Photoshopping Beauty

My skill in photoshop largely is from messing around with it, supplemented by a few videos and online tutorials. I have had no official training.

But, in designing these book covers, I’m starting to see how easy it really is to just touch up the odd blemish here and there, improve what someone looks like.

In my case, it’s the removal of shadows caused by bad lighting, and a few spots that Taylor asked me to ‘please get rid of’, rather than enhancing to the state of making something that isn’t there.

But it’s making me see why the magazines do it. And why they really shouldn’t.

Taylor, who is beautiful all the time.

New Look Blog

So I decided it was time for a new look. As I’m starting to think seriously about publishing, I want to gear the blog a bit more towards being a platform for my writing, rather than just a place where I babble. There will still be babbling for some time yet, but I’m starting with the look.

The banner above is my first attempt at manipulating a photograph taken yesterday – photos that will eventually become front covers for the books I’m hoping to publish. It is, those of you who have been following the blog for a while (or who read the last post) may recognise, Taylor, posing as Cadence, the main character of my book. She is, in my cousin’s words, a ‘ninja police officer.’ Okay, maybe not so much the ninja part. But she does have a flaming sword. Making the fire was hard.

As I get closer to being ready to publish, I’ll post a bit more about the characters and stories on here, but for now, I hope the new look is good, and for those interested – here is the original picture:

No tutorial for this one. I honestly can’t remember what I did and forgot to save my ‘stage by stage’ pictures anyway. When I get round to making the front covers, I will endeavour to be better.

P.S. Photo taken by the very talented (and generous of her time and talents!) Kirsty Warner.

MYWYN Week Three?

So much for my weekly update post. Been so busy actually writing, I’ve not caught up with the blog for a while.

So, things are going okay. Due to an exceptionally busy past few days, I’m something like 3000 words behind, but I’ve been spending my spare moments getting better acquainted with some characters – particularly a very complex character who has just met up with some of the other major characters. She’s a character with two distinctly different sides. On the one hand, she’s a nice girl who cares about her friends and would do anything to look after them, but on the other hand, that ‘anything’ stretches to some pretty dodgy things. Within a few pages of her first appearance, she’s been arrested for the seventeenth time.

While perusing the internet, I came across this list of grunge brushes and, after spending forever downloading most of them, I had to try them out. I often make photoshopped pictures of characters to help me remember what they look like and get to know them a bit better, so I decided to do so for this character, attempting to represent her two sides with some grungy brushes. Then, because I was having so much fun, I decided to do one for a character who doesn’t even feature (beyond a brief mention) in the book I’m writing for the MYWYN project, but would play a major role in the sequel (if I ever make it that far).

Here are the original images:

And here are the finished images:

Demonstrating her softer side, this is Caitlin as she would normally appear…

…and this is Cait in kick-ass mode. (Okay, the gun is a bit of a stretch, but after photoshopping out the unconscious men, I got a bit bored of fighting with my dodgy clone stamp brush – it doesn’t work very well on my copy of photoshop for some reason)

And lastly, a very vampy looking Katherine, who, as I said, isn’t even in the first book really. But the flower grunge brushes that I downloaded were just crying out for black and red sexy background making.

To put these together I mostly used layering of various different grunge brushes, with some clone stamping to remove unconscious blokes and a bit of hair and eye colour tampering. Katherine’s lipstick involved a bit of colour manipulation. To get the backgrounds not to cover up the people, it was a case of layering and careful application of the eraser brush. Which takes a very, very long time. Especially when your photoshop is equally unfond of the eraser brush as it is of the clone stamp brush. All in all though, I’m very pleased with the results. And with that procrastination over, I should probably get back to actually writing…

Word Count: 18,000

Quote: ‘Young lady, from this impressive record in front of me, I would say that you are more than familiar with your rights.’

The Weekend Creation: The National Memorial Arboretum

A colleague of mine was talking about visiting the National Memorial Arboretum the other day, which reminded me of the time I spent there. It was a freezing, blustery day, spent trekking round the acres of memorial’s with a couple of friends. I wouldn’t say I enjoyed it, it’s not the sort of place you enjoy, but I have a strong, lasting memory of it.

When I overheard my colleague talking about it, I had to look up the photos I took while I was there. I took a whole load and photoshopped them so they were black and white, except for any red, to tie in with the theme of remembrance, particularly Remembrance Sunday.

I’m a shoddy photographer, so excuse the poor quality of the photos. I just hope I captured a sense of the solemn ambiance of the place.

Photoshop: Portal To Another Dimension

Ivy: Liiiiiiiib, I’m pitching a sci-fi tv series as part of my course and it would really help if I had a picture of a PORTAL TO ANOTHER DIMENSION!

Er, where to start…

Haha, it’s actually a lot easier than it sounds. Abstract always is. It’s trying to make realistic looking things that’s tricky.

So, I chatted with Ivy, who told me ‘it has to be purpley/blue’ and ‘a bit like that whispy stuff that is left behind in that Jumper film, but slightly more tangible.’ Oookay…

I have seen Jumper, but pretty much all I remember was Hayden Christensen. Who I don’t rate as an actor, but I find very attractive. Until he talks. I wasn’t paying too much attention to whispy stuff…

So, in the interest of not wasting too much time, I made a mock up in five minutes using a glitter brush and the ‘liquidise’ tool.

After sending to Ivy, who confirmed I was roughly on the right lines, I decided to have a proper go. This took about 15 minutes and was really good fun to make:

 

A little bit better than the 5 minute job! Here’s how I made it.

The Starting Point

Probably the simplest starting point ever. A black square. 500×500 in its original size to give me plenty of space to work with.

The first thing I had to do was make a second layer over the black background so later, when I start editing the colours so they go swirly and portal to another dimension-y the black stays separate and the colours stay crisp. All my editing in the following stages takes place on that second layer.

Stage 1

Once again using brushes made by the wonderful Obsidian Dawn (seriously check out their stuff, they’re amazing) this time the Glitter Brush Set, I selected a nice dark blue colour and layered three or four of the different glitter brushes over each other.

I wasn’t really trying to create any specific pattern or style as I knew later I would be blurring the whole thing into a big swirly circle, but I wanted to get lots of texture to the initial picture.

Stage 2

Next up was purple. I chose quite a bright purple, as this was meant to be sci-fi rather than calming lavender. The hearts look a bit rubbish at this stage, but I love how they turned out in the final picture.

Again, it was all about building up texture, so I used random brushes (all from the glitter set) and just printed them on in random places. I could make this again using different combinations and would get a slightly different end product, but it’s all pretty much working towards the same thing.

Stage 3

Now it was pink’s turn. Ivy only specified bluish-purple, but I added pink because it highlights the other two colours nicely. I thought it would be a bit of a dark portal, particularly against the black background, if it didn’t have a bit of pink.

Also, this is the only time I used a specific brush in a specific place. I did the random glitter attack for a couple of different brushes, then used the firework1 brush for that central burst.

Stage 4

Next I used the filter>blur>radial blur tool to turn my glitter explosion into a spinning wheel of pink and purple. I set the spin to 32 (not specifically, that’s just where it landed as I scrolled through the preview until I saw a look I liked) which gave it a soft enough blur to still have some definition, but enough so it looked nice and round. And portal-y.

I then set the history brush to the action before the radial blur so I could return just a little more definition to the portal.

Stage 5

After turning the opacity and flow of the history brush roughly half way, I started tracing round the edges to give the outside of the portal a few errant sparkles, like it was made of them and they came away at the edges.

I also gave the firework in the middle a bit more definition, trying to bring out the sense that it was something you went into. I was careful to avoid touching the very central bit, as I wanted this to remain extra swirly, like that was the most powerful bit of the portal. Or, you know, because it looks kind of cool that way.

Stage 6

Next, I turned the flow on the history brush way down to 10% and traced some lines, both straight and wavy, from the outside of the portal into the centre. You can barely see it, but I thought it made it look a bit more like something you were supposed to walk into, not just a random swirl on a page.

It’s a bit like everything is sucking into the middle now. Or at least, that was the look I was going for.

Final Stage

After that I sent it to Ivy, who said she wanted the pink toning down a bit. I used the image>adjustments>replace colour tool, selecting the bright pink in the middle and just turned down the darkness so it all went a bit more purple.

I also attacked the pink dots at the top with the blur tool, just because I didn’t like them and thought they stood out too much. They were easy to smudge into the background.

And there you have it! How to make a portal to another dimension in seven easy steps.

All photos are linked to their original file if you want to view any of the stages at full size.

Want something making? Leave me a comment and I’ll see what I can do!

A Banner For QWERTY Mum

So, after my recent experiments with Photoshop – which reminded me how much I enjoyed using it – I offered my assistance to other bloggers in the family. If they could provide me with a photo and a general idea of what they wanted, I would endeavour to make them a banner for their blogs.

First up for the photoshop treatment was QWERTY Mum. We discussed her vision whilst in the sauna at the gym, and though she was going to go away and think about it, she had mentioned a couple of photos and I found I had a spare five minutes, so I gave it a go, creating as close an approximation to what I thought she wanted. After going back and forth a few times we reached a picture we were both happy with:

The Starting Point

This is a photo taken during the preparation photoshoot for QWERTY Mum’s wedding. Both she and her husband love dancing, and have got the boyfriend and I into it too, so it seemed appropriate to use this one, which captures a sense of her grace, beauty and interests. Plus it has a nice plain-ish floor I can replicate easily when I stretch it to be banner shaped!

But mostly the first three reasons…

Stage 1

First off I flipped the picture horizontally, as I wanted the words to the left where the eye would naturally look on QWERTY Mum’s blog.

Second, I used the crop tool to trim down the height and extend the edges to make it a little more banner shaped. At this stage I wasn’t being any more specific about pixel dimensions than eye judgement. The background colour was set to the colour of the floor using the eyedropper tool.

Stage 2

Because I knew I was writing over the left side, I wasn’t too careful about replicating the floor – just using the clone stamp tool to copy it very quickly. I did copy over the second chair and the table to make the background more plain.

I then used a fading eraser to soften the edges. I also used the blur tool to blur the tiles a little bit.

Stage 3

Next I added the writing. The keyboard font I downloaded from here, the other I can’t find, but again, it was one I downloaded a long time ago, if it wasn’t one of the default photoshop fonts.

I wrote the type in white originally. To get the QWERTY to show up white against the black keys, I had to flatten the image so all layers combined (once I was happy with the positioning) then, using the colour select tool, lower the darkness of all the white to black. Then, using the history brush (set to the flatten image stage) I returned all the darkened whites to their original white, being careful to avoid the black keys. With a carefully selected size brush, I returned the letters to white, leaving the black keys as they were.

Stage 4

After Stage 3 I sent the banner to QWERTY Mum for her approval. She wanted the colour to be toned down a bit and her tagline put on. Using the colour replace tool, I selected the orange and desaturated it a little, turning the fuzziness up until the whole floor was covered evenly.

The font for th e tagline is Mom’s Typewriter, downloaded from here. Once I’d included the tagline on the picture, I had to crop the picture down at the top to make it look more symmetrical. Which I wouldn’t have had to do if I hadn’t accidentally closed the .psd file with the layers on it without saving. D’oh.

Final Stage

After a second consultation with QWERTY Mum, she said she wanted a black border and rounded corners. At this stage I thought to ask about pixel size (I learn from my mistakes!) and found my banner about 30px short in width.

To round the corners of the original picture, I created a new layer and drew a rounded rectangle shape across the picture. When I had the new shape over it perfectly, I lowered its opacity to zero and clicked paths>make selection. I then clicked edit>copy merged and pasted the newly rounded picture onto a black background that was set to the right size of 860px width, with about 30px extra height to make it symmetrical.

I repeated the process for the new picture, setting the corner radius a little higher so the corners appeared more rounded and pasting it onto a transparent background so the automatically square/rectangle photoshop file doesn’t show up beyond the nice rounded edges I’d just created!

And there you have it

EDIT: So, you can have a transparent background in photoshop, but when you upload the photo the corners are automatically turned white. How annoying. I remember having this problem before now. With a bit of shuffling, QWERTY Mum found a new layout with a solid coloured background and by using the hexadecimal code for the colour (that’s the #fffffff number – that one is white, the letters and numbers vary by colour) to find the same colour in photoshop, it was just a case of colouring the corners in to make them blend into the background when the new final photo is uploaded!

And here it is (again!):

All pictures are linked to their original images if you want to view them full size!

P.S. If anyone else would like me to make them something, leave a comment!

How To Turn Your Sister Into A Fairy In Nine Easy Steps

I’ve always enjoyed a bit of photomanipulation. Ever since my fanfiction days, I’ve used photoshop to make banners for my stories. It’s been a while since I last had a go, so I teamed up with willing volunteer, my little sister Taylor (who has her own blog here) to take a few photos for my story series on the blog.

Here is the finished result:

It took a lot of playing around to get the starter image to this final banner.

The Starting Point

This was the original image. Now, I’m not the best photographer, and the boyfriend has already pointed out that it looks a little like she only has one leg, but I think we both did quite well given the conditions.

I always wanted the photo to be taken against a plain brick wall. Easier said than done – the only part of our house that has a plain brick wall is next to the pond… First we had to drag some giant bags of garden waste out of the way, then I had to teeter on the edge of the pond, crouching uncomfortably to get the best angle. Poor Taylor had to stand for ages in my shoes and wind blowing a gale before I deemed I had enough photos that surely, by law of averages, one would be good enough!

Stage 1

In hindsight, I should have moved the fishing nets on the floor, as the first thing I did was photoshop them out, but oh well.

Using the clone stamp tool I covered over the poles of the fishing nets with another section of the stone tile. It looks a bit obvious at first, but later on when all the other effects are added it won’t stand out quite so much.

The hardest bit to do was getting the crack between the two tiles vaguely straight. Again, it was a bit obvious it had been tampered with at first, but it was close enough to not be noticed later.

I decided to leave the bit of wood in, as I quite liked how it broke up the brick wall and looked a bit gritty. Incidentally, I have no idea why there is a random bit of wood nailed to our wall.

Stage 2

After I’d finished getting rid of the nets, I cropped the photo so the bit of windowframe on the left side was cut out.

This had the double advantage of making the wall look vaguely symmetrical and also cutting off a section of the tile with the most nets on. It was harder to make that tile look realistic with the clone stamp tool because of the ratio of net to tile.

It still doesn’t look great in this picture, but being right in the corner means it’s not the first place someone would look anyway.

So, with Taylor’s background all sorted, the next stage was to turn her into a fairy…

Stage 3

I used a photoshop brush to give Taylor her fairy wings. The brush was from a set called SS Fairy Wings which I downloaded from here. It’s a really pretty set with many different types of wings, but these were my favourites. I liked how soft they looked!

I lowered the flow and opacity of my brush so the wings came out translucent rather than an opaque blob, then printed them over the top of Taylor.

The photo wasn’t quite big enough to contain all of the wings at the size I’d set them at, but I was happy with the amount of wing showing and didn’t really want to make them any smaller.

Stage 4

Now my fairy has wings – just need to make them look like they are behind her, not in front of her.

Setting the history brush tool to the stage before the drawing the wings on, I returned Taylor’s arms to the forground.

That’s all the adding to the picture I wanted to do, but it still looks like a photo of Taylor in our garden. Time to add some atmosphere to the picture.

I was hoping to go for a gritty, mysterious look with this one, but also wanted to give Taylor a bit of an ethereal quality to make her look like she’s a bit mystical.

Stage 5

To set the mood of the photo, I played with the levels a bit – bringing out the black tones in the picture. It makes it look darker, but also crisper.

After using the ‘image-adjustments-curves’ tool to sharpen the black, the bricks in the background still looked a bit bright. It was making the bricks the focus of the picture, not Taylor.

To lower the brightness, I used the ‘image-adjustments-replace colour’ tool to darken the tone of the bricks. Fortunately Taylor was wearing mostly blue, so darkinening the terracotta tones didn’t affect any other section of the photo.

Stage 6

Next I extended the size of the photo. I set the background colour to match the colour of the tiles at the botom of the photo.

Using the crop tool, I dragged the boundaries of the photo out beyond where it ended originally. This left me with a block of bricks next to a block of green. To soften the transition I used a fading eraser to blur the boundary, then using the wing brush again, extended the tips of the wings onto the green background to make sure definition wasn’t lost at the edges.

Stage 7

To soften the edges and give Taylor the desired ethereal glow, I duplicated the background to form a new layer. Using the ‘filter-blur-gaussian blur’ set to about 6px, I blurred the image, then set it to ‘overlay’ the background.

After playing with the opacity of the blurred layer until I was happy with it, I combined the layers then used the history brush from before the blurred layer to return a bit of definition to the body of the wings.

Stage 8

Next I created a new layer filled with black and used the ‘filter-noise-add noise’  to create a grain effect. I set the noise to about 140% and checked the monochromatic box to make them white rather than coloured.

After setting the layer to ‘screen’ so it sat over the top of the background, again playing with the opacity til I was happy with the effect, I combined the layers and adjusted the overall saturation of the photo to reduce the blue glow on Taylor’s clothes.

And Finally…

Then I just had to add the writing. I think both fonts were downloaded, but I have so many and got them all so long ago that I can’t remember where I got them from. The title is written in ‘Burton’s Nightmare’ and my name in Aleia.

Once I was happy with the positioning, it was just a case of saving one last time.

And there you have it. How to turn your sister into a fairy in nine easy steps!

(All images in this post are linked to their source image. Click on them if you want to see the full size picture.)