button to move the gradient overlay until achieving desired effect.

Detailed setting see below:

Flip image vertically

Layer Blending Mode

Gradient Overlay

Step 5

Duplicate the “case” layer twice, than apply radial blur filter on the first one, and motion blur on the second one. Apply relevant layer blending options to each of the two layers.

Detailed settings see below:

Radial blur Setting:

Radial layer blending option:

Motion blur setting:

Motion Blur layer blending option:

Step 6

Create a new layer on top of all previous layers and set its blending option to color dodge, name the layer “cloud” and render cloud using white as foreground colour and black for background colour.

Detailed Blending setting see below:

This is the effect so far, yours may not be exactly the same.

Step 7

Create a new layer called “light and colour”, set the layer blending style to colour dodge. Now use a combination of the brush tool, dodge tool, sponge tool to add some lighting and colours! This is fun part of this tutorial and there is really no limit to what type of tool you use to create the effect.

I have the following result image:

That’s it for this tutorial. As usual I left room for you to maximise your own creativity. Remember, you can always try different blending options, apply different filters on the image.

Below is a the final work of mine, I added some extra lighting and adjust the hue and colour balance a bit:

Hope you enjoy this tutorial, any commnet or feedback just drop me a line! Thanks~

Till next time, have a great day!