140. Tutorial #7: Will Scarlett (BBC's Robin Hood)
Subject: BBC's Robin Hood
Program: Photoshop CS4
Translateable: If you know you're program, yes
Difficulty: Easy
hopeitallaway requested this tutorial at Ask the Maker. So sorry it took me so long!
Step #1.
I used this cap, from www.harry-lloyd.net, which is unfortunately down since a couple of weeks.
The first thing I did was to crop the image. I went for a close up to capture that gourgeous shadow on Will's gourgeous face. If you are unsure of how to crop your image I suggest to paste the picture onto a new 100x100px canvas and play around until you find a result you like.
Step #2.
Something I always do in the beginning is brighten the picture. I usually use a Curves Layer to do that and that's exactly what I did here. Play around with the brightness.
(Output: 155, Input: 83)
Step #3.
Next I created a new layer and used a big soft round brush to paint some light streaks over his face. Set the layer to Soft Light, Opacity 100%.
I know, I know it looks awful like this, but later you'll see that this is adds a tad of lightning to his face, which is just a detail, but I think that these light dots make the overall icon look softer.
When I make an icon I don't make it exactly in the order as explained here. I jump back and forth between the layers and add something, but unfortunately that is something I can recreate so I'm pretty sure that this is a step I actually made later in the process. Just as a sidenote... :D
Step #4.
Now, we begin with the actual coloring. I added a texture from darlaslilgirl (from her "colourific"-set). Set the layer to Soft Light, Opacity 30%.
See how it brings out the magenta in his lip and the green in his eye? That's exactly what I wanted. When you choose a texture think what colors you want and where you want them. Or instead of using a premade texture paint over the parts you want colored with a soft brush.
Step #5.
Let's add another texture! I used a texture from colormetwice (18 Gradient/Soft Layers, Gaussian Blur is the set). I set it to Soft Light, Opacity 26%.
It adds color and warmth to the icon.
Step #6.
The next step is another case where I didn't work chronological. I copied and merged only the first two layers of my layers palette and merged them together. On this merged layer I applies a Gaussian Blur Filter (about a 5-6px Radius).
My layer palette:
Set this blurred layer to Soft Light, Opacity 100%. The Soft Light Layer adds the contrast we lost with brightening the icon, also it gives more depth and vibrance to the colors. The Gaussian Blur gives the whole icon a soft glow and makes it softer all around.
Step #7.
Now I wanted to get back a little of the blue-ish/purple tones, so I used a Color Balance Layer (set to Midtones) and increased the blues a bit.
This is what I got:
Step #8.
We have a pretty basis for our coloring now. What I wanted now is COLOR. So I added a Vibrance Layer
Result:
BAAM! Color!
Step #9.
I wasn't satisfied with the vibrance of the darker parts of the icon, so I made another Vibrance layer, (Vibrance +41) and deleted all the parts that were already vibrant enough with the vector mask.
[If you are unfamiliar with vector masks I wrote a guide here, which I hope will help you]
Step #10.
Now the icon is just a tad to yellow so I used a Color Balance Layer and increased the yellows a bit.
Also I wanted the reds to be a bit more blue-ish so I increased the Cyans a bit as well.
Step #11.
I duplicated and merged the whole thing and pasted it on top of my layer palette. Then I used the Sharpen Filter and lowered the Opacity to 50%, because I didn't want it to be oversharpened.
Step #12.
What I did next are really just a little details. I created a new layer and used a very small soft brush to paint a tiny dot of green (#f0fc9e) onto his right eye. Then I set the layer to Overlay, Opacity 54%. You actually can barely see it, but it brightens and therefor emphasizes Will's eye a bit more.
I created another new layer and used a white soft round brush to paint over the dark side of his face. I set the layer to Soft Light, Opacity 6%.
Then I created yet another new layer and painted a black dot over his right eye, because the whole area was just a bit too bright. I set this layer to Soft Light, Opacity 13%.
And voilá - we're done! :)
As always, if you have any questions or concern, don't hesitate to comment and I will help you as best as I can. (Although you may have to wait a while for your answer because I'll leave for a hiatus in a few days - but as soon as I get back I'm happy to reply!)
I hope this was useful!