Adding Texture to the Skin

Firstly, start by finding a stock photo that you can add the texture to. For example, you can use this one or you can of course, go to Google Images and look up some picture you are interesting in. Also you need to find some appropriate stone texture. You can do it in the same way or feel free to use mine. Ok, now open up both of your photos in Photoshop, you can either keep it at it's current size of resize it down a little bit if you want. After that bring the texture picture to the canvas with the man's face:

Flip this texture vertical with Edit > Transform > Flip Vertical and set opacity up to 50% for this layer:

Ok, then mess with the layer mode & opacity/fill. I tried Multiply with opacity of 80%. After that apply Edit > Transform > Warp to transform the texture as on picture below:

This texture will cover the face and we need one more for the neck covering. Copy the stone texture one more time to our canvas and then change layer mode to the Multiply for the new layer, also set opacity to 80% up. After that resize it a little bit and transform is as below using Edit > Transform > Warp like on picture below:

Now it's time to compose two different texture layers in one and cut away the textures out the skin area. Hide the upper layer (click on the eye, which indicates layer visibility) and go to lower layer with the texture. Select the Eraser Tool and a soft round brush about 20 px and process the edges to get the picture like mine:

Go back to the hidden layer and make it visible again. Now process its edges in the same way.

Merge two of these layers and change layer mode to Multiply again. Then you might want to make more sharpen this layer. Get out the Sharpen Tool and a soft round brush about 400 px and make a little sharpen work:

Now I would like to clear eyes area from the texture. To do this use the Eraser Tool and a soft round brush about 10 px:

Time to make the texture three-dimensional. For this effect use Dodge Tool (Range: Highlights, Exposure: 35%) and Burn Tool (Range: Shadows, Exposure: 40%) to make some parts of the face more brightness and bring some shadows to the dark parts. Try to do it more realistic.

Now I would like to bring man's clothes some sharpness. Use the Sharpen Tool (Size: 90px, Mode: Normal, Strength: 50%) to get the picture similar to this:

Looks good! Isn't it? But we are not finished yet! Now time to add some color to the skin. Use Select > Load Selection to create selection as on picture below, after that create a new layer and fill the selected area with color of #331e01:

Remove the selection with Ctrl+D and change the layer mode for this layer to Color:

After creating a new color for the man's skin I think we should add some cold hue to his face. For this effect select the Rectangular Marquee Tool (Feather: 100 px) and make selection as on picture below:

Then use Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation with similar settings to these:

Remove selection with Ctrl+D. Now we have an effect like this one:

Looks great! To finish off the tutorial select the Eraser Tool and a soft round brush with size of 100 px and make clear the lower part of the face and neck, but a little bit!

That is it for now! Read this tutorial, make it and enjoy your own cool pictures! Also thanks for visiting PhotoshopStar.

Transform a Cloud Photo into an Flaming Scene in Photoshop

Step 1

Create a new document sized 800px * 800px (size doesn't really matter for this tutorial, you can choose one you feel comfortable with), fill the background with Black colour.

Download a copy of this image (this is my OWN image so don't worry about copyright, you can use it freely) and load it into Photoshop.

Use the Rectangular Marquee Tool (Press the "M" key) to select a portion of the image as shown below:

Copy and paste the selected portion onto our newly created document, resize and position it in the centre of the canvas:

By pasting the selection, a new layer will automatically be generated on top of the background layer. Name this new layer as "flame".

Step 2

We will now get rid of the square edges of the "explosion" layer. I found a quick way is to use the Eraser Tool with a big, round, soft brush setting (I used 300px round brush, with 0% hardness), and set both the brush opacity and flow to 100%, gently eraser the edges off.

The result is shown below:

Apply the following the Level Adjustments to this layer: (Please note the setting may be slight different for your image, the purpose is to adjust the colour input of the image to make the effect more realistic)

The result so far will look like this:

Still on the same layer, apply the Curve Tool (Ctrl + M) and use the following settings:

And the image should look similar to this one:

Step 3

We will add various effect onto the flame and make it look more realistic.

Now duplicate the "flame" layer Five Times. Hide the top four duplicated layers for now and just leave the "flame copy" layer visible.

On the "flame Copy" layer, apply the followng Hue and Saturation Image Adjustment Settings:

Change the layer blending option to "Soft Light" and you will have the following image:

Step 4

Un-hide the "flame Copy 2″ layer, apply the following Black and White Adjustment to it:

(For those who use CS2 or earlier versions of Photoshop, you may try to the Curve or Level adjustment tool first to alter the colour contrast, then desaturate the layer.)

Change the layer blending mode to "color dodge" and you will have the following result:

Step 5

We can add some particles into the flame so it look a bit more realistic. To do this, un-hide the "flame Copy 3″ layer, go to Filter > Artistic > Film Grain and apply the following settings:

Then change the layer blending option to "Overlay" and drop the opacity of 80%. You will have the following image:

Step 6

We can some highlights and softness to the flame. Un-hide the "flame Copy 4″ layer, apply the Gaussian Blur filter with the following settings:

Change the blending mode to "Screen" and you will have following effect:

Step 7

Now we can give the flame a bit of motion. Un-hide the "flame Copy 5″ layer and apply the following Motion Blur settings:

Use the Move Tool to move this layer slight up a bit and change the layer blending option to "Screen", drop the opacity to 50%. The result so far will look like this:

Step 8

Now let's make some explosion effect. Select all layers previously created, hit Ctrl + T to bring up the Free Transformation Tool, distort, perspective, resize the image as shown below:

Here is a zoom-in view:

Step 9

Create a new layer called "Particles". Use the Lasso Tool with a 20px feather, select some random area outside the explosion:

Fill the selection with Black colour and render some cloud (White as foreground colour, Black as background colour). Then apply the following Level Adjustments:

Change the layer blending option to "Screen" and drop the opacity to around 80%.

Here is the result so far:

Ok that's it for this tutorial! The rest is left upon your own creativity. Have a play with the layers and change the blending modes, or apply some other filters and see what results they will bring you!

Below is the final image (I added some watercolour painting effect to the image)

Hope you enjoy this tutorial and find it useful and inspirational! If you have any question, just drop me a line and I will try and get back to you asap.

Thank you very much and have a nice day!

Create an Action Pack Movie Scene

Preparation:

I came across a very nice shot from jademacalla. Reminds me alot on 007. We also need a jail background.

Download REQ15 image.
Download Eastern State Penitentiary image.

All rights of these resources belong to their respective owners.

Step 1 - Setting Up Background:

Create a new document with size 750x550 pixels.

Open up the Eastern State Penitentiary image, drag into the document and resize it like the one shown in the diagram. Rename this layer as Jail.

Step 2 - Adding Lens Blur:

Duplicate the Jail layer and rename it as Blurred Jail.

Select the Jail layer and go to Filter > Blur > Lens Blur. Check on Faster, set Blur Focal Distance to 0, Iris Shape to Hexagon(6), Radius to 25, Blade Curvature to 0, Rotation to 0, Brightness to 0, Threshold to 255, Noise to 0 and Distribution to Uniform.

Step 3a - Cropping Figure:

Open up REQ15 image.

Crop out the figure using Pen tool.

Step 3b - Cropping Figure:

Drag the figure as a layer above the Jail layers. Rename this figure layer as Hero. Resize the figure so it looks similar to the one on the left.

Select the Soft Eraser tool with size 800pt, click once at the center of Blurred Jail layer.

Step 4a - Adding Shadow:

Create a new layer above Hero and name it as Shadow.

Fill the layer with #000000 using Paint Bucket. Set the opacity of this layer to 80%.

Step 4b - Adding Shadow:.

Select the Soft Eraser tool with size 800pt, click once at the center of Shadow layer.

Step 5 - Adding Saturation Effect:

Create a Hue/Saturation Adjustment layer above all layers.

Set the Hue to 0, Saturation to -40 and Lightness to 0.

Step 6 - Adding Exposure Effect:

Create a Exposure Adjustment layer above all layers.

Set the Exposure to +0.6, Offset to -0.01 and Gamma Correction to 1.2.

Step 7 - Adding Levels Effect:

Create a Levels Adjustment layer above all layers.

Set the values to 20, 1, 240 and you are done!

Optional:

I have added another Hue/Saturation Adjustment layer and check on Colorize. Set the Hue to 120, Saturation to 25 and Lightness to 0. Set the opacity of this adjustment layer to 50%

I also included a top and bottom border to make it look cinematic. Hope you enjoy this tutorial!