Anyone ever attempts to write Photoshop tutorial knows that to be able to produce a good result is one thing, to write an excellent tutorial based on that result is another. Sometime it’s difficult to explain in detail how to achieve certain effect in Photoshop, although the writers tried their best.

In this post, I collected 15 fresh, Well-Explained Photoshop Tutorials with Fantastic End Result. These are high quality tutorials that would surely impress you, take a look :) I’m sure you will learn lots!

Here goes the list, enjoy! (You can click on the title or the image to view the tutorial)

Create a fantasy-horror scene in Photoshop

Today I’ll drive you through the process of making a fantasy horror scene in Photoshop. We will use some of our grunge textures to realize the background scene, several Photoshop filters to create light effects and we will turn the picture of an innocent child into a diabolic character. I’ll show you how the liquify filter can be used to modify face lineaments. Inspiration derives from horror movie posters design. Are you ready to enter in the dark horror world?

- source: wegraphics.net

Dark, Moody and Comical Photoshop Effect

Create a Dark, Moody and Comical Photoshop Effect and sexy artwork by following a few simple steps! Inspired by Max Payne and Sin City.

- source: anothera.net

Create a beautiful illustrated sketch effect

Today i will show you how to do a nice illustrated sketch effect.

- source: pureromance88.ucoz.com

Making of Fotia

In this tutorial George Patsouras describes in details how his work “Fotia” was created and gives useful tips.

- source: dtuts.com

Photoshop & Illustrator Tutorial: High-end photo compositing techniques

Want to merge a number of images seamlessly into one design? In this tutorial, Kevin Roodhorst illustrates how to make an Africa-inspired graphic compiled from a number of photographic elements. You will be shown how to add several textures and effects, including lighting effects, using Photoshop and Illustrator.

- source: digitalartsonline.co.uk

How To Give Your Photos a Cool Retro Analog Effect

Back in the days of analog photography imperfections were part of the job. Colour washes, light leaks, vignettes and blurs were all common problems that appeared during the processing of your film, particularly from cheap cameras such as the Holga, or simply down to human error. While these problems don’t affect digital cameras, we can recreate the cool effects in Photoshop to give our shots that cool lo-fi retro effect.

- source: blog.spoongraphics.co.uk

Create an Ink Splattering Knight Composition

In this tutorial, we will see how to use Photoshop filters and brushes to create an ink splattering knight composition. This is a relatively simple technique, which yields excellent artistic results.

- source: 10steps.sg

How to Create an Essentially Beautiful Flyer

In today’s tutorial we will be showing you how to make use of simple elements and colors in Photoshop to get an essentially beautiful outcome. People always over complicate things, that’s why we will be having a simple approach towards this large piece. We will be teaching you in a step by step manner and hopefully you can learn something new from this tutorial. Let’s get to it.

- source: photoshoplady.com

Photoshop Tutorial: Paint with fire

In this tutorial, we’re going to take a simple model shot and transform it into a spitting, crackling beacon of fire.

- source: digitalartsonline.co.uk

How to create retro aesthetic poster in Photoshop

Today, I’m going to show you how to blend a stock image with shapes and pattern, add lightness and color to get a nice retro poster in Adobe Photoshop CS4. Layered PSD file included. Let’s get started!

- source: adobetutorialz.com

Artistic dreamy effect

Make a soft dreamy effect using simple techniques to give fantastic and artistic look to your picture.

- source: pureromance88.ucoz.com

How to create a melancholy model photo manipulation

This tutorial was born with a specific aim. I was playing with the image of a beautiful model, with the intention to realize a simple photo retouch tutorial, thought for all those who are approaching to photography and need simple Photoshop skills to embellish their models shots.

- source: wegraphics.net

Create an Incredible Avatar Inspired Matte Painting of Pandora

The artworks from Avatar and the visual effects from the film were largely considered some of the highest quality and innovative artworks seen in film up until that point, perhaps rivaled only by Star Wars in terms of their ingenuity and use of new techniques for visual effects.

- source: creativefan.com

Develop a Dynamic Illustration for a Dance Motion in Photoshop

This tutorial shows how to create fantastic image poster in Photoshop. We will concentrate on masking and adjusting color parameters mainly. We will put parts of stocks to use in order to improvement defects and elaborate details.

- source: free-web-design.co.cc

Show me the light – digital art tutorial

In this photoshop tutorial I will show you how to use stock images to make a beautiful digital artwork with nicely colored lights.

- source: psdbox.com

That’s it for this post! Hope you enjoy it and find those tutorial useful and inspirational!

Till next time, have a nice day!

In this post, I hand-picked 25 Fresh and Ultra Creative Text Effect Artworks to Spark Your Imagination. Those works are from the creattica.com community and are of high standards. I always go there to take a look at their showcases when I’m lack of inspiration :) So if you’re interested, head over and take a look!

Here goes the list, enjoy!

Note: You can click on the image to view its source on creattica.

That’s it for this post! Hope you enjoy those text effect artworks and find them inspirational!

Till next time, have a great day!

Recently I went and saw the movie “Inception” and thought it was really awesome. That’s why I thought I can probably try and create a similar effect using Photoshop and make a tutorial of it for you guys :)

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Surreal/Sci-fi Environment Inspired by the “Inception” Movie in Photoshop. Some steps can be a little tricky, but why not have a try!

Here is a preview of the final effect we will be aiming to achieve: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

You will need the following stock to complete this tutorial:

Ocean

Sky

Building

Wave

Girl

OK let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 900 * 1300px, fill the background layer with black colour. Load the “Ocean” stock image into Photoshop, use the Rectangular Marquee Tool to select a portion of it, paste it onto our document. Name this layer as “Ocean”:

Duplicate this ocean layer once and apply the following “Reduce Noise” filter once:

As you can see, the ocean looks a lot smoother and calmer then before:

Duplicate the original ocean once more and drag it to the top, chnage the blending mode of this second duplicated layer to “color doge”. You will have the following effect:

Add a Levels adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Add a Black and White adjustment layer on top of all layers, this time DO NOT tick the “”use previous layer as clipping mask” option:

You will have the following effect:

Use a big soft brush to the erase top edge of the ocean as shown below:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 2

Load the “Sky” image into Photoshop, select a portion of it with the rectangular marquee tool, copy and paste the selection onto our document, resize and position it as shown below:

Erase the bottom edge with soft brush:

Add a black and white adjustment layer with the following settings on it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

and here is the effect so far:

Step 3

Load the “Building” image into Phtooshop, use the quick selection tool to select any one of the highrises: (I use the one on the right)

Paste the selection onto our canvas, use a soft brush to erase the top and left edge of the layer:

Make sure you erase the bottom left edge of the building so it fades into the cloud:

Black and white

Levels

Mask on the levels adjustment layer:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Now let’s add some splashing wave to the bottom of the building. Load the “Wave” stock image into Photoshop, cut a piece of the wave and paste it onto our document, resize and position it to the bottom of the building, as shown below:

Erase the edges with soft brush:

Black and white:

Levels

and here is the effect so far:

Step 5

Now make a layer group and put all the layers links to the building on the right under it, duplicate this layer group once, and hit Ctrl + T and right-click, choose “Flip Horizontal”:

Then move this duplicated group to the left side of the image, as shown below:

Load the “Girl” Stock image into Photoshop, cut out the girl and paste it onto our document, name the new layer as “girl”:

Erase the erase of the girl as shown below so she blending it with the surroundings:

Create a new layer called “glow” and use a soft white brush, paint around the girl to create some glow effect:

Create a new layer called “splash” under the girl layer, grab some waves from the “Wave” stock image and paste it onto it, reduce the layer opacity to low level around 20%, also perspective it a bit so it looks more realistic:

Add the following three adjustment layers on top of the girl layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Curves

Black and White

and here is the effect so far:

Step 6

Now let’s add some textures over the image. You can use any grunge or abstract brushset and paint on a  new layer, set the layer opacity to around 50%. Here is my effect after the painting:

Add a new Curve image adjustment layer on top of all layers with the following settings:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 7

Now let’s fill the empty sky portion within some surreal effect. I thought of using the polar coordinates filter to add a few black holes on it.

So let’s flatten the iamge, and duplicate the background layer once and apply the following Polar Coordinates Filter to it: (Filter > Distort > Polar Coordinates)

and you will have the following effect:

Resize this layer to the small size, then distort it and a bit and use a soft brush to erase the edges, as shwon below:

Duplicate this layer a few times, rotate, resize each of the duplicated layer, move them to the position shown below to create some variety:

Once you’re done, sharpen the background layer a bit and here is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this Photoshop tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. Until next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you how you can Create this Awesome Abstract Photo Effect via Layer Masking and Custom Patterns. Some steps can be a little tricky, but why not have a try!

Along the way, I will show you some interesting method of making custom, abstract style patterns by mixing hard and soft round brush, plus some lighting techniques.

Here is a preview of the final effect we will be aiming to achieve: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

You will need the following stock to complete this tutorial:

Model

Cloud Brush

Smoke Brush

Star Brush 1

Star Brush 2

OK let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 800px * 1044px, fill the background layer with black colour. Create a new layer called “background light” and use the Cloud Brush and big soft white brush, create some random light as shown below:

Load the Model image into Photoshop, cut out the model and paste it onto our document. Don’t worry if edges appear to be a bit rough – this is not important for this tutorial as we will be masking them out later on.

We will be doing a bit of retouching for this model. If you look closely, you will see some black spots on the girl’s cheek. We will remove them by using the healing brush, as shown below:

This is the effect after applying the healing brush:

Grab the Sharpen Tool from the toolbox, set strength to around 20%, apply some sharp effect onto the girl:

Hair

Lips

Step 2

We can create some abstract pattern by mixing Soft and Hard Circle round brush. As you can see, below is a big soft white brush with 0% hardness (a single-click):

Now grab the eraser tool, set the brush hardness to 100% for the round brush, do a single-click to the position shown below:

Then use the free tranform tool to warp it, distort it, whatever you like:

You can create abstract shape like this, which you can then apply to the image:

Meanwhile, you can add some shining stripes by doing the followings:

Firstly use a soft white brush to do a single-click on the top edge:

Then compress it down using the free-transform tool:

Rotate it to an angle you prefer:

By repeating the steps shown above, we can create some cool abstract patten quickly and use the to spice up the effect:

and this is the overall effect so far: (you effect may look different, as the pattern you create may be different from mine)

Step 3

Now let’s add a layer mask on the model layer, use a combination of hard, soft and smoke brush sets on it. Use your own creativity on the mask, and see what result it brings you:

and here is my effect after messing up with my layer mask:

Add a Curves adjustment layer to the top of the model layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option when adding them)

As you can see, by adjusting the channels on the curves adjustment layer, we can add colours to the image:

I added another levels adjsutment layer as clipping mask to increase the contrast a bit:

Mask on the levels adjustment layer:

here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Now let’s play with the lighting effect for a while. Create a new layer on top of all previous layer called “highlights” and set the blending mode to “overlay”, use a soft white brush to do a single-click to the spot shown below:

Create another light layer on top and use a big soft white brush to do a single-click on the spot shown below:

Optional: duplicate this light layer once for brighter effect:

We can add some light strips to the image. Grab a big soft brush to do a single-click on a new layer:

Then narrow it down by using the free transform tool:

and add those lights on the position shown below:

Step 5

Now let’s use the star brushes we downloaded to paint some star to the image, make sure you use a mixture of big and small stars:

(you can either create a new layer on top of all previous layer to paint star, or you can create layer below the original model layer if you want to add stars behind the model)

Also make sure you use both white and black colour to paint the star.

Once you’re done with the painting, add the following two adjustment layers on top:

Color Balance

Layer Mask on Colour Balance adjustment layer:

Vibrance

Layer Mask on Vibrance adjustment layer:

and here is the effect you will have so far:

For some final lighting touch-ups, you can use the dodge tool (set strength to around 30%) to add some highlights to the girls hair and face, as shown below: (after you flatten the image)

and here is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this Photoshop tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. Until next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you how you can quickly and effectively Create Fantasy Scene via Combining Landscape Images in Photoshop. Some steps can be a little tricky for beginners, but why not have a try!

Along the way, we will be using techniques such as layer blending options, masking, image adjustments, cloud rendering, custom brushsets, as well as various tools from the toolbox.

Here is a preview of the final effect we will be aiming to achieve: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

You will need the following stock to complete this tutorial:

Some Cloud Brushsets

Dirt Brushsets

Lookout Tower

Grass Field 1

Grass Field 2

Mountain

OK let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 900px * 1200px, leave the background colour as white, create a new layer on top of it called “sky gradient”, grab the gradient tool from the toolbox and fill this layer as shown below:

Create another layer and use a darker blue to do a gradient fill as shown below:

The reason I use two layers to create the gradient is to be able to adjust each layer seperately, should anything needs to be changed.

and you will have the following effect:

Create a new layer called “cloud”, and use the cloud brushes you download, paint some cloud on top of the gradient layers:

Create a new layer called “dirt”, use the dirt brushsets you downloaded, paint some dirt onto the canvas: (don’t paint too much, adjust the flow to around 20%)

Duplicate the dirt layer once and apply the following motion blur settings to the duplicated layer:

and you will have the following effect:

This is the overall effect so far:

Step 2

Now let’s add some grass field to the image. Load the “Grass field 1″ image into Photoshop, select a portion of the grass as shown below:

Paste it onto our document, postion it to the bottom and use a soft brush to erase the top edge:

and here is the effect so far:

Load the “Grass Field 2″ image into Photoshop, cut out the mountain portion as shown below: (in this tutorial, there is no need to make precise selection of the mountain)

Paste it onto our canvas, move it to the right side and use a soft erase tool to remove the edges, as shown below:

Duplicate this mountain once, flip it horizontally and move it to the left, resize if necessary:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 3

Load the “Lookout Tower” image into Photoshop, cut out the tower portion of the image and paste it onto our canvas as shown below:

Add the following layer mask to this layer to remove this edges of the mountain:

Add the following adjustment layer to this lookout tower layer, make sure you tick the “user previous layer as clipping mask” option:

Black and white

Colour Balance

Curves

Levels

Layer mask on Levels adjustment layer:

and you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Now let’s create a ray of light to shoot from the mountain. Create a new layer and use the rectangular tool to draw a selection and fill it with white colour:

Then apply the following Gaussian Blur settings:

Perspective this layer as shown below:

Use a soft brush eraser to remove the top and bottom of the light, as shown below: (Also reduce the layer opacity to around 80%)

Duplicate this layer a few times, adjust the sizes of the duplicated layers, and put them into groups as shown below:

Step 5

Now let’s add a floating rock to the image. Load the “mountain” stock image into Photoshop, then use the quick selection tool to select a piece of rock as shown below:

Paste it on to our document, name this new layer as “big rock”:

Erase the bottom-left portion of the rock with a soft brush to it blends into the cloud:

Add the following 2 adjustment layers to this big rock layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Levels

Curves

and you will have the following effect for the rock:

Duplicate this big rock layer a few times, reduce the size of the rock and scatter the smaller rocks around the canvas, as shown below:

Also render some cloud on the grass to create some foggy effect. To do this, simply use the lasso tool with a 50px feather to draw a selection, set the foregound colour to be white, background colour to be light-grey, then render some cloud in it:

Duplicate this cloud layer a few times and scatter them round the canvas:

Step 6

Now let’s create a ring effect for this image. Create a new layer and use the elliptical tool with 10px feather to draw a seletion as shown below:

right-click and choose “stroke”:

Apply the following stroke settings:

and you will have the following ring effect:

Attach this ring to the big floating rock, make sure you erase the portion behind the rock, as shown below: (use the free transform tool to adjust its size to fit the rock)

Add a curves adjustment on top of all previous layers:

Layer mask on this curves adjustment layer:

As you can see, we add a bit of depth to the sky portion: (upper-left becomes darker than the rest)

and here is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this Photoshop tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. Until next time, have a great day!

In the tutorial, I will show you the processes I used to Create an Awesome 3D Text Effect with Abstract Brush Decoration in Photoshop. This is an intermediate tutorial so some steps can be tricky, but why not have a try :)

Here is a preview of the final effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

You will need the following stock to complete this tutorial:

Any Grunge Brushset

Font

OK let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 740px * 1050px, fill the background layer with black colour. Create a new layer called “texture” and paint some grunge texture onto it:

Duplicate this texture layer once, resize it as shown below:

Erase the corners of the duplicated layer with a big soft brush:

you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Now let’s add a big 3D text onto it. If you have illustrator, use it to render a 3D text. If not, you can download this PSD file and use it for this tutorial.

Place the text to the position shown below, name the layer as “big text”:

Apply the following layer blending option to it:

Color Overlay

Gradient Overlay

you will have the following effect:

Add the following mask to this big text layer:

you will have the following effect:

Also create a new clipping mask layer, grab a big soft white brush to add a highlight to the top-left corner of the big text:

Step 3

Create a layer called “cloud” under the big text layer, use either cloud brush or rendered cloud, to the positions shown below:

Also add a highlight layer with a big soft white brush from the top-left corner:

I also decided to add a bit of splashing effect to the text. So grab a 1px hard brush, apply the following brush dynamics to it:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Other Dynamics

Tick the “Airbrush”, “Smoothing” and “Protect Texture” options.

Use this brush and paint some dots to the positions shown below:

You can also add a ray of light on top of the big text to spice things up. To do this, use a soft white brush to do a single-click, then distort it as shown below:

Warp it after the distortion, try to bend the bottom to create a curvy shape:

Position this light on the top right corner of the big text:

Step 4

Now let’s add some variety to the text. Duplicate the big text layer once, cancel the color overlay blending option, resize and position it as shown below:

Add a dark light for the text, painted it with a black soft brush to the position shown below:

Carefully painting some shadow under the text, with a soft black brush:

Duplicate the big text layer once more, resize it and position the layer to the top-left, as shown below:

Add a highlight layer with a soft white brush (single-click to the position shown below):

Carefully paint some shadow under the text, same as the previous step:

Create a new layer called “big text shadow” on top of all previous layer, and grab a big soft brush with black colour, paint some shadow to the bottom of the text, as shown below”

you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Now let’s make another custom brushset. Create a new document sized 40px * 100px, add a new layer and fill it with black colour, hit Ctrl + A and select this new layer:

Go to Edit > Define Brush Preset and create a new brushset:

Then apply the following brush dynamics:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Other Dynamics

Tick the “Airbrush”, “Smoothing”, “Protect Texture” options.

Create a new layer just below the original text layer, and start painting. (try different brush size as you go, apply the following smart sharpen filter once you’re done painting)

you will have the following effect:

You can see we also have some see-through effect on the text, because of the layer mask on the big text layer we added earlier:

Step 6

OK we’re almost done. For some final touchups, I added two image adjustment layers on top:

Curves

Color Balance

Layer Mask of Color Balance adjustment layer:

and you will have the following effect:

For add some motions into the images, we can flatten the image, duplicate the background layer once and apply the following motion blur settings to it:

Change the layer blending mode of this blur layer to “Screen” and layer opacity to around 60%, then add the following layer mask on it:

Here is the final effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this Photoshop tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. Until next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Zebra Patterned Crimson Text Effect in Photoshop. This is an intermediate level tutorial and some steps can be tricky, but why not have a go :) ?

What I would like to show you in this tutorial in how you can combine the pattern clone stamp with work path to render special effects for your text, and how you can create realistic light and shadow for your environment.

Here is a preview of the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

Alternative Version (with more red colour + a bit of Motion Blur in it)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies + Exclusive Photoshop tutorial there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

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

Font

Step 1

Creata a new document sized 1300px * 650px. Create a new layer called “floor” and select the lower portion of the canvas as shown below:

Right-click inside the selection and choose “Fill”:

Select the following tile pattern from the “Pattern” category:

Drop the layer opacity to around 40%:

Then perspective the layer as shown below:

add the following layer mask to this floor layer:

and you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Use the font we donwloaded, type some text onto the canvas as shown below:

Apply the following Drop Shadow blending option to this text layer:

Now in order to make a smooth transition from the text layer to the floor layer, as the following layer mask to the text layer: (with Gradient Fill tool)

Now let’s create the shadow for the text. Firstly load the selection of the text layer by Ctrl + Left-click the thumbnail image on the layer palette, then create a new layer called “shadow” under the text layer, maintain the selection and fill it with black colour, flip it vertically and use the free-transform tool to perspective as shown below:

Add the following layer mask to this shadow layer:

and you will have the following effect:

Step 3

Create a new layer on top of the text layer called “zebra texture”. Load the text layer selection and right-click on it, choose “make work path” option:

Grab the Pattern Stamp Tool from the toolbox:

Choose the Zebra texture from the dropdown window:

Set tolerance to 2.0 pixels:

Choose the Pen Tool, then right-click on the path and choose “Stroke Path”:

Stroke the path with Pattern Stamp we just chose:

and you will have the following effect:

Change the layer blending mode to be “overlay” for this zebra texture layer, you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Now create a new layer under the “shadow” layer called “back light”. Grab the Lasso Tool with a 50px feather setting to draw a selection, then render some cloud inside it:

Hit Ctrl + L to bring up the Levels adjustment tool and apply the following settings:

Use the free transform tool to reduce the size of the cloud, position it behind the text:

Duplicate this light layer a few more times, put them around the text as shown below: (reduce their layer opacity to around 20-30%)

Add the following two adjustment layers to the top of all previous layers:

Curves

Levels

and you will have the following effect:

Go back to the text layer, change the text colour to be black, and you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Now we’re almost done. Flatten the image and duplicate the background layer once, apply the following Reduce Noise filter settings to the duplicated layer: (we don’t want this text effect to be sharp)

I decided to add a line a smaller text in the far distant to make a transition effect for the main text. So I duplicate the background layer again, and apply the following Motion blur filter to the duplicated layer:

Then resize this layer to a smaller scale, then move it up to the position as shown below:

Add the following layer mask to this layer:  (use Gradient Tool)

Then reduce the layer opacity to around 30%, you will have the following effect:  (a barely visible, samll text in the far distance)

I added the following two image adjustment layers for final touchups:

Curves

Color Balance

Mask on Colour Balance layer: (for adding image depth)

and here is the final effect I have for this tutorial:

Alternative Version (with more red colour + a bit of Motion Blur in it)

That’s for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful. If you have any question, just drop me a comment below. Have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to Create Awesome Splashing Water Text Effect in Photoshop. Along the way, you will learn how you can incorporate water splash brushsets into your text and create great effect from that. Have a try!

Here is a preview of the final effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

You can download the PSD File for this tutorial via the VIP Members Area for only $4.95/Month (or less)! You will not only get this PSD File, but also 40+ other PSD Files + Extra Goodies + Exclusive Photoshop tutorial there. Signup now and get exclusive! Find out more about the VIP Members Areas

OK let’s get started!

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

Water Splashing Brush

Lake

Font

Step 1

Create a new document sized 940px * 700px, fill the background layer with black. Load the Lake stock image into Photoshop, use the Lasso Tool with a 40px feather setting, draw a selection of the lake portion:

Copy and paste the selection on to our canvas, use a big soft brush to erase its edges, and reduce its layer opacity to around 60%. The effect is as shown below:

Duplicate the water layer twice, move the duplicated layer to the left and right of the original water layer, as shown below: (set the layer opacity to slightly lower than the original water layer to create depth)

Duplicate the original water layer once more, resize it to a smaller piece and position it to the center, then increase the layer opacity to 100%:

Add the following two adjustment layers on top of all layers created so far:

Curves

Levels

and you will have the following effect so far: (centre portion highlighted, and that will be the text will be placed)

Step 2

Now use any font you like, type a single letter on the canvas as shown below:

Apply the following layer blending options to this text layer:

Bevel and Emboss

Gradient Overlay:

Stroke

and here is the effect so far:

Step 3

Now let’s add some noise to the text and get ready for the water splashing effect later on. Create a new layer on top of the text called “noise”, load the selection of the text layer and fill the selection with black colour, go to Filter > Noise > Add Noise and apply the following setting:

The effect after you apply the noise filter:

Change the blending mode of thie noise layer to “screen”, drop the layer opacity to around 35%, you will have the following effect:

Create a new layer on top of the noise layer, name it “light and shadow”, use a combination of black and white brush, paint it as shown below:

Change the blending mode of this light and shadow layer to “Overlay” – as you can see, this add some lighting contrast to the text:

Step 4

Now we can paint some water splashing effect around text. Create a new layer called “water splash” and load the water splash brushes into Photoshop, choose some brushes from the set and paint around the text, as shown below:

Make sure when you paint the water splashing effect, use a combination of big and small sized brushsets, also adjust the flow and opacity of the brush, DO NOT just use one setting for the whole thing:

Keep adding more water splashing around the text – to be more creative, paint some water streams dropping from the edges of the text:

For the water streams, I used a 6px, soft white brush to paint in addition to the water splashing brush, as shown below:

Use the same technique to paint the water stream on the left:

You can use a small, soft white brush to draw around the edge of the text to create some waterflow/highlight effect:

Highlight effect for the text edges:

here is the effect you will be aiming to achieve so far:

Step 5

Now we will make the water splash around the text sharpen a bit. To do this, duplicate the water splash layer you’re painting on once (if you have searval layers for the water splash, group them first, then right-click on the group and choose “merge group” option).

Apply the following Smart Sharpen filter setting to the duplicated layer:

and you can see the water splash sharpened and become more visible:

Now create a new layer called “shadow” under the original text layer, grab a black soft brush and paint some shadow on the water and under the text, as shown below:

Optionally, you can add more water splashing effect around the text:

To make the text effect more dramatic, you can add some misty effect by create a new layer named “mist” just above the background layer, use a Lasso Tool with 50px feather, draw a selection around the text as shown below:

Render some cloud inside the selection, drop the layer opacity of this mist layer to around 50%, and you will have the following misty effect:

Step 6

Now we’re into the final stage of this tutorial. I feel like adding some highlights around the text, so as to make the certain parts stand out. To do this, create a new light on top of all previus layers, use a small white soft brush to paint (single-click) to the points shown below:

Now you can also use the Distrot option (available when you press Ctrl + T, then right-click) to adjust the shape of the light, to fit the angel of the latter:

I added one Color Balance image adjustment layer just to add a bit more light blue colour into the image:

Layer Mask on the Color Balance adjustment layer:

and you will have the following final effect:

OK that’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful and inspirational. If you have any question, drop a comment below and 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 this cool Abstract Artwork via Custom Brushsets and Particle Effect in Photoshop. I will demonstrate how you can create your own brushset and use them to add particle effect to the image to spice it up. Have a try!

Here is a preview of the final effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

Alternative Light Version:

PSD File Download

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OK let’s get started!

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

Girl

Some Grunge Brushes

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200px * 800px, fill the background with a light grey colour, and some random lighting and grungy texture on it as shown below:

Load the “girl” stock image into Photoshop, cut out the girl from the rest of the image, place her to the lower left side of the canvas:

To bring out some light on the girl image, add the folloing two adjustment layers onto it (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option when adding them)

Levels

Curves

and here is the effect so far:

Step 2

Now create new layer, and random paint some abstract textures around the girl:

Now apply a layer mask on this abstract painting layer. On the layer mask, use a mixture of grungy, halftone, and hard circle brush, as shown below:

Now let’s add some light strips. Create a new layer and grab a soft round brush, do a single click on the top edge of the canvas:

Compress it down as shown below:

Rotate this light strip as shown below:

Duplicate this light strip layer a few times, scatter them around the girl for more effect:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 3

I decided to turn this image into a darker version (just my personal taste), so I went ahead and add the following two adjustment layers on top of all previous layers:

Levels

Add the following layer mask on the Levels adjustment layer: (as you can see, I apply some light grungy texture, plus some hard circle brush on where the girl is)

Curves

Layer Mask on the Curves adjustment layer:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Now we can practice some Pen Tool techniques. Create a new layer and draw a work path as shown below:

Right-click on the path and choose “Stroke Path” with a 9px hard circle brush:

Make sure you tick the “Simulate Pressure” setting:

Now you will have a curvy line, you can use free transform to distort, rotate it for more variety:

In the mean time, you can try a softer and bigger brush for stroking the path, also scatter the duplicated curvy lines around for more effect:

Step 5

Now let’s make a custom brush for adding some little particle effect. Create a new file called “brush” (size 200px * 200px) and use a the Pen Tool to draw a shape like this:

Right-click on the shape and choose “Fill Path …”:

Fill it with black colour:

Now make the background layer transparent: (after you fill the shape with black colour)

Now go to “Edit > Define Brush Preset…”:

Save this brushset, then bring up the brush presets (F5) and apply the following settings:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Other Dynamics

Tick the Airbrush, Smoothing, Protect Texture options. Then try and do some random painting on the canvas (create a new layer first) and test out the effect:

Combine the Free Transform tool, distort, rotate and warp the particles for extra effects:

Apply the particles random on the canvas as shown below: (you can also adjust the brush size, flow and opacity as you go)

Step 6

OK let’s do some final tune-ups. I flattened the image and duplicated the background layer, apply the following Smart Sharpen filter on the duplicated layer:

Color Balance

Layer Mask on the Color Balance Adjustment Layer:

Levels

and here is the effect you’ll have:

The main part of the tutorial concludes here, however you can still experiment different colour balance settings, filter effect and so on:

a light version:

OK that’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and find it useful and inspirational. If you have any question, drop a comment below and 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 this Ultra-Shining Text Effect with Bokeh and Abstract Texture in Photoshop. Have a try!

Along the way, you will learn the method used to create lighting effect, bokeh, image adjustments, plus an rather interesting way of creating those little flying/falling light particles :)

Here is a preview of the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

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Ok let’s get started!

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

A Bold Font (You can choose any one from the list)

Abstract Brush

Step 1

Create a new document sized 550px *600px, grab the Gradient Tool from the toolbox and fill the background as shown below:

As you can see this gradient color is different from the final effect color – this is because initially I thought it would be better to use a dark gradient fill in the beginning, just for experimental purpose. I can always change the colour later on with image adjustments.

Grab the type tool and type a big text (using a font you downloaded from the list) on the centre of the canvas, name this text layer as “mother text”, reduce its opacity to 40%:

Apply the following layer blending options to it:

Drop Shadow

Outer Glow

Gradient Overlay

and you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Type another smaller size letter on the canvas, name this type layer as “child text”, drop its opacity to around 30%, use the free transform tool to rotate it a bit so it looks like falling from the top:

Apply the following layer blending options to it:

Drop shadow

Gradient Overlay

Then duplicate this child text layer a few times, rotate each duplicated layer and scatter them around the mother text:

Step 3

Now let’s add some fancy lighting effect for the text. Create a new layer named “light strip bottom” below the mother text layer, use a soft white brush to do a single click on the top of the canvas:

Compress this layer to a very thin strip with the free trasform tool (scale):

Move this strip to this bottom of the text, and change the blending mode to “soft light”:

Now let’s add some highlights for the text. To do this, create a new layer on top of the “light strip bottom” layer, name it “highlight” and use a soft round white brush to do a single click as shown below:

Compress it to a thin size:

Move it over the bottom light strip and change the blending mode to “overlay”:

You will have the following effect: (you can duplicate this highlight layer a few more times for deeper effect)

Use the same method as the highlight layer creation (apart from the compression), add a few more lighting source around the text:

Step 4

Now let’s add some bokeh to the text. Thanks to the dynamic brush function in Photoshop, it’s really simple to make the bokeh effect.

So grab a round white brush with 80% hardness, apply the following dynamic brush settings to it:

Shape dynamics

Scattering

Other Dynamics

and tick the “Airbrush”, “Smoothing” and “Protect Texture” option.

Use this brush we just made to paint some bokeh around the text, make sure you adjust the brush size along the way:

As you can see, I used smaller bokeh on the top for more depth:

Step 5

Now let’s add some flying/falling light particles to the text. Create a new layer on top of all previous layers, name it as “particles”, grab a small round white brush, do a single click anywhere on the canvas:

Use the Warp Tool to warp this dot as shown below:

You may have to warp it twice for a more curvy shape:

Once you finish the warping, simply duplicate this particle layer and scatter them around the text: (experiment with blending mode as you duplicate them, try “soft light”, “overlay”, and “normal” mixing together. Also adjust the layer opacity for each layer so that they look different and as a result the image can have more depth)

Optional: for add some elegance to the text, you can duplicate the “light strip bottom” layer and resize and rotate it, and place the smaller strip on the bottom of the text:

Step 6

Now we can add some abstract texture onto the texture. Create a new layer called “texture” above the background layer, use the abstract brushset we downloaded and paint to the positions as shown below:

OK, we’re pretty much done. For some fine-tuning, I added two adjustment layers on top of all previous layer:

Color Balance

Curves

Optionally, you can also flatten the image, duplicate the background layer once and add the following “accented edge” (Filter > Brush strokes > Accented edge) filter effect to it:

This will create some blurry and melting effec to the text:

Add the following layer mask to the duplicated layer so it doesn’t look blurry for the whole canvas:

Smart sharpen the flattened background layer a bit, and here the final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and learn something new :)

Until next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, i will show you the steps I took to create this epic Fantasy Style artwork “Lost in Memory” in Photoshop. I combined the meteor effect, some matte-painting tricks plus lighting effect in this tutorial. Have a try!

Here is a preview of the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

Version 1

Version 2 (this is an alternative version with a darker contrast)

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Ok let’s get started!

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

Cloud brush

Rust

Mountain 1

Moutain 2

Palace

Bridge

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1400px * 800px, fill the background with black colour. Load the “Rust” image into Photoshop, select a portion of the rust texture as shown below:

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas, resize it to fit the height and width of the canvas, then apply the following motion blur settings to it:

Add the following adjustment layers to this texture layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and white

Curves

Levels

Apply the following layer mask to the texture layer:

The reason I added the mask is when I start this artwork, I’ve already made a plan of how each object will be placed, and here is an indication of it:

Obviously by adding the layer mask, we can hide those areas that we don’t want the texture to be shown.

Step 2

Load the “cloud brush” into the Photoshop, create a new layer called “cloud” above all previous layer, and paint some cloud on it: (adjust the flow and opacity of the cloud brush to a low level, and don’t just use one brush, use the lot!)

Load the “Mountain 1″ image into Photoshop and cut out the mountain portion of the image, paste it onto our canvas, resize and position it to the left side of the canvas, and name this layer as “mountain left”:

Add the following layer mask to this “mountain left” layer: (this hide the edges and make a smooth transition, use a combination of a soft round brush and chalk brush to achieve this, make sure you adjust the flow and opacity along the way)

Add the following adjustment layers to this mountain left layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and White

Levels

Curves

Here is the effect so far:

Step 3

As you can we have a river flowing on the bottom of the moutnain – somehow I feel it’s a just too short and I decide to extend it a bit.

To do this, go back to the “mountain 1″ image, select the river portion of the image, copy and paste the selection on our canvas. Name this layer as”river”, resize it to smaller size as shown below:

Erase the edges with a soft brush:

Add the following adjustment layers to this river layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and White

Curves

For more variety, duplicate this river layer one more time and move it to the right side, apply the same black and white, curves adjustment settings as before:

Here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Load the “Mountain 2″ image into Photoshop, cut out the following portion of the mountain and paste it onto our canvas, as shown below:

Name this layer as “mountain right”, add the following layer mask to this layer:

Add the following adjustment layers to this texture layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and white

Now we move on to the palace bit of the image. Load the “palace” image into Photoshop, cut out the palace portion (i found the quick select tool is probably the best tool here) and paste it onto our canvas. Position it on top of the right mountain, resize it to fit the size of the mountain:

Erase the edges of the castle with a soft round brush (you can use chalk brush with a really low opacity and flow to erase some parts of the palace, to create a old and rusty effect)

Add the following adjustment layers to this palace layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and White

Curves

Here is the effect so far:

Step 5

Now we can spice up the fantasy effect a bit by doing some cloud warping. If you are not familiar with this technique, check out this post here on PSD Vault.

The point I would like to mention is once you finish the cloud warp, experiment the layer blending mode with it, don’t just leave it to “normal”. For instance, I used the “screen” blending mode for the following cloud:

Also duplicate the cloud layer, move them around to the positions shown below for more lighting and depth:

Once you’re happy with the cloud, load the “bridge” stock image into Photoshop, cut out and portion of the bridge and paste it onto our canvas. Name this layer as “bridge” and put it under the “mountain left” layer and “cloud” layer we created in the beginner of the tutorial, erase the edges of the bridge with a soft eraser:

Add the following adjustment layers to this bridge layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and white

Curves

We can fine-tuning the contrast of the image a bit. Add the following adjustment layers on top of all previous layer:

Curves

Here is the effect so far:

Step 6

Now let’s create a simple meteor effect for this artwork. To do this, create a new layer called “meteor head” and grab a round white brush with 60% hardness, do a single click on the new layer, then hit Ctrl + Shift + X to bring up the liquify fitler, apply the following settings:

Left-click and hold, then drag the liquify brush to the direction as shown below for this effect:

Create a new layer called “meteor tail” and grab a round white brush with 40% hardness, do a single-click on this layer, then distort and warp it as shown below:

Warp

To add some more effect around the tail, use the cloud brushset we downloaded and reduce their brush size to a very small level, then simply paint around the tail (use a soft eraser tool to erase the edges for better result):

Then group those layers, duplicate this group and scatter the meteor around the canvas:

Step 7

OK we’re petty much done. To fine-tune the final effect, I added the following adjustment layers above all previous layers:

Colour Balance

Layer Mask on Colour Balance layer:

Vibrance

Levels

Here is the effect so far:

For final touchups, I reduce the noise of the image a bit, and here is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

Version 1

Version 2 (this is an alternative version with a darker contrast)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hopefully you learnt something new :)

Until next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Surreal Artwork via Simple Break Apart Effect in Photoshop. I will also introduce the use of dynamic brushsets to generate a “magic dust” effect. Have a try!

Techniques included in this tut are layer mask, image adjustments, cloud rendering and various tools.

Here is a preview of my final image for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

Alternative version with colours added:

PSD File Download

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OK Let’s get started!

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

Stone Background (the first image on the page)

Girl

Smoke Brush

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1000px * 1500px,

Levels

Curves

Black and White

You will have the following effect so far:

Step 2

Now let’s get on to the break apart effect creation. One quick way is to use a 0px feather Lasso Tool, select some random pieces on the outer part of the girl model:

Then choose the select tool, move your mouse over the selection, you mouse will change into a pair of scissors:

Click and drag to move the pieces away from the girl:

You can also distort the selection for some zooming effect:

Repeat the above method to different body portions for more effect:

That’s it! Isn’t that simple? :)

Step 3

Now load the “stone texture” into Photoshop. Copy and paste the entire image onto our canvas and put the new layer  just above the background layer. Apply the following Smart Sharpen filter a few times to this texture:

You will have the following effect:

Drop the opacity of this stone texture layer to around 10%. This will create a noisy overlay for our background.

Now we’re onto creating some light strips. Create a new layer called “light” and grab a soft round brush, do a single click anywhere on the canvas:

Resize it as shown below:

Then rotate it as shown below

Now simply duplicate the light layer, scatter those light around the girl and adjust the opacity as you see fit:

By moving those light around, you can easily add depth and grab people’s attention to the areas you hightlighted.

I also added a ray of light on the right arm, for extra effect:

Levels

Mask on the levels adjustment layer:

Curves

Here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Now that’s add some grass texture on the bottom of the canvas.  To do this, use the Lasso Tool with 50px feather to cut out a piece of grass texture from the girl stock image, then use the free transform tool to resize and distort it until the shape is similar to the one shown below:

Add the following adjustment layers on top of the grass texture layer: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Levels:

Curves:

Create a new layer called “smoke overlay”, use the smoke brushset we downloaded and paint away, make sure you change the size, opacity and flow of the brush as you go for more effect:

For some extra effect, I added some smoke texture on the right arm:

Of course you can experiment different smoke shapes then the ones I used and see what result it brings you.

Step 5

Now let’s make a brushset for painting some dusts around the girl and over the grass texture. To do this, grab a 1px, 100% hardness brush, apply the following brush dynamics:

Shapes Dynamics

Scattering

Transfer (other dynamics)

Make sure you tick Noise, Airbrush and Smoothing options too.

Once you done this settings above (you can save this brushset if you want to use it again in the future). Starting Painting on the area above the grass and around the girl:

As you can see, this brush creates a thin layer of dust-like effect:

At last, we can add some image adjustment layers on top of all previous layers to fine-tune the image:

Curves

Color Balance

That’s it! Here is the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

Alternative version with colours added:

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and find it useful! Cheers and have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you techniques involved to create this rather cool, 3D typography with abvanced Texturing and Lighting Effect in Photoshop. Some steps can be a little tricky and you do need a lot of patience to complete this tut, but why not have a try?

The aim of this tut is to demonstrate how you can texture a 3D text (created in Illustrator) quickly and effectively, using the least amount of steps possible.

Here is a preview of the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

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OK let’s get started!

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

Font

Ground Crack

Mountain (Soil) Texture

Grass

Bird

Step 1

Create a document sized 1500px * 680px (you can choose a smaller size to fit your screen, but make sure you maintain the proportion), fill the background with #161616 colour.

Load the “Ground Crack” texture into Photoshop, Press Ctrl + A to select the entire image, copy and paste it onto out document. Name the new layer as “crack”, resize, rotate and distort this layer until you achieve the following effect:

Erase the the edges of the crack texture so it transits into the background colour:

Duplicate this crack layer once and move the duplicated layer toward the lower right end of the canvas for more variety:

Please note that the erase part is totally optional, if you’re happy with just the distorted texture, you can just leave it as it is.

Step 2

Now we have a ground base we can work on, let’s get on with the text creation.

I used Illustrator to render this 3D effect (I won’t demonstrate the steps for rendering as it’s irrelevant to this tutorial) and you can download a copy by clicking the following image, then loaded into Photoshop:

On top of the text layer, add the following two adjustment layers (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Levels

Curves

Add a layer mask on the text layer, then use the erase tool with chalk bursh setting  (Assign 40% opacity and flow) , erase the portions as shown below to create a rough surface. Also use a soft round brush to erase the bottom part on the text:

Portions you need to erase:

Once you’re happy with the text, load the “Mountain (soil) texture” stock into Photoshop. Load the select of the text layer by Ctrl + left-clicking the thumbnail image on the layer pallette, drag the selection on the soil texture:

Hint: to drag the selection, you must select the rectangular marquee tool first, then move you mouse over the selection, and click-hold to drag it.

Maintain the selection around the text, copy and paste your chosen soil texture onto our canvas. Name this layer as “soil” and make it a clipping mask layer for the text layer:

Use a soft round brush to erase the portions texture as indicated below: (set the opacity and flow to around 20% – this way you can make sure you don’t erase too much of the texture, as well as creating depth for the image)

Add the following Levels adjustment layer on top of the soil layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option):

Load the “Grass” image into the Photoshop, select a portion of the grass:

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas and name it as “grass”, right click the layer and select “create clipping mask”, and you will have the following effect:

Add the following Curves adjustment layer on top of the grass layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option):

Change the blending mode of the grass layer to “soft light” and here is the effect so far:

Optionally, you can add a layer mask and erase certain portion of the grass texture if you think they’re unnecessary.

Step 3

Duplicate the grass layer once and drag it to the top, release the clipping mask and delete the layer mask attached to it. Add a new layer mask and change the blending mode to “overlay”, then erase the following areas on this grass overlay layer:

Hint: Same as all previous texture erases, combine the use of the chalk brush and circle brush is important, also set the flow and opacity to a low level (20% for both).

Add the following Levels adjustment layer on top of the grass overlay layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option):

and here is the effect so far:

Create a “Shadow” layer under the text layer, garb a soft round brush to paint under the texture, in the area shown as below:

When you paint the shadows, make sure you pay attention to areas around the text:

Change the blending mode of this shadow layer to “soft light”, and here is the effect so far:

Step 4

Load the “Bird” stock image into Photoshop, cut out the bird and paste it onto canvas, position it as shown below:

Create a new layer called “bird shadow” under the bird layer, use a small soft round brush with black colour (set opacity and flow to both around 30%), carefully paint a thin shadow under the bird:

Duplicate the bird and the bird shadow layer, flip them horizontally and position them the left side as shown below:

Step 5

Now we’re pretty much done the main aspects of the tutorial. And we can add some background touches for some more depths. Some mist/cloud here would add some extra effect here.

I won’t brag you again with the cloud rendering and warping (you can check out this post if you haven’t used it before). What I would like to address is that when render the clouds, put each of them onto seperate layers, and change their blending mode into either “overlay”, “soft light” or “screen”:

Here is a screenshot of what I did to the cloud layers – it shows the cloud position and blending mode: (click to enlarge)

You will notice by change their blending mode (and layer opacity), you can add lighting depth and extra effect to the text and ground texture,

Also you can use a soft eraser to erase the portion of cloud where it links to the ground texture for more depth:

Step 6

Now we’re petty done for this tutorial! For some final adjustments, I add the following 2 adjustment layers:

Vibrance

Curves

and here is the effect:

Optionally, you can add some colours and glowing effect to touch up the overall design. You can achieve this by adding a new colour balance adjustment layer, and use the Gaussian blur filter. I won’t show you the exact settings here and I will leave this to you to explore and experiment :)

Here is the version where the colours and glowing effect is applied: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and learn something new! Have a great day :)

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to Design this cool looking,  Awesome Nature-Themed Artwork in Photoshop. This is an intermediate level tutorial and some steps can be tricky, but why not have a try!

Here a preview of the final effect: (click to enlarge)

PSD File Download

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

Rock

Waterfall

Tree 1

Tree 2

Hawk

Step 1

Create a new document sized 900px * 800px, leave the background colour as white.

The way I intended for this artwork is somehow the overall shape would resemble a number “1″ shape. So Firstly I create a 3D text model using Illustrator (I won’t demonstate the steps to create this 3D effect as it’s irrelevant to this Photoshop tutorial) to use as a model for this abstract effect.

You can download a copy of this image and paste it on your canvas, by clicking the image below:

Of course the final effect won’t include this 3D text, however it gives a good starting point for the abstract effect I’m going to make.

Load the “Rock” texture into Photoshop, grab the Quick Selection tool and select a random piece of rock according to the settings below:

Important: Tick the “Auto-Enhance” option on the top toolbar for the Quick Selection Tool, this will help improving the edges of the selection.

Select Random Rock Pieces from this rock stock image:

Copy and paste the selection onto our document, resize, rotate and fit it onto any position you like on the text:

Select another different piece from the rock texture using the quick selection tool:

Paste it onto the canvas, and after you paste it, make sure you use a soft eraser to get rid of any edge roughness, so as to blend it with the background and other rock texture.

Hint: Use the Chalk brush (comes with Photoshop by default), with a 40% flow and opacity to erase the edges. You will find it quite effective in situation like this.

Repeat the select, copy and paste routine, make sure you select a different piece of the rock texture each time, until you cover the whole 3D text as shown below: (Erase the edges with soft brushes along the way)

Also use the dodge and burn tool to darken and lighten some areas of the rocky texture so we have some lighting dynamics and increase the depth of the image:

Please note that the above screenshots only provide an indicative guide, you will need to experience the effect yourself as the textures may differ from mine to yours.

Step 2

Load the “Waterfall” stock image into Photoshop, use whatever selection method you prefer to cutout the waterfall portion, copy and paste it on our document, name this layer as “waterfall”, resize and fit it to the portion as shown below

use soft brush to erase the edges of the waterfall so it blends with the rock and the background:

Add the following Curves adjustment layer on top of the waterfall layer: (make sure to select “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Duplicate the waterfall layer once, flip it horizontally and put it to the lower position as shown below:

Add the following Curves adjustment layer on top of the waterfall layer: (make sure to select “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

We can also do some tiny adjustments for the overall effect. So add the following two adjustment layers on top of all previous layers:

Vibrance

Curves

Here is the effect so far:

We can now hide the original 3D text layer cos we won’t be needing it anymore.

Step 3

Load the “Tree 1″ texture into Photoshop. Cut the tree portion of the image with Channel Masking technique (if you’re not familar with this technique, please refer to Step 3 of this post for detailed explanation) and paste it onto our document. Name this new layer as “tree 1″, resize it to a small size and fit it on top of the rocks:

Make sure you erase the edges of the tree layer as depicted below:

Add the following Curves adjustment layer (make sure to select “use previous layer as clipping mask” option) on top of the tree layer to bring out some extra lights:

We can also add some grass texture on to the bottom of the tree for more details. So grab the lasso tool with a 40px feather to select a piece of the grass from the tree  stock image:

Copy and paste it onto our document and put the new layer below the Tree layer, resize it to fit the size of the rock base, change the blending mode to “overlay”, you will have the following effect:

Step 4

I feel like adding more tree images on the rocks for more details. So load the “Tree 2″ texture into Photoshop. Use the same channel masking technique to cut out the tree from the stock image, paste it onto our document, into the the following positions:

Top Left

Add the following Curves adjustment layer on top: (make sure to select “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Bottom Right:

Add the following Curves adjustment layer on top: (make sure to select “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Step 5

Load the “Hawk” image into Photoshop, cut out the hawk and paste it onto our document, resize it to a very small size:

To add some motion for the hawk, duplicate this new hawk layer once, apply the following motion blur settings to the duplicated layer:

Change the blending mode the duplicated layer to “Hard Light”, drop the opacity to 30%:

Adding more details, we can also put aonther hawk on the left side of the rock:

and here is the overall effect so far:

Step 6

Ok we’re almost done! For some final adjustments, I added the following two things:

• Lens flare – not a popular option in Photoshop, but in this occasion I think it brings extra effect and color into the image
• Cloud texture – for the surrounding environment

To add the lens flare effect, we can create a new layer on top of all previous layers, fill the new layer with black color, then apply the following Lens Flare settings:

You will have the following effect:

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

You can move, duplicate this Lens Flare layer for more effect:

For the cloud texture, you can either use cloud brushsets or stock image to achieve it. I painted some cloud on the top and bottom of the canvas:

and here is the final effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and learn something new!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this surreal “Departing” Jump Scene with Cloud Warping in Photoshop. This is an intermediate tutorial so some steps can be tricky, but why not have a try!

Along the way, you will learn how to bring out extra details from your photo via a few simple tweaks, plus how to warp the cloud generated by Photoshop filter so to best suit your image.

Here is a preview of the final result I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

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

Jumping Man

Mountain

Sky

Ok let’s get started!

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1000px * 1400px, fill the background layer with black colour. Create a new layer on top of the background layer callled “background light”. On this layer, grab the Gradient Fill Tool and fill it with the following colour and direction:

Load the Jumping Man stock into Photoshop, cut out the man using whatever selection method you prefer, and paste it on to our doucment (Resize and position it to the centre of the canvas), name this layer as “Model”:

Use the Erase Tool with 80% hardness (adjust the brush size accordingly) to get rid of any rough edge around the body:

On this model layer, apply the following Reduce Noise filter settings:

As you can see by applying this reduce noise filter, we can bring out some extra details for this model layer:

Add the following adjustment layers on the model layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option:

Black and White

Curves

Levels

and you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Create a new layer named “highlights” under the model layer but above the backgroud light layer, use a soft round brush with white colour, do a few single clicks in the position as shown below:

Ideally you should seperate those three light dots in 3 seperate layers – the reason is that you can alter the size, opacity and the position of the light dots more freely. For instance, if you place the bottom light dot in a seperate light, you can resize it to fit the legs:

Create a new layer called “cloud overlay” on top of the model layer, grab a Lasso Tool with a 50px feather, draw a selection around the model and render some cloud in it:

Use the Warp Tool to warp the cloud as shown below:

Change the blending mode of this cloud overlay layer to “Screen” and reduce the opacity to 30%, you will have the following effect:

Erase the upper portion of the cloud with a big soft brushset eraser:

Step 3

Create a new layer called “cloud color dodge” on top of all previous layers and use the lasso tool with 50% feather to draw a big selection first (anywhere on the canvas) and render some cloud inside it, then resize it to a much smaller piece and position it above of the right shoe of the man.

Use the Warp Tool to warp and extend the cloud as shown below:

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

Duplicate the original “cloud overlay” layer twice and drag them to the left and right side of the canvas, change the blending mode of those two layer to “soft light”, with 70% opacity:

Duplicate the “cloud color dodge” layer a few times and scatter them around the model and adjust the opacity of each layer accordingly. You can also experiment different blending mode such as “overlay”, “hard light” and “screen” and what result that gives you:

I also duplicated the original “cloud overlay” layer once again. and drag it below the model, change the blending mode of the duplicated layer to “soft light” and a 80% opacity:

I created another layer on top of all previous layer, and use a white white brush to paint some extra lights under the model, then resize it as shown below:

This helps me set the overall mood for the image and making easier for me to apply textures later on.

Step 4

Load the mountain texture into Photoshop, cut out the mountain portion and paste it onto our canvas. Name this layer as “Mountain” and put the layer below the “Model” layer:

Use the eraser tool with a soft brush setting to erase the edge of the mountain so it blends into the canvas naturally:

Add the following adjustment layers on the model layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option:

black and white

Curves

Levels

Colour Balance (change blending mode to “Soft light”, opacity 70%)

and you will have the following effect so far:

Step 5

Load the sky texture into Photoshop, select a portion of the cloud and copy and paste it onto our canvas. Name this layer as “cloud” and put it above all previous layers: (resize the layer if necessary)

Add the following adjustment layers on the model layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option:

Black and White

Curves

and you will have the following effect so far:

Step 6

I decided to give the image some natural elements. So I used one of my own flower photo (you don’t have the use the same one as this is for tutorial purpose only. However you really like this stock, you can get one from the VIP Members Area)

Regardless what stock photo you use, cut out of the flower portion and paste it onto our document. Name this layer as “flower” and make sure you put this layer below the “model” layer, resize if necessary:

Add the following adjustment layers on the model layer (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option:

Vibrance

Curves

Put the flower layer along with its adjustment layer into a folder, duplicate the folder twice and position them in the location as shown below:

Step 7

Now let’s get into a bit fine-tuning of the image. Firstly, we can take the overall image and see what we could do to improve it:

• adding some abstract patterns would spice things up
• the top of mountain needs some lights so it blends more seamlessly with the jumping man, plus adding depth to the image
• lack of colour, probably good idea to add some adjustment layers

For the first point, we can add a new “mountain lighting” layer on top of all previous layer, grab a soft round white brush and do a single click on the mountain tip as shown below:

Warp this layer so the light follow the shape of the mountain:

Change the blending mode to “overlay”, and duplicate this layer a few times to increase its contrast:

For the second point, we can easily create a new layer just above the background light layer named “abstract pattern”, download some abstract brushsets from sites such as qbrushes.net or brushesszy, and paint away!

I won’t tell you which brushsets I used here because I’d like you to use your own creativity, and not limited by this tutorial.

For the third point, we can add the following adjustment layers on the model layer:

Curves

Colour Balance

and you will have the following effect so far:

Ok that’s pretty much it! I further adjust the colour balance a bit and added some motion blur effect to it. Here is the final result: (click to enlarge)

Of course you can add more texture to it and enhance its details further, totally up to you :)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you enjoy it and learn something new!

Till next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show the processes I took to create this Abstract Colourful, Artistic Feeling Text Effect in Photoshop. The steps are really simple but I think the end result looks good :)  Have a try!

Here is a preview of the final image effect for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

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Ok let’s get started!

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

Font

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200px * 800px, fill the background layer with black, use the font we downloaded and type some texts on the canvas:

On the text layer, apply the follow layer blending options:

Drop Shadow

Inner Shadow

Bevel and Emboss

Gradient Overlay

Stroke

and you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Now we’re into the interesting part of this tutorial. Create a new layer on top of the text layer and name it as “lines outside”, grab a 1px solid brush as shown below:

Use this brush to paint on the edge of every letter on the canvas:

Make sure you paint around the edges:

and this is the overall effect:

Step 3

Now we can add a bit lighting variations to the text. One quick way to do this is to load the selection of the “lines” layer with created in previous step, apply the following Refine Edge options:

Maintain the selection, create a new layer called “refined edge” on top of the “lines” layer, fill the selection with Black color on this new layer:

As you can, we added some dark color to the text. However because of the refined edge option used, the dark colour is not covering the whole text.

Optionally, you can change the blending mode of this refined edge layer to be “Color Burn” – this will reveal the edge lines better than the “Normal” blending mode.

We can also add some blurring effect to the text. To do this, duplicte the “lines” layer once and name the duplicated layer as “motion blur”, put this layer above the original text layer.

Apply the following Motion Blur filter settings to it:

Resize the motion blur layer to roughly the same size of the text layer, and you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Create a new layer on top of all previous layers called “cloud overlay”, and on this new layer,  use the Lasso Tool with a 40px feather to draw a selection around the text:

Render some cloud inside the selection (with white foreground colour and black background colour):

change the blending mode of this cloud layer to “Hard Light”, and you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Now let’s add some colours to the text. Create a new layer called “Colours”, load the selection of the text layer, and grab a soft brush with colours of your choice, paint some colours inside the selection:

Duplicate this colours layer twice, change the layer blending mode according to the below:

and you will have the following effect:

Add the following two adjustment layers on top of the colours layer:

Color Balance

Vibrance

and you will have the following effect:

Create a new layer called “abstract texture” just above the background layer, grab any abstract brushsets you like (you can find lots of them on qbrushes.net or brusheezy) and paint on it. You can adjust the colour of the brush as you paint for some colour variations:

Step 6

We’re almost done! There is one more trick I would like to show you – the Wave Filter. I personally like it very much and sometimes it generates some very unique style for your design.

So flatten the image, duplicate the background layer once and go to Filter > Distort > Wave:

Apply the following settings:

and you will have the following effect:

Now we want to reveal the text part of the image, so add the following layer mask on the wave layer to hide it:

and you will have the following effect:

Lastly, you can add some further colour adjustments, or sharpen the image a bit to get more details out.

and here is my final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you find it useful and learn something new!

Till next time, have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this black and white, dreamy style sureal artwork in Photoshop. Have a try!

If you have been following my tutorials for a while, you will notice that I very rarely publish anything that is black and white – I love colours, but I think sometimes black and white style can produce effect that colour can’t – for example, a sense of dark and gloom.

Here is a preview of the final effect I have for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

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OK let’s get started!

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

Female model

Cliff

Tree

Cloud

Planet

Step 1

Create a new document size 1300px *700px. fill the background layer with black colour. Now let’s start laying the foundation.

Load the “Cliff” image into Photoshop and use the Rectangular Marquee tool to select a portion of the cliff:

copy and paste your selection onto our canvas, resize it and position it as shown below:

Name this layer as “Rock 1″, add a layer mask to it and on the mask, use a soft round brush (20% hardness) to erase the edges of the rock:

As you can see, I erased a large portion of the texture and left only a fraction of it – the reason I did it is because initially it was hard to judge what portion of the texture would be suitable, and I could only experiment with it until I get the right piece.

Add a black and white adjustment layer onto this rock 1 layer:

and you will have the following effect:

Step 2

Now duplicate this Rock 1 layer twice (along with the black and white adjustment layer), name the duplicated layers as “rock 2″ and “rock 3″ respectively. Drag the duplicated layer around and position them to the left and right of the Rock 1 layer, as shown below:

Adjust the mask on those duplicated layer by using a soft eraser to remove the edges, especially the parts where each rock joins together:

Step 3

Now we pretty much finished with the rock texture. Let’s add the tree image onto our canvas. Load the “Tree” stock image into Photoshop, cut out the tree and the grass texture using the following channel mask technique:

(you can use other method if you prefer, but I think channel mask here is the most effective one.)

On the background layer, click on the “Channel” tab on the layer palette, then click on the “Blur” channel (the reason is this channel provides the biggest contrast)

Duplicate this Blue channel once, apply the following Levels adjustment to the duplicated channel:

Use a black brush to fill the area:

Load the selection of this blue copy channel by going into Select > Load selection, then apply the following options then click on “OK”:

Copy and paste the selection onto our document, name the layer as “Tree Right”, resize it and position it as shown below:

Erase the bottom part of the grass with a soft brush:

And the following two adjustment layers to this tree right layer: (make sure you tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Black and white

Curves

Curves Mask

and you will have the following effect:

Duplicate the Tree right layer once along with its adjustment layers (leave all adjustment layers as they are, apart from canceling the layer mask on the Curves adjustment layer). Name the duplicated layer as “tree left”, drag and resize this layer smaller, and position it as shown below:

Step 4

Load the “Female Model” stock image into Photoshop, cut out the model and paste it into the centre of our canvas:

Don’t worry if your selection is not perfect, it doesn’t really matter in this tutorial.

Name this layer as “Model Original”, duplicate it once and go to Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen Edge and apply this filter a few times on the duplicated layer:

As you can see this sharpens all edges of the model – an effect may look horrible right now, but will add extra details as we go deeper into the tutorial.

Duplicate the original model layer once more and drag it above the previous sharpen edge layer, make this layer a clipping mask  to the sharpen edge layer (right-click the layer, then choose “create clipping mask”), reduce the layer opacity to 80%, you will have the following effect:

Add the following image adjustment layers to it: (make sure you tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Curves

Mask:

Levels

Black and White

On the Black and white adjustment layer, use a soft brush eraser to do a single click on the spot where the flower is: (this reveals the flowers, adding a bit of colour to the image)

Duplicate the original model layer once more and drag it above all the adjustment layer, change the blending mode to “hard light” and opacity to 30%, you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Load the “Planet” image into Photoshop, cut out the planet and paste it onto our document. Name this layer as “planet”, resize and position it as shown below:

add the following image adjustment layer to the planet:

Black and White

Curves

We can also add some aura around the planet for more effect. To do this, load the selection of the planet layer (ctrl+left-click the thumbnail of the planet layer on the layer palette), apply the following refine edge option to it:

Create a new layer called “aura” under the plaent layer, render some cloud in it:

Duplicate this aura layer once, then use the Warp Tool (Ctrl + T then right-click choose warp) to manipulate it so it looks like dropping down from the planet:

Step 6

Load th “Sky” image into Photoshop, copy a portion of it and paste it onto our document, above all previous layers. Resize the layer and position it as shown below: (Erase the Edge with a soft eraser, if necessary)

Add the following two adjustment layers to it:

Black and White

Curves

Optional: it would be good to add variety onto the image by applying more cloud texture. Make sure you black and white them as you add them in:

Step 7

Now we’re getting into an interest part of the tutorial. As you can see the image so far looks ok, but it lacks that surreal, dreamy sort of effect. So to enhance those effect, we can use cloud warping, especially on the area just above the ground, below the model.

To do this, create a new layer above the last duplicated Model layer, use the Lasso Tool with 50% feather to draw a selection on this layer, render some cloud in it:

Then use the warp tool, manipulate the cloud as shown below:

You can them duplicate and re-size this cloud layer for more effect:

I also added some abstract brush effect on the background, mixing it with the Warp Tool for more effect: (There are tons of brushsets on qbrushes.net, or brusheezy that will do the job)

This is the overall effect so far:

Step 8

We’re almost done! In the last fine-tuning step, I add the following Reduce Noise Filter to make the image smoother:

with the following layer mask:

and this is the final effect: (click to enlarge)

That’s it for this tutorial! Hope you find it useful and learn something new!

Till next time, have a nice day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the processes I used to create this really cool, fantasy style floating Mountain Scene in Photoshop. This is an intermediate level tutorial and some steps can be tricky, but why not have a try!

Here is a a preview of the final effect: (click to enlarge)

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OK let’s get started!

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

Grass Hilltop

Sky 1

Sky 2

River

Mountain

Girl

Ok let’s get started!

Step 1

create a new document sized 1000px * 1500px, leave the background layer colour as white. Load the Grass Hilltopinto Photoshop, use the Rectangular Marquee Tool to select a portion of the image – when you make the selection, make sure you select a piece where it contain both sky and the grass, as shown below:

Copy and paste the selection onto our docuemnt, name this layer as “Grass land” and resize it to fit the width of our document, with roughly about half of the height:

As you can see we leave a large portion the upper area for the sky, personally I think this will help later on when we add more objects on the sky and make the image look deeper.

Add the following two adjustment layer on top the grass land layer:

Curves

Mask

Black and White (Set blending mode to “Hard Light”)

and you will have the following effect so far:

Step 2

Load the “River” stock image into Photoshop, use the the Lasso tool with a 20px feather, cut out the river portion of the image, and paste it on to our document to the position as shown below:

Hint: use the Free Transform tool (Ctrl + T) to resize and distort the image if necessary. Use the eraser tool with a soft brush tip to erase the edges so it blends into the image with the grass background.

Name this layer as “river”, add the following Curves adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Here is the effect so far:

You can see by adding a simple adjustment layer, we make the river portion blend into the grass texture and as a result, it would be easier for us to edit the image later on when needed.

Step 3

Load the Sky 1 image into Photoshop, select the upper portion the image and copy it onto our document, name this new layer as “sky 1″:

Use the Warp Tool (Ctrl + T, then right-click to choose Warp) to drag the right bottom edge lower so it links with the grass texture:

Add the following mask to this Sky 1 layer:

and you will have the following effect:

As you can see, I dug a hole on the sky so that I can add the mountain texture under it.

Load the Sky 2 texture into Photoshop, copy and paste the entire image onto our document and put this layer above the previous Sky 1 layer. Resize and position it as shown below:

Rename this layer as “Sky 2″ and right-click the layer on the layer palette, choose “create clipping mask”, also erase the bottom edge on this sky 2 layer so it blends with the Sky 1 layer:

add the following 3 adjustment layers on top of the Sky 2 layer (make sure to tick “use previous layer as clipping mask” option):

Curves

Black and White (blend mode set to “Hard Light”, opacity to 40%)

Color Balance

and you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Load the “mountain” texture into Photoshop, select the lower portion of the image, copy and paste onto our document. Name the layer as “mountain” and put this layer under the “Sky 1″ layer: (Resize the layer to a smaller size)

As you can see, because we previously added the mask on the Sky 1 layer, this mountain layer will therefore be visible. You can of course reveal a different portion of the mountain by simply moving the mountain layer left or right, that’s totally up to you.

Add the following two adjustment layer to this mountain layer:

Curves

Colour Balance

and you will have the following effect:

Step 5

I feel the bottom part of the image looks a bit dark and boring, so I decided to add a thin layer of fog/air flow to it.

To do this, we simply use the “Sky 1″ image, select a portion of the image as shown below:

Copy and paste the selection onto our document, name this new layer as “fog” and put it above all previous layers, desaturate it and apply the following motion blur to it:

Position this layer on top of the grass and river section of the image:

erase the top edge with a soft brush, change the blending mode to “Vivid Light”. Duplicate this layer once and change the blending mode of the duplicated layer to “Screen”, opcacity to 30%, you will have the following effect:

Step 6

Load the “Lady” image into Photoshop, cut out the girl image from the background with whatever method you prefer (I used the Quick Selection Tool here, with a 3px brush tip), paste it onto our document.

Name this layer as “Girl” and put it above all previous layer, resize and position it as shown below:

Create a new layer under the girl layer, use a very small soft brush (3px), paint some shadow under the girl and slighly to the left:

Add the following two adjustment layer on top of the girl layer:

Color Balance

Curves

By doing so we adjust the lighting of the girl to be similar to her surrounding:

Also we can create a new layer on top of all other layers, grab an abstract/fractal brushset from qbrushes.net or brusheezy.com, paint around the mountain to create some misty effect: (adjust the layer opacity to around 30%)

and you will have this overall effect so far:

Step 7

OK we’re almost there! There is one more trick I would like to show you here. You might remeber on the preview I have a abstract line bursting from the top of the mountain. Here I will show you how I did this effect.

We flatten the image, duplicate the background layer once, find the Twirl Filter under the Filter menu and apply the following settings:

Hit Ctrl + F 2 or 3 more times, you will have the following effect:

Use a big soft brush to erase the bottom portion of the duplicated twirl layer and leave only the top bits, as shown below: (Drop the layer opacity to 70%)

That’s pretty much it for this tutorial! I further adjusted the color balance a bit and sharpen the image, and here is my final effect:

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and find it useful! Thanks and have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Hot and Sparkling, Firery Text Effect in Photoshop. Have a try!

The point I would like to emphasise in the totorial is how you can achive great result by simply mixing the layer blending options and apply various filter effects.

Here is a preview of the final image for this toturial: (click to enlarge)

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OK let’s get started!

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

Font

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200px * 600px, fill the background layer with black colour and create a new layer on top of it, grab a soft round white brush and do a single click on the position as shown below:

Resize this new layer with the Ctrl + T free transform tool to the lower half of the canvas, as shown below:

Name this layer as “back light bottom” and reduce the opacity around 20%, duplicate this layer once and move the duplicated layer up a bit, increase the opacity of the duplicated layer to 40%, we’ll have the following layered effect:

Step 2

Use the font we downloaded, type some texts on top of the previous layers, a shown below:

Apply the following layer blending options to this layer:

Drop Shadow

Inner Shadow

Outer Glow

Inner Glow

Bevel and Emboss

Contour

Color Overlay

Stroke

And you will  have the following effect so far:

Step 3

Now we have the base text, let’s add some sparkles around the text. You may achieve this effect through filters but I prefer using a dynamic brush. Let’s grab a 3px soft brush, apply the following brush dynamics to it:

Shape Dynamics

Scattering

Save the brushset as we will be using it later on in the tutorial.

Now let’s create a new layer called “sparks” and use this brushset and paint  some dots around the text, as shown below:

Let’s spice up the effect by adding some motions into the text. Duplicate the “sparks” layer once, apply the following motion blur settings to it:

And you will have the following effect so far:

You can see so far we have just laying the fundation of the text effect. We will be adding more effect to it in the next few steps to touch things up.

Step 4

Create a new layer on top of all other layers called “cloud”, load the selection of the original text layer by Ctrl + left-clicking the thumbnail image on the layer palette of the text layer.

Render some cloud inside the selection on the new layer via the cloud filter:

Change the blending mode of the new cloud layer to “linear light” and drop the opacity to 80%, add the following layer mask to it:

And you will have the following effect so far:

Now here is an interesting trick: create a new layer called “cloud overlay”, firstly we render the whole layer with cloud, as shown below:

Then we use the free transform tool to resize this cloud overlay layer to around the same size as the text layer:

Change the blending mode of the cloud overlay light to “Pin Light” and drop the opacity to 50%, duplicate it once and you will have the following effect:

Step 5

Now we add a new color balance adjustment layer to give the text some colour boost, with the following settings:

And you will have the following effect so far:

You can see by simply adding a new adjustment layer, we give the text a great look (not yet finished, though).

Step 6

Now we can create a new layer on top of the two background bottom light layers, call the layer “dots” and use the custom brushset we made for the sparkles in Step 3, adjust the brush tip size to be a bigger one, keep the colour as White, paint some small dots around the text:

You can always paint some big dots (with a lower flow and opacity settings), as shown below:

You can see because of the colour balance adjustment layer we used, those dots will become red hot automatically.

Step 7

Now we can add some more splashing effect to the text. Remember we created a “Sparkle” layer below with tiny dots? We can duplicate that layer once, apply the following Radial Blur settings to the duplicated layer:

On the same layer, apply the following “Add noise” filter to it:

Resize the layer to a smaller size and position it to the centre:

Duplicate this layer a few more times, move the duplicated layer around, resize them to various shapes for variety, and you will have the following effect:

Step 8

We’re nearly there! We can flatten the image first (remember to save the layered one in a seperate file in case you want to go back), duplicate the background layer twice.

On the first duplicated layer, apply the following Smart Sharpen Filter to it:

On the second duplicate layer, apply the following

and the following mask to it:

and you will have the following final effect: (click to enlarge)

Ok that’s it for this tutorial! Of course you can alter the colour and add more effect it. Experiment and practices make you better.

Till next time, have a great day!

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Epic, Sci-Fi Sytle Urban City Scene (Montage) in Photoshop, by utilising a few simple photo manipulation tricks. Have a try!

Here is a preview of the final image for this tutorial: (click to enlarge)

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Ok let’s get started!

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

Ground

City

Cloud Right

Cloud Left

Cloud Overlay

Girl

Watercolor Brushes

Step 1

Create a new document sized 1200px * 1200px, fill the background layer with Black colour. Load the Ground stock image into Photoshop, select the lower half of the image with the Rectangular Marquee Tool, as shown below:

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas, as shown below:

Erase the top edges of the texture, as shown below:

Name this layer as “Ground”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 2

Load the City texture into Photoshop, select the building portion of the image as shown below:

Don’t worry if the selection is not precise, this is not important in this tutorial.

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas, resize and position the new layer as shown below:

Now we want to hide certain portion of the city building. So we can add the following mask to this city building layer:

As you can see, here we not only used a soft round brush, but also the Watercolor Brushes we downloaded before for the edges of the building, plus a feathered rectangular marquee tool:

and here is the effect after the masking:

Name this layer as “City”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

and here is the effect so far:

Step 3

Load the Cloud Right stock image into Photoshop, copy the entire image, and paste it onto our canvas.

Put the new layer below the “City” layer, resize and position the new layer as shown below:

Add the following layer mask to this cloud layer:

Name this layer as “Cloud Right”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Duplicate this cloud right layer once, apply the following motion blur to the duplicated layer:

This will smoothen the cloud and add a bit more motion into the image.

Apply the same black and white adjustment layer as depicted in the original cloud right layer to the duplicated layer, reduce the opacity of the duplicate to around 40%, you will have the following effect:

Step 4

Load the Cloud Left texture image into Photoshop. Select a portion of texture with Lasso Tool (50px feather) as shown below:

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas, put the layer above the “Cloud Right” layer, but below the “City” layer, resize it as shown below:

Erase the excessive portion with a soft brush as shown below:

Name this layer as “Cloud Left”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

here is the effect so far:

Step 5

Load the Girl texture image into Photoshop. Use the Lasso Tool to make a selection around the girl and the snake, as shown below: (set feather to 40px)

Copy and paste the selection onto our canvas, put the new layer above all other layers, resize and position it as shown below:

Name this layer as “Girl”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

and here is the effect so far:

Step 6

Load the Cloud Overlay texture image into Photoshop, copy and paste the entire image onto our canvas, as shown below:

Name this layer as “Cloud overlay”, apply the following Black and White adjustment layer to it: (make sure to tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” option)

Change the blending mode of this layer to “Screen” and opacity to 30%, you will have the following effect:

Cloud overlay is a perfect way to add lighting dynamics and increase the depth for your image. Experiment with it and you will find it very useful when it comes to add extra flavor to your design.

Step 7

Now we pretty much set the overall layout for this city scene. Now we add some more contrast and colour onto it to make it look sci-fi.

Add the following adjustment layers (and their relevant masks) on top of all layers:

Curves

Mask

Attention: for the following 2 colour balance adjustment layer, use the watercolour brushset on the mask for more painting and realistic effect.

Colour Balance Right (set blending mode to “soft light”)

Mask

Colour Balance Rest of the image

Mask

Levels

Mask

and here is the effect so far:

Step 8

We’re nearly finished! I decided to add more contrast to the left side of the image, especially on the left edge of the high-rise in the centre. So I further added the following two adjustment layers:

Hue and Saturation

Mask

Brightness and Contrast

Mask

and here is the effect so far:

You can see now the building is highlighted and as a result, the image has more lighting depth.

Step 9

I feel the right side of the image is a bit boring compare with the left. So I create a new layer on top the background layer, and use the water colour brush to paint some textures on the centre right portion, beneath the buildings:

And you will have the following effect as a result:

That’s it for this tutorial! I sharpen the image with the “Reduce Noise” filter and add some abstract lines on the girl, and here is my final result: (click to enlarge)

Lastly, I would like to stress that you will find the “Black and White” filter and the “Water Colour” style brushsets will be extremely useful when it comes to photo manipulation. Experiment with them :)

Till next time, have a great day!