139. Tutorial #6: Jon/Daenerys (Game of Thrones)
Subject: Game of Thrones
Program: Photoshop CS4
Translateable: If you know your way around your program very well I think it's possible, but I use a lot of Selective Color and Vibrance Layers.
Difficulty: Difficult. However I added some additional notes for Beginners (marked as [B:].
dudette_in_town requested this tutorial at Ask the Maker. I'm sorry it took me so long, but as you will see, this is quite a long tutorial. So be warned, it's very image- and text- heavy.
We'll be starting with this cap (from pineapple_sky). I used a lot of layers on this one, especially Selective Color Layers. You can probably achieve the same results with a lot less layers, but I like to keep things as separate as possible. During the working process I usually take small steps and change bits and pieces until I'm satisfied with the result. You will have to do the same for your caps anyway, so in this tutorial I will only show you how I did the major steps and will the details out - of course if you have any questions, feel free to ask.
Also please note that I have no idea how this coloring will work on other pictures, so you will definetly have to play around with the settings. I tried as best as I can to explain why I did the things I did, so I hope that this will help you.
Step 1.
First thing I usually do is to brighten the image and to give it more contrast. In this case I used a Curves Layer with two points, the first one to brighten the image (Output: 169, Input: 136) and the second point to add contrast (Output: 59, Input: 71).
Result:
As you can see now the image is too dark, but we will fix soon.
Step 2.
Now I used a Color Balance Layer to add more yellow to the picture, since it is quite grey/blueish. I usually only work with the Midtones, because they affect the whole image.
[B: The principle of using Color Balance Layers is really easy... if an image is too blue, add yellows and reds, if the image is too yellow add blues, etc.]
After that I added another Curves Layer to brighten the image again.
Step 3.
Next thing I did was to add a black and white Gradient Fill (white on the top half of the image, black on the bottom half) and set this layer to Soft Light, Opacity 54%. I really love Gradient Fills, the graphics a little more shiny. Also in this particular cased it solved the problem of the overly contrasted look.
As I said I love Gradient Fills, so why not add another? This time not in black/white though, but a nice warm green and orange, to increase the yellows in our image (I don't know why but I think this is a somewhat softer way of adding color to a picture).
Set this layer to Soft Light, Opacity 20%.
Voilá!
Step 4.
The picture is still too dark, so I added a Brightness/Contrast Layer and increased the Brightness and decreased the Contrast. Usually I use Curves to brighten a picture, but in this case I needed to decrease the contrast again (of course I could have just decreased the contrast in Step 1, but that's the thing about making such a coloring you play around and adjust as you go, so you end up with lots of layers that aren't particularly necessary because you could simply adjust what you've done before).
Result:
Step 5.
It's time for another Gradient Fill! :D I wanted to increase the warmth of the picture, so I used orange as top color and a warm brown as bottom color.
Set it to Soft Light, Opacity 21%.
I used a Curves Layer to brighten the image a bit further and then added another black/white Gradient Fill (Soft Light, Opacity 79%).
Step 6.
So up until now most of the steps were preparation for the real coloring I wanted to achieve. We brightened the image a good deal, we enhanced added a lot of warmth to it and we gave it a structure if you will, with the gradient maps. It depends on your image if you'll need all that or not. I assume that if your initial image is quite yellowish/reddish for example you can skip these first steps.
And now comes the fun part. :D
I created a new Selective Color Layer and increased the yellows (Yellows > Yellow -100%, Neutrals > Yellows + 40%). I wanted the reds to be less red and more magenta so I decreased the Yellows (Reds > Yellow -100%).
[B: As with the Color Balance Layers, the principle behind using Selective Color Layers is basic color theory: If you want your more yellow, increase the yellow, decrease the blues, etc. The big difference is that Color Balance Layers affect all the colors in an image, while Selective Colors only affect specific colors, therefore you have to choose first which color you want to change and then how to change it.]
Step 7.
I wanted the lower part to be more blue and less green, so I made a new Selective Color Layer and decreased the yellows (Green > Cyan +100%, Magenta +100%, Yellow -100%, Black +20%).
Step 8.
So now we're slowly getting there, you'll see.
Open a new Selective Color Layer (Reds > Yellow +100%; Cyans & Blues > Cyan +100%, Magenta -100%, Yellow -100%; Neutrals > Magenta +35%, Yellow -20%). So what we did now is increase the reds, magentas and blues, but thanks to our endeaver to add yellow to the picture in the steps before, we have this pretty yellow shine underneath.
Add a new Vibrance Layer and increase the vibrance and saturation to your liking.
Step 9.
In the following step we're just tweaking the coloring a little more.
I wanted the Magentas to stand out a bit more so I created another Selective Color Layer (Magenta > Cyan +15%, Yellow -35%).
I also added a Color Balance Layers and increased the Blues a little.
Then I added another Curves Layer to brighten the image again.
Voilá! We are done with this cap now. But don't get too excited, we still have some steps ahead of us!
Step 10.
I used this beautiful beautiful promo picture of Daenerys (credit goes to HBO, I guess). I started coloring the cap of Jon without the intention of adding Dany's pic to it. Otherwise the coloring probably would've been completely different. Because now we have the situation that we have one picture that has a pretty complicated coloring and we have another picture with a completely different base.
So what I had to do was to bend that picture to my will so too speak.
What I first did was repeating the steps 1-9 (or rather copy all of the adjustment layers from Jon's cap).
I ended up with this:
What we can see is that we already have the yellows and magentas we need for this coloring. But no blues in sight...
Step 11.
To get some blues into this picture I simply created a new layer and painted blue over the parts where I wanted them with a big soft round brush. Set this layer to Color, Opacity 62%.
Create another layer and paint a cyan blue wherever you want it to be. Set this layer to Color, Opacity 72%.
Step 12.
I used an orange color on the top half of the picture and set this new layer to Screen, Opacity 16%. This brightens top part.
I created another layer and painted with a light yellow and set it to Soft Light, Opacity 72%. Again it brightens the image and also together with the other painted layers it creates some sort of light effect.
Step 13.
Copy, merge and paste all the layers together. Apply a Gaussian Blur Filter and set this layer to Soft Light. On the one hand this adds vibrance and color to the picture on the other hand it gives it a soft glow.
Step 14.
Now the details... I needed the reds to be more magenta, so I used a Selective Color Layer and fixed that (Red > Magenta +100%, Yellow -40%). I copied that Layer and set it to Opacity, 25%.
And we're done with this picture as well. You see that as single picture it doesn't look very well. You can see the colors were added and it looks too artificial. But I didn't worry too much about that, since I wanted to blend it anyway. I just needed all the colors to be represented somewhere so that it will look natural together with Jon's cap.
Step 15.
Create a new document (just big enough for your two images). Copy, merge and paste your two colored images onto that canvas and position them however you like. I put Dany's pic on top of Jon's and set it to Lighten. Between the two layers I created a new one and painted it black where I didn't want Jon to shine through. Blend them together.
[B: If you are unfamiliar with Blending, I wrote a Guide here, which will hopefully explain all you need for this simple blend.]
Copy, merge and paste again once you're satisfied with your blend. Add a vector mask to this Layer.
Step 16.
To create the circle I used the Ellipse Tool and created a new shape, of course the shape of the circle I wanted.
Rasterize the Shape (right-click on the shape-mask > rasterize). Then use the Magic Wand Tool to select the outside of the circle and select the vector mask of our blend and fill the selection with black. This will delete everything outside of the circle. There are a lot methods on how you can do that (Elliptical Marquee Tool, etc), and probably a lot of them are much quicker, but I often end up doing it this way. Delete the shape and you have your blended circle.
[B: If you don't know how to use vector masks, see my Blending Guide. /*shameless selfpimping]
Step 17.
The final step is putting it all together. And that's really a fun part, because it's just playing around. Since this tutorial is long enough as it is and is mostly about the coloring technique I will stop here. I set most of the textures either to Screen or to Soft Light and played around with the opacity, that's as far as the technique goes. If you have any questions regarding the textures I used feel free to ask though!
And now we are done! :D
If you have any further questions don't hesitate to ask and I hope I'll be able to help! (You may have to wait a bit for a reply as I'll be leaving for a hiatus on Sunday, but I will definetly answer anything as soon as I can.)
As I said in the beginning, I'm not sure if this coloring works on anything else, but I hope you get the idea behind it and that it helps you to come up with your own colorings.