Table of contents for No. 167 in Photoshop Creative

As so many of us have a decent digital camera on our phone, our ambition and desire to shoot, edit and share high-quality media while on the go is higher than ever. And that includes being able to edit and manipulate photos and even create digital art on our mobile devices. That’s why our big feature this month is all about mobile artworking. From smartphone photography tips and guides on how to make your selfies look their best, to creating your own digital illustrations, we cover everything you can do on the go, which is quite a lot. In addition, we have expert tutorials on how to master text-mask portraits, vintage posters and create stunning 3D-style artworks. Also, make sure to check out our expert, insightful interviews and beautiful galleries.…

There’s nothing more inspiring than surfing the internet and seeing what other artists are creating, and we encourage you to do so. Here are some of our favourite pictures that caught our attention recently, from some of the world’s most exciting artists and designers. Slava Semeniuta www.instagram.com/thisset/ I was very inspired by the snow slopes and I took about 15 pictures on a digital camera that I borrowed from a friend. I really love bright colours so using a graphics tablet and a combination of overlay filters in Photoshop, I achieved a steep colour solution. Pham Quang Phuc www.behance.net/phamquangphuc Photoshop helps me to transform my imagination to my illustration easily. I just used the Lasso Tool and some of my favourite brushes. I think when you understand your art, you…

ANDRE VILLANUEVA I’m always running into interesting textures and vistas on my journeys. Having a smartphone to chronicle them is such a convenience. I love injecting these found assets into my artwork (p14). JONATHAN BAIL I love smartphone photography because everybody can do it. Just apply standard photography techniques like composition or depth of field (p17) and you get a great picture. MARK WHITE I spend way too much time on my phone, but when it came to editing the dog photo on page 15, that wasn’t such a bad thing! It gave me a chance to reveal my favourite apps, too. RODRIGO MARINELLI I love to create vibrant images. For the selfie composition on the left, I wanted to take bright photos surrounded by nature, and my phone enables…

At this year’s World Cup, snapshots of footballing excellence will be etched into history. Why not join in by creating your own football moment in Photoshop? This is a mixed-media piece of sorts that combines different brushes, a mish-mash of styles and some cohesive adjustments to create a rich poster. Though a lot of the styles used here are very different – from the jagged sketching of the flags in the background to the impressionist strokes of the footballer and the splatter brushes used in the sky – they can all be tied together using filters and a few adjustments. For this tutorial, we’ve used some GrutBrushes. You’ll find that ten of them are provided on the FileSilo for you to get stuck into, but there are hundreds available on…

Drawing wings Draw leading edges 01 Use long curved lines to mark out the feather edges; overshoot the sketch and clean up later. This structure gives a sense of how the feathers are spaced and aligned. Feather tips 02 On a new layer, draw in the feather tips. Use your reference photos to get a good idea of the different feather shapes that can occur on bird wings. Clean up 03 As we used another layer, it’s easy to clean up the lines that overshoot. Pay attention to the way the feathers overlap – it’s different for the topside and underside! Repeat method 04 For each wing section, repeat the technique. Use extra layers to make cleaning up easier. Eventually you’ll have a complete wing!…

Ah, inspiration. ’Tis a tricky thing. Sometimes you have it in spades. Other times it’s painfully hidden, requiring the deepest of hunts to locate. There are those moments when a single idea – a drop – erupts into a fountain of artistic motivation. But, if noonething moves you, you might have to look at multiple sources, distilling all the interesting things you come across into a hybrid testimony to your assorted muses. The mix of objects and elements can provide a rich story, or at least offer up prompts for abstract thought-lines. Case in point is this artwork here. Symmetrical designs, vintage imagery and Illuminati-fuelled intrigue all contributed to the development of this tutorial image. To facilitate symmetry as you piece together the image, you’ll take advantage of guides and…

Edit in stages Plan and group 01 Use colour-coded groups in Photoshop/CC to segment the phases [Elements: use blank layers with descriptive labels]. Here you’ll start with the background and base paint splats. Add animals 02 The most important phase is the focal point. Here animals are corralled in one group. If you had many more items, you could utilise sub-groups (Photoshop/CC) for greater organisation. Texturing and adjustments 03 Having texturing and adjustments in their own groups (Photoshop/ CC) enables you to toggle their visibility to gauge the overall effect. You can lower Opacity and/or mask the groups to reduce. Finalise and experiment 04 At the top of the stack, add final tweaks and adjustments. You can also use an experimental group to test things out. Toggle group visibility (Photoshop/CC)…

Select model Select subject 01 Ensure the model layer is selected. In CC, go to Select> Subject to quickly select the model. In non-CC versions, use the Quick Selection Tool to make the selection. Refine Edge 02 Go to Select> Select and Mask [non-CC: Refine Edge]. Paint with the Refine Edge Brush Tool [non-CC: Refine Radius Tool] along the hair and any other tricky areas. Edit the mask 03 When done, set Output To to Layer Mask. Click OK [Elements: Click mask]. Using the Brush Tool, paint black to hide and white to restore areas and set about refining the mask. Need edge help? 04 Cmd/Ctrl-click ‘Create a new layer’ button. Click ‘Create new fill/adjustment’ button, Solid Color. Pick a colour. Click OK. Continue refining. Disable or trash test colour…

Tschutti Heftli tschuttiheft.li @tschuttiheftli Since 2008, Tschutti Heftli has been giving a new, artistic face to football, or rather to footballers. We chose to create a sticker album that veered away from boring footballer photos, in favour of small works of art: each team is designed by different artists. Tschutti Heftli not only offers an overview of the best footballers, but also the most varied styles of contemporary portrait illustration. Name of the project Tschutti Heftli Sticker Album…

Working with masks and creating 3D objects is among my favourite things to do in Photoshop CC. The new Select Subject, Select and Mask tools make my job easier. These enable me to select an element with one click and then refine the mask with a variety of options. The Adobe Fuse application lets me build 3D human characters and bring them into Photoshop to add more realism to my projects. I started to get involved in the digital world more than 15 years ago and have been working as a freelance artist ever since, creating all kinds of multimedia projects and tutorial guides.…

Advanced Luminar edits Graduated masking 01 To gradually fade out a filter in Luminar, on the Bi-Color Toning for example, click on the paint brush symbol next to its name and select Gradient Mask. Apply the gradient by dragging the lines. Brush masking 02 Brushes can be used to selectively remove parts of a filter. From the paint brush symbol, select Brush. Ctrl/ right-click over the image to alter brush Size, Opacity and Softness, and then paint over areas to remove them. Clone Healing tools 03 Click on the Tools option along the top and select Clone & Stamp. This loads a brush especially for cloning. Click to select the source pixels and simply paint over the areas that need cloning out. Custom workspaces 04 Luminar can be set up…

Cursor speed 01 There are 10 speed settings for the Unimouse. You access them by holding the cursor speed button and then cycling through the LED indicators. This is great for changing your cursor speed to carry out delicate work. Battery 02 The lithium battery charges quickly and lasts up to three months. This is partly down to the Smart Sleep technology, which saves power by hibernating when not in use. Unlike some competitors, you can keep working even during the occasional charge. Articulated hinge 03 The main body hinge is friction based so you need to exert some force to make adjustments. It’s still very easy to make changes on the fly to prevent fatigue and the stiffness of the joints stops any movement occurring when you don’t want.…

“ The author expands on questions… into where you might want to take your process. It strays away from making the tutorials too practical, so as to keep this a quick reference tool” This is the book for those familiar with some of the Adobe Creative Suite, but who struggle to hunt down some of the features you know are there somewhere. Anyone using Photoshop will have had the familiar feeling of being sure there is a way to do something, if only the tool or path would present itself. This book enables you to ask the specific questions to gain access and familiarise yourself with all the hidden features of Photoshop. There are seven chapters to the book. These take you from the basics of the interface and tools,…

Price Free Web snapfish.co.uk They say nothing ever comes for free, but that’s something Snapfish has never heard of. The app, available on iOS and Android, offers 50 free prints a month (you do have to pay shipping). Snapfish has a range of products available to buy, too. There are mugs, greetings cards, even blankets, all priced in line with similar sites. This is great for a digital artist or graphic designer who’s looking to create gifts from their work, and you can get really creative with some of the templates available. As an app, Snapfish works smoothly and is easy to get the hang of. There are cropping tools in place to help you finalise your work for print, and everything is well laid out and simple to navigate.…

Claudio Tosi I divided this in two phases: hand sketch and digital painting, and adding patterns and textures. The lines, sketches and strokes make the work look ‘confused’ but it was a rigorous graphic process. Corine Spring After isolating the saxophone, I integrated it on a background and added various brushes to achieve this effect. On a new layer I painted some shade. And finally I used Hue/Saturation to desaturate the saxophone. Bob Parsi I used stock photos with the tiger as the main theme. I blended all the images by masking and using blend modes. Then I used adjustment layers, filters and gradients to make the image pop. Jorge Miranda I created this image with a lot of stock photos. Sometimes I take them from online sites, other times…

Photoshop Express This app can help you to remove blemishes from your image before you go onto more overall edits. There’s also a tool – should you sign in with your CC account – to correct eyes. There’s a pet eyes option, which is useful here. Snapseed With the spots on the nose airbrushed, we take the image to Snapseed and get a little more into the colouration and tone of the image. This is just a preset, but there are all kinds of options for tweaking highlights, saturation and tone. Mextures Mextures is where you can really have fun with your photo. Insert light leaks, film textures and make all kinds of edits to get your image looking brighter, more colourful and more vintage.…

Craft the fire ball Insert the images 01 Insert a football image and add a fire stock image to it. Set the fire layer to Screen and transform it so that the flame emanates from the ball. Begin painting over 02 Select the ball layer and then go to Filter> Distort> Ripple to give it more of a burning effect. Create a new layer and with a brush, touch over the ball and the fire. Blend it together 03 Reduce your brush to 50% Opacity and blend all the strokes you’ve made together; use a 50% Opacity black layer to see your strokes clearly. Carry on with brushes 04 Continue blending all your strokes together to create the flaming effect. Make longer strokes around the ball itself to create a…

Depth with gradients Use the Gradient Tool (G) to add darker and lighter gradients to give the impression of depth; use dark colours to add shadow, or light colours to add saturation and lighting. This is most useful on background elements. Use a linear gradient to add subtle darkening to scenery where it comes closer to the foreground. You can also use coloured gradients to add depth to backgrounds; use a transparent sky blue linear gradient on top of the background to give the effect of distant mountains and aerial perspective, for example.…

In this tutorial you will find lots of advice for expanding and exploiting your creativity. Starting off with pencil line art, you will move up the ladder through a series of layers and effects that will take you to a final artwork to be proud of. You will learn the best way to use simple generic brushes in Photoshop to create shadows and highlights in order to give your model a soft, but realistic volume that shapes her face and body. You will also learn how to draw realistic hair and eyes through the use of lines and colour. The final steps include importing and filtering a background by creating a screened layer, adding assets on top of and behind your model and applying blur and lighting effects. This will…

Vintage-ify with Curves Bring up Curves 01 Click the ‘Create new fill or adjustment layer’ button, choose Curves. Drop adjustment layer’s Opacity to 70-80% so you gently increase/decrease the look via opacity at the end if needed. Adjust the red channel 02 You’ll adjust each channel’s curve separately. Click the drop-down menu that says RGB, choose Red. Click to add two points to the red channel’s curve. Push these up a smidge. Edit the green channel 03 Now you’ll move on to the next channel. Click the channel drop-down menu, choose Green. Again, click to add two points to the curve. Create an ever-so-slight S-curve. Tweak blue channel 04 Click the channel drop-down menu again, choose Blue. Once again, add two points to the curve. Make a slight reverse S-curve…

Adobe Fuse Create a 3D character 01 Open Adobe Fuse and then start assembling the character. To choose the perfect outfit, double-click to select the clothes. It automatically sizes itself to fit the character. Save to CC Libraries 02 After your custom 3D character is done, click Save to CC Libraries on the top right. Launch Photoshop and go to Windows> Libraries. Select and drag the character to the scene. Poses and animations 03 Switch to the 3D workspace. In the 3D panel, select the skeleton and in the Properties panel, choose from a variety of poses or animations. Render 3D layer 04 Go to Windows> Timeline and then scroll sideways to find the right pose. Adjust the light and rotate the 3D character. Go to 3D> Render 3D layer.…

No Color Balance? In Elements, Color Balance isn’t available for altering the light streaks. Instead, use a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer, and change from Master to Reds (or any of the other colours under Channel). Move the Hue slider up or down to control the colour of that part of the layer. Setting this to the Yellows channel, for example, alters the look and feel of the light streak in just the yellow parts. Adjusting Lightness and Saturation completely changes the look of the image.…

Increase contrast 01 Contrast is needed in most photos, but what makes it so useful in the Smart Brush panel is that you dictate where you apply the contrast by dragging it across the image. You can also change the amount of contrast by adjusting the fill layer. Make lips red 02 The Smart Brush has a few effects for portraits, including this lip-reddening option, and a couple for whitening teeth. By combining some of the other effects, you can theoretically alter anything that you want in your portrait. Turn your photos sepia 03 Sepia images can give a retro finish; you can alter the shade at the end, too. Apply the effect over certain parts of your image, or give the whole of the picture a rework by simply…

“ The works make for some authentically engaging showcases ” Publisher Phaidon Price £49.95 / $38.59 US Author Snarkitecture Release date Out now In this first collection from the New York-based design agency, we get to explore Snarkitecture’s world – where the familiar becomes extraordinary. The reader is reminded at each page turn that these works are not art and they are not architecture. Then the reader discovers with each project viewed, that they occupy the space between. The interactive nature of the works makes for some authentically engaging showcases. The reader is taken through the history and growth of the Snarkitecture studio with an introduction by curator Maria Cristina Didero. The name, Snarkitecture, is taken from Lewis Carroll’s The Hunting of the Snark, where we witness an “impossible voyage…

We challenged you... In Issue 165, we challenged you to get creative with the set theme of Music. You were allowed to create whatever you wanted, so long as it incorporated the theme somehow. Alison Koller Tribute Gibson This was an isometric composition that replicated each part of the guitar in a landscape. The speedboats along the neck created lines similar to guitar strings, and the island in the middle is in the same position as the guitar’s scratch plate. This issue’s challenge... Think you can do better? Prove it! Next issue, the theme is Darkness. We don’t mind how you incorporate it into your image, just be as creative as you possibly can! Head to www.photoshop creative.co.uk and simply hit the Challenge link. Closing date: 19/7/18. THE PRIZE… Escape…

Just over ten years ago, Apple introduced the iPhone to the world, and it’s fair to say technology hasn’t been the same since. Now, we all have a mini-computer in our pockets, with apps for taking photos, editing photos and sharing photos with the rest of the world. But how has this impacted the way we use Photoshop? Of course, Adobe introduced its own apps, including Photoshop Express and Capture to help Photoshop users create on the go. These can really help enhance your creative process, and offer solutions for when you’re not at a computer, but the impression of the smartphone on Photoshop is deeper than that. Nowadays, if you see the perfect subject for a composition – take the tiger on the left – you most likely have…

“Adobe Color will automatically select disparate colours within the image” Adobe Color’s greatest strength is that it doesn’t sacrifice functionality for ease of use. Either upload a photo or take a new one, and Adobe Color will automatically select disparate colours within the image. You can amend the palette manually using RGB, CMYK or LAB sliders, or by selecting colour harmonies, including Complementary and Analogous. Once you’re happy with your chosen colour palette, you can upload it directly to Adobe AIR, which can then be accessed from Photoshop and used in your artwork.…

Most phones these days take panoramic photos. The healing tools are particularly useful in Photoshop for clearing up your work once you’ve taken these pictures, but you can also create panoramic photos from individual shots. You have to keep in mind that you will need to take at least four or five pictures with the same angle, so try to not move your body too much when you take the pictures. After that, go to Photoshop, select Photomerge (File>Automate> Photomerge), activate the Layout menu to Auto, click on the Browse button, select the pictures, press OK, and you’re done.…

Illustrating in Photoshop is a doddle – everything you need is already available in the program, all you need is a drawing tablet and some determination!In this tutorial, we’ll go step-by-step from sketch to finished product using only default Photoshop resources and create a full scene from scratch. Don’t worry if you’ve never tried something like this before or if it doesn’t turn out right first time – practice (and perseverance) makes perfect. The focus of this tutorial is a mythical gryphon, a half-eagle, half-lion beast, but you can choose your own subject and apply the same tips and techniques. Believe it or not, all you need for this tutorial are a few different styles of brushes in varying sizes, and liberal use of the Lasso, Fill and Gradient tools.…

It’s easy to draw a straight line by holding down Shift while you draw, or holding Shift while clicking for connected lines, but when drawing freehand, curves can become difficult. However, you can use your own anatomy to make curves easier. Hold the pen still and rotate your arm from the elbow for gentle curves, or from the wrist for a sharper curve. Rotate the canvas (R) to position the subject to complement your natural drawing curve. Hold Shift while rotating the canvas for a 45° lock and a less blurry view. For long curves, draw in sections and be prepared to redraw any parts that curve too loose or sharp on the first go.…

Create the eyes Eyes colours 01 To create realistic eyes, regardless of the style you are using, it is handy to use several layers. Begin with the basic shape of the eyes. Eyelids 02 Then you can work on the eyelids with a small hard brush and adjust the size of the pupils and overall details within the iris. Highlights 03 The eye should look like a glass sphere. It’s the soul’s window and it should reflect life. Apply highlights on top of the pupils and lacrimal caruncles. Need a break? 04 Take a 15-minute break and try to clear your mind. You might see things in a different way when you come back to your illustration.…

Use the king of image-editing programs to pay homage to the king of beasts. Get ready to have a roaring good time as you gather lions and other denizens of the savannah and utilise key features and tools for a dramatic blended composition. Layer masks, one of the main tools in your compositing arsenal, will be used in conjunction with blend modes to create the interlocking mass of creatures, in addition to the supporting texturescape. The masks enable you to use black to fade edges and hide unneeded areas, while the various blend modes give you much greater blending muscle than simply stacking layers and lowering the Opacity setting. Your goal with the composition is to portray the passion and vigour characteristic of the lion, along with the starkness of…

Love words and images? Great! Grab your message and a photo (or use the supplied portrait) and gear up for a simple and bold typographic treat. Typographic design and art intertwine text with imagery for an often-stimulating blend. The end result could be a gloriously abstract fusion, where the letterforms and words are used as design elements in the service of the overall visual, and the message (if there is one) is made secondary. In other cases, such as this tutorial image, the actual words and message are integral to the compositional equation. You’ll start off with a quick application of Shadows/Highlights to the model for a bit of HDR-esque tone. To further enhance, you’ll do some non-destructive dodging and burning with the help of 50% grey overlay layers. After…

Football looked quite different in 2008. Pep Guardiola had just taken charge of Barcelona’s first team, but in Lucerne, Switzerland, a different kind of footballing project was under way. Tschutti Heftli’s alternative sticker book began when the Euros visited founder Silvan Glanzmann’s native Switzerland, and was originally a cult project for his town. Fast-forward a decade, and 2018’s sticker book is truly international, with this year’s edition promising to be the best one yet. We caught up with Silvan to ask all about the project, and how this latest edition came to fruition. How did this project begin? The idea was born in 2008, the year the European Championships were held in Switzerland and Austria. The Swiss ministry of culture had planned some national cultural projects during the tournament, but…

In this fantastic project, we’ll transform an inoffensive cabbage into a wild carnivorous plant with the help of the powerful tools in Photoshop. This comprehensive tutorial will guide you through different processes and techniques to combine multiples images and 3D elements created in Photoshop and Adobe Fuse. We’ll start by creating a gradient background set to the Radial option. Next, we’ll explore the 3D features to create a simple 3D base and add images and textures to build the foundation for our project. Then we’ll work with selections and masks, to isolate each element and modify them using the Warp Tool or the Puppet Warp. Another technique commonly used through the project is applying the adjustments. Typically the Levels will be used to increase the contrast and the Hue/ Saturation…

In this tutorial we’ll be putting Skylum’s Luminar software through its paces, combining its extraordinary filters with Photoshop’s masking and adjustment layers to form an HDR masterpiece that’s dramatic and hyper-realistic. We’ll be taking advantage of Luminar’s fast, dynamic Filter system to create a light-infused portrait that’s prepped for editing in Photoshop. The trick to creating this effect lies in the choice of filters and in finding the right balance between each one inside of Luminar. And that’s exactly what we’ve done for you! Over the following steps, you’ll learn how to compose and mask together two separate images using some of Photoshop’s selection tools, and then import the result into Luminar for editing. You can essentially use as many filters as you like – each working differently upon the…

New Shoot 01 In the Task panel, click New Shoot. This will be logged as an enquiry. The default shoot type is Weddings, but this can be changed. Enter data 02 Add a title, shoot type, date and time. Light Blue will alert you if a shoot clashes. Under Linked Records, add client contacts. Add workflows 03 Click the Workflows button, add the Enquiry Workflow. Access Preferences, choose Workflows to add default tasks. Requests 04 Create shoot schedules to pre-plan your photography. In Linked Records, add any new purchases you might make as expenses. Run Reports 05 Add payments and use Reports to analyse profitability of your business. Use Charts to plot finances, or create invoices from one place.…

“ Every page feels like an exhibit itself, where each object is given reverence and space to be observed, both in isloation and in context ” Publisher Phaidon Author Moscow Design Museum Price £24.95 / $39.95 US Released April 2018 Only a generation ago, the objects displayed in this book would have been commonplace in Russia. But with the fall of the Soviet Union, there was a subsequent attempt to erase the relics of the past. The Moscow Design Museum is dedicated to preserving the design history of Russia and its unique cultural perspective. This collection spans 39 years of Soviet history and documents over 350 fascinating objects and images from the Museum’s exhibition in 2012. Every page feels like an exhibit in itself, where each object is given reverence…

“I try to learn from constructive criticism,” explains Dixon Jong of his artwork, “but ultimately I trust my vision. It shouldn’t matter what people think: trust yourself!” Dixon’s work feels confident and strong, but it might surprise you to know that Dixon wasn’t always an artist; he used to make music. We asked Dixon about his journey into digital art. How did you first get into art? I was in a band and we wanted to have an album cover for our EP, but we couldn’t afford to pay for an artist to do it, since we were all kids back then; we had no money. So I decided to take on that task myself, thinking I’d learn a way to create some artwork all by myself. That’s pretty much…

www.photoshopcreative.co.uk/user/punk21 I’m a senior graphic designer and illustrator from Cape Town, South Africa, who has a zest for art and design. I’ve always been drawn to visual communication, and the opportunities I get to bring concepts alive using my creative skills really excite me. I also ride as a professional downhill skateboarder so when I’m not designing, you’ll find me on my board. THE COLOUR GREEN This was an abstract 3D image created in Photoshop originally, and inspired by the colour green. Selections and adjustments helped to create this final image. BORN FROM THE CITY This was a photomontage created in Adobe Photoshop CS6 using a variety of blend modes, filters and loads of deep etching. It was an entry for a Photoshop Creative Readers’ Challenge. NEXT ISSUE ON SALE 19…