/Super/ Photoshop Guide and Tutorials ;D
I've decided that instead of making a special permanent shiny header, I'll use this part to showcase stuff I've recently made. :)
Lesson of the; err...last update :D
Signatures can sometimes depend on the type of render/stock you use, its colors and is it interesting.
If a render was not high quality as the above one was, but still interesting enough for YOU to want to make a signature out of it, find a way to /make/ it high quality.
Render used for signature:(rendered myself, photo courtesy of my friend and her awesome nendoroids ;D)
Short introduction.
This is a guide I've created for those out there who have photoshop. Most guides should work on Photoshop 7.0+ onwards, except the smudging. I've split the tutorials into two sections: Technique and Tutorial. Technique will focus on things such as clip masking and introductions to the Photoshop interface for people who have just begun to learn about it. Tutorial will be the usual signature tutorials, guiding you step by step to making a particular signature.
Will work on it whenever I have time :D I know its not much now.
Construction status postponed :( My computer crashed and Im using someone else's laptop.
Bolded ones are things that already have been completed. Woo! I will add on to this list when I can think of more.
- Techniques:
- Layer Introduction
- 'Surreal Glow' Effect
- Lighting Guide
- Text and Font Placement Guide
- Focal&Flow Introduction
- Clipping Masks Guide
- Pen Tool
- Rendering
- Gradient Map, Color Balances and other.
- Brush Introduction and Installment Guide
- Sig Making:
- Will be updated as I actually make some.
Layers are the most basic thing in Photoshop, and the most useful. Layers are like transparent sheets. If you draw say, a circle on one sheet, and then a square on another, when you put them on top of each other both the circle and square would be showing. Layers are extremely helpful because if you get into the habit of creating a new layer whenever you want to do a new thing, if you mess one area up, you wont mess the whole thing up.
On the left is the basic interfaces of a layer.
A: To create a new layer and do things related to layers, there is a layer tab at the top where you can select Layer>New>Layer. There is also teh Shift+Ctrl+N shortcut.
B:The layers panel, which should be at the bottom right of your photoshop screen. Whichever Layer that is highlighted is the one you would be currently working on. The background has a lock beside it; that means its locked so you can't make any changes to it. Beside each layer you can see that there is an eye. That eye represents the viewing of each layer. If you want to hide a certain layer so it cant be seen, you click the eye and it'll disappear, and the layer will be hidden. Click it again and it magically pops up~
C:A typical menu when you right click a layer in the layers panel. You can do things to the layer like Blending Options, which gives you a whole panel of effects to play around with, you can duplicate it and delete it, you can create it into a clipping mask, etc.
Text has its own layer, different from images. When you use the text tool, a layer is automatically created for you. You cant draw on that text layer unless you Rasterize it, turning the text into an Image.
Its a pretty awesome trick my friend taught me, and now I pass it on to you!~
After>Before. ;)
First off, choose a picture you want to use. I chose Hatsune Miku! Paste it onto a new canvas. It will make a new layer for the image. Then in the Layers Panel, right click on the layer of your image and click Duplicate Layer. You now should have two layers; Layer 1(or whatever the layer your image is on is called. we'll call it layer 1.) and Layer 1 Cop
y. With Layer 1 Copy highlighted, at the top of the layers panel you should see a drop down menu currently on Normal, click it and click on either Overlay or Soft Light, depending on how you want it to look. I chose Overlay, and now my Hatsune Miku picture is all pretty like this:
Im not done yet. At the top(making sure that Layer 1 Copy is still high
lighted), go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur and a window should pop up. I used 4.5 for my Blur strength, but you can add more or less depending on how hard you want the glow to be. Then, click okay, and then press CTRL+E to merge Layer1 Copy with Layer 1, to get a final result.
. Have fun!
Lighting is an important part of making your signature look good, especially the rectangular sort. :D Its not hard to determine the position of lighting; often you can determine it yourself. Starting with basics, I'll show you a following sig I made recently.
Its pretty obvious where the lighting is coming from: the top right. You can also see how it is darker at the bottom. Lighting gives your sig a more realistic feel to it.
First off, Im going to introduce a guide on how to add lighting. Theres plenty of different ways you can use; this is just one of them. First, I dulled the music sig so I can begin to give it lighting :D
First, I used a yellow soft brush and then used it on(a new layer) some of the main areas of interest I want to light.
I set this layer to linear dodge %30 opacity. Then I used a very large soft brush, around 170px, on a new layer, and brushed the edge of it on the edge of the signature where I want the light to be coming in, using white. I set this layer to Lighten at 73%. Then I had some fun and added a Lens Flare (Filter>Render>Lens Flare) on Ichigo's shades for no particular reason. :P Anyways, you have created fire light!
Clipping mask is fun and when used right, can turn out pretty awesome. I'll be using the picture from the Surreal Glow guide as an example for this guide, and we're going to make it look like this:
First off, lets paste the image we want onto a fresh new canvas. Create a new layer and the on that new layer use the brush or shape etc of what you want your image's shape to be, like below. It doesnt matter what color it is, or if its blocking the image's face or not, just position it so that it fits nicely on the canvas and where you want it to be.
Yay! Now that thats done, we're going to st
art the clipping mask. First, we're going to drag Layer 2(the layer with the brush/shape on it) in between Layer 1 and background so that its now below Layer 1.Now, right click Layer 1(the layer with the main image you want to clip mask on it) and choose "Create Clipping Mask". Voila! You've got your clipping mask. You can also use the 
to move around Layer 1 to a comfortable setting.
After I clip masked, I did a few adjustments of my own and here is my result .
font placement header
Font is tricky; if you decide to use it, the wrong font might perfectly ruin a good signature. Font depends on what sort of signature you made. Is it a small, sophisticated sig with lots of C4Ds, smudging and lighting? Or is it a signature that shouts your creativity?
I myself prefer
to use only the simplest of fonts, relying on the rest of the signature to suffice, and minimum font effects. However that doesnt mean that large, showy fonts are neglected.
First of all: placement. Where is the text going to go? I like my text close and huggng my focal, being small and unnoticable, because I like to draw all the attention to the focal and not to the text itself.
I do this, but if the area around the focal is too extravagant and text will only complicate it, I let the focal have some space and put it a little further away, around on the other side.
Not wanting my text to look random and just floating there, I added a black 'tag' background.
Text should also go with the flow of your signature.
You can see clearly that the flow is flowing diagonally from the top right and down. Therefore the text, me wanting it to be discreet, is clip masked and titlted so that it follows the flow and rests on a piece of C4D. Remember; some signatures dont need text at all. Its up to you if theres text or not on your signature.
Who said text was meant to be read? On this sig are some examples of blocks of text that can be effective in the right circumstances. I can't read it! Thats the point; even blocks of little, unreadable text can be useful and efficient.
-in construction-
SIGNATURE MAKING TUTS :D
These aren't new; since I dont have photoshop atm Im digging out some of my past (neater) tutorials for you. Note my past forum name for these gfx tuts was Calamity. Click on the sigs for the tutorial for them.
Heart C Sig - Good pentool practice.
Inspire Sprite Sig.
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