graphics by nobodysomeday (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} sugarfreewings) wrote,@ 2007-02-01 13:17:00 |
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| Entry tags: | tutorial, without a trace |
Anyway, for your viewing/amusement, I give you - a tutorial.
Please remember, this is for general colouring/quality guidelines only; please don't make exact replicas of my icon and claim them as your own.
This is all using PSP XI, but I should imagine it's transferable...none of it is too complicated. If you have any questions, just ask.
Going from this to
in 10 easy steps.1) Find your picture. I used this one, which was lying around my harddrive.
2) Crop it. I try to crop in interesting ways, and it's not always easy - it's also quite easy to go too far into "interesting" and end up with something where you can't actually see what it is. Anyway, a rule of thumb is, don't put the subject of your icon right in the middle. It looks dull.
When cropping, keep an eye on the status bar at the bottom (helpfully pointed to by that big red arrow). When you're sizing out the crop box, the numbers in the status bar change, showing you the basic dimensions of what you're cropping. It doesn't matter how big it is, as long as the numbers match ie 230x230. That way, when you resize it, it doesn't look squashed up or dragged out.
3) Resize it to 100x100.
4) Sharpen it: Adjust > Sharpness > Sharpen
5) Use the soften brush (it should be in the toolbar down the side or at the top), set on size 3, hardness 25, step 1, density/thickness/opacity 100; smooth out forehead, cheeks, chest – avoiding her nose, lips, eyebrows, hair, edges of her face and clothes etc. Also smooth out the phone behind her so there’s no distractions.
6) Duplicate the bottom layer three times – set them all to Screen, with the top screen layer at 50% opacity.
7) Duplicate the bottom layer (not the Screen layers) twice and move both these layers above the Screen layers. Set to Soft Light. Set the top layer to 50% opacity.
8) Paste on this gradient:
(made by teen_titans_gradients)9) Move it between the two Soft Light layers; set it to Soft Light, 30%.
10) Merge all layers. Save as .png file rather than .jpg by clicking the drop down menu underneath where you type in the file name.
