#1 Tutorial

[_euphory]

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First sharpen your base (Filter >> Sharpen >> Sharpen)


Then go to Filter >> Surface Blur, set Radius to 5 and Threshold to 5. And/or take blur tool and blur the sharpened and pixel-y areas, so skin looks clean and smooth.



Duplicate the base three times, set first two duplicated layers to Screen 100%, the third copy set to Soft Light 100% and Desaturate (Image >> Adjustments >> Desaturate or Shift+Ctrl+U).



Now the coloring part (Actually you can stop after any of these steps and get very nice coloring):

Add this gradient and set it to Hard Light 80%


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Next add this gradient and set it to Multiply 100%


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Next gradient, set it to Soft Light 100%


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And the last one - set to Soft Light 100%


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Next duplicate the base, drag it on top, desaturate and set to Soft Light 100%



Next add a selective color layer (Layer--->New Adjustment Layer--->Selective Color) and choose Blacks:



Set the black color to +15%



Then go to neutrals and set the yellow to -15%



This is what you got:



And this is what my Layer Palette looks like if you got confused:



Layer >> Flatten Image

Very nice add to icon is rounded border:


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Make a selection 98x98 px



Select >> Modify >> Smooth

Set Sample Radius to 5 pixels



Next Copy your selection and past it on new 100x100 Transparent canvas.

Save it as *gif document and your done!