Create Stone Face Wrapped by Tree Roots in Photoshop

In this tutorial, I will show you the steps I took to create this Stone Face Wrapped by Tree Roots in Photoshop. This effect looks complicated but it’s in fact easy to create. You do need have some knowledge of image adjustments and layer blending.

We will apply the stone texture onto the face first, then work on the tree roots. We will finalise the effect with lighting and cloud effect.

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

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

Face by Random-Acts-Stock

Stone

Tree Root

Step 1

Note: If you’re having difficulty with applying stone texture in this step, please have a look at this video tutorial below:

Create a new document sized 800px * 1132px with white blackground. Grab the Gradient Fill tool and set its option to be “Radial Gradient”, and fill the background layer with colours as shown below:

Load the model image into Photoshop and copy out the facial area. Paste it to our document and re-size the layer and position it as the canvas centre. Use a soft eraser to face the edges as shown below:

Apply the following image adjustment layers as clipping mask to the face layer:

Black and White

Levels

Curves

Load the stone texture into Photoshop and select the following portion:

Copy and paste the selection to our document, resize the new layer to roughly the size of the face, then set it as clipping mask to the layer below:

Use a soft eraser to remove part of the stone off the top:

Apply the following black and white adjustment layer as shown below:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 2

Load the tree root stock image into Photoshop. Select a piece of the tree root as shown below:

Then copy and paste the selection to our document. Re-size and attach it to the face bottom left. Use a soft eraser to remove the edge to it blends into the face. Depending on your selection above, your result might be different to mine:

Use a hard brush, remove parts of the roots as shown below:

Apply the following adjustment layers as clipping masks to the tree root layer:

Black and White

Levels

and here is the effect so far:

Repeat the above process, add another tree root on the top:

Step 3

We will add some stone texture in the background. Select another piece of stone from the stock image:

Copy and paste the selection, place it below the face layer, and use a soft eraser to fade it as shown below:

Apply the following black and white adjustment to this stone layer:

Add some more stone texture below the face layer – this time put it around the forehead:

and here is the effect so far:

Step 4

We can use a cloud brush to paint some cloud/smoke effect behind the face to add some dynamics to the image:

Use a particle brush to paint some particles around the face:

Step 5

In this final step, we will add some touch-ups to the image. Create a new layer and use a soft white brush to paint some lighting effect around the cheek/lips area:

Create a new layer and paint some cloud around with a cloud brush:

Add the following adjustment layers on top:

Levels

Curves

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

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