Day 303: Halloween Poster

Fun stuff for Halloween.

Tutorial link

Day 302: Abstract Texture Background

I combined several textures together to create the background. I applied a gradient map to my "stamped" copy of all layers. I used Pixel Bender to twirl a black rectangle to make the abstract swoosh. I copied the background into the swoosh and inverted the colors then applied an inner shadow. Dropping a soft light vignette and the script font completed the design.

Day 301: Light Text

One of my students turned me on to this tutorial. The steps were a bit hard to follow and I ended up spending way too much time trying to find a font and position the radial blur in the right spot.Not a bad effect but I think the text needs more variations in its height in order to get a a better "burst effect". I dropped in a grungy text and dropped the opacity to create a film grain type of effect without using the filter.

Tutorial link

Day 300: Fake 300

The tutorial I "followed" was rather weak. I used the basic idea for inspiration and then went off in my own direction. I found several cloud images and used channel selections to make various layers of clouds. I used the dust and scratch filter to distort the image. Heavy use of color range combined with adjustment layers and additional filters applied to the other portions of the image created the other effects.

Day 299: Faux Movie Poster

A simple grid design with a cardboard texture in the middle combined with some text variations of HelveticaNeue  and a few layer styles for the title and the "actor" text boxes.

Tutorial link

Day 298: Text Displacement Map

I started by making a displacement map of the image (but first I burned the areas around his eyes, brow, hands and arms). I then added text using a cool dummy text generator called Blind Text Generator. I masked out everything but his face, hands, arms and rosary and changed the blending mode to overlay. I duplicated this layer, inverted the selection and masked everything except the shoulders, chest, eyes and rosary. I applied a gaussian blur and changed the blending mode to subtract. I created a 50% grey layer above everything and applied a 105mm Lens flare and set the blending mode to Linear light and erased the parts of the lens flare that went over his forehead. I dropped an old paper texture on top and masked out his fingernails and eyes and changed the blending mode to Soft Light. I finished off by creating a soft black vignette to frame the image. Wow, that was easier said than done :)

Day 297: Photoshop Lesson Answer Keys

Since I've completely retooled the introductory Photoshop lessons for my class I also needed to create new answer keys to grade them. Rather than use hand scribbled notes I decided to step it up a notch and do a  consistent layout. Not necessarily "Photoshop beauty" but the functionality and consistency are nice

Day 296: Rusted Displacement

I created the jagged edges by using a displacement map. I then added a simple bevel and emboss with a thin size, set to Chisel hard to make the jagged edge pop out. I spent some time trying various metal backgrounds, experimented with a lens blur and added various gradient maps but ultimately decided that black helped make the text pop off of the background. I blended two other textures together and then cranked up the blacks in a levels adjustment do give it some background interest without distracting from the text.

Day 295: Serra Football

Another grunged look applied to our Serra football coaches.

Day 294: Coach Grunge

Before and after.

Way too many random effects to describe.

Day 293: Bleached and Grungy

Before and After

Layer 1: Image
Layer 2 & 3: Duplicated image, desaturated each one, set one to overlay, one to softlight and lowered the opacity on each
Layer 4: Hue Saturation Adjustment Layer... lowered saturation by 20%
Layer 5: Levels adjustment... lowered midtone on Blue, raised Midtone on Red
Layer 6: 50 Grey Fill set to overlay... added 12% noise
Layer 7: Stamped layer
Layer 8: High pass filter on duplicated of stamped layer set to softlight
Layer 9: Brightness/Contrast Adjustment... increased contrast
Layer 10: Grungy brushes
Layer 11: Fabric grunge center white set to soft light
Layer 12: Stamped layer
Layer 13: High pass filter of stamped layer.

Sheesh!

Day 292: Ice Queen

 Before and After

One layer filled with white, set to overlay and 25% opacity with a mask grouped with another layer filled with white set to color and 50% opacity. I duplicated this group eight times and then painted out the eyes and lips on each of the nine layer masks. I added a curves adjustment layer and created a copy of the all layers into one layer. I applied an unsharpen mask and then a gaussian blur set to 15 to this "stamped" layer. I masked the layer and painted the skin to soften the effect. I added white to the eyes to clean them up a bit.

Day 291: Bird Dog

Unnatural Hybrid...

Day 290: Matt

A picture of my friend Matt.

Day 289: Fine Art Barney

Gallery worthy? I think so... but I might be bias... at least a bit :)

Day 288: Magazine Cover

Here is a faux magazine cover using a picture of my friend Stacy. I created a halftone pattern and set it to overlay, masked out her hair on the top and left side to appear over the text. I had way too much fun coming up with the article names.

Day 287: Football Grunge

Our Varsity Football team won it's first league game against Hoover today. During warmups a coach set down two balls in the endzone. I snapped a picture  before they started using them. The photo effect was created using a Black and White adjustment layer, a set of grain on a layer set to soft light, a high pass filter for sharpening and a set of grungy edges and fabric texture overlays.

Day 286: Water Splashes

Interesting effect although a bit time consuming. The water brushes are high res and quite nice. I'm sure I'll find another use for them in something else.

Tutorial link

Day 285: Romi's Flyer

Friends of mine are opening a fantastic soft-serve shop in Normal Heights and needed a flyer.

Day 284: AVID club Posters

I helped create some posters to promote the AVID club on campus.

Day 283: Yearbook T-Shirts

Here is the rough draft of the yearbook T-shirt design.

Day 281-282: Photoshop Basics

I'm in the process of retooling my entire Photoshop ciriculumn for my CGD class. In doing so I've had to rework and create quite a few lessons. I've finished the first 15 tutorials and this collage show the main pieces. Of course I had to add some sort of texture to it (I have way too much fun "grunging" up the images).

Day 280: Light Text

Don't follow these steps. I didn't take the time to trace the fonts because I didn't have a script font that connected from letter to letter. The steps were poorly written ( I should have been clued in early by the title - "create-light-text-for-easily"

I deviated quite a bit from the tutorial. Not a bad result but a bad path to get there.

Day 279: Anniversary Card

Here is the anniversary card I made for my wife this year. It's a picture from our wedding trip to Hawaii.

Day 278: Flowing Dress

Before and After

I'm not really sure how I feel about this one. I started out with problems trying to extract the woman and the dress from the background. As I added more and more stuff to her the less I liked it. Ah well.

Day 277: Wooden Facebook Icon

I really enjoyed working with this one. I spent way too much time finding a wood texture and trying to get the cracks to look right. Overall I'm pleased with the effect however the two large black lines in the middle of the f are a bit too distracting. Ah well. However, I love the edge layer style on the rounded rectangle.

Tutorial link

Day 276: Melting Mouse

A really simple but effect technique. The steps were easy to follow and relatively easy to do.

Tutorial link

Day 275: Yearbook Facebook Ad

I'm trying to get the word out that Yearbook has a Facebook page so I created a flyer to spread around campus. We'll see how it works out.

Day 274: Recycling Flyer

Here is a flyer I created for Kearny Office Park for a recycling event they are putting on for their tenants.

Day 273: Burned paper

I used the same techniques as yesterday but this time on old paper. I added a high pass filter (it's one of my current favorites) and a vignette on the edges.