The mystery of creation...
Or something like that.
I opened Photoshop with the sole intention of getting back to the business of iconing to the alphabet, but then I opened this cap by mistake, and this icon sprung fully-formed from my head.
It's funky and quirky and a little extreme, much like Maria herself, so I thought I'd write a quick tutorial on how it was done.
First, select your image. I used this cap of Maria from "So I Married an Alien". Usually I would've gone with Michael or Kyle or Isabel or... anyone but Maria, but what can I say? I liked the pretty colors.
I cropped my base slightly off center, then toyed with the contrast and clarity (my default image prep process in a nutshell - sharpen, duplicate, set to screen, duplicate screened layer, duplicate base, move to top, lower saturation to 50%, set to soft light). Once that was done, I resized larger than my icon canvas (in this case, 130x130) so that I had room to play around with image placement.
Duplicate the base. Set your art history brush at this stage, then desaturate. With a hard-edged round brush, replace the color in the background with the art history brush, leaving the foreground greyscale. Set the layer to color, 100% opacity.
Dupicate the layer, set to Soft Light at 100% opacity. This will add a little extra depth to the greyscale figure and give the colors a bit more kick.
Duplicate the original base, bring it to the top, move to an appropriate place, and set your art history brush. Then desaturate, and repeat the process of replacing the original color, in the foreground this time.
The background is a little light for my taste. To rectify this, duplicate the new layer, carefully erase Maria so that you're left with nothing but the greyscale background, and set to multiply at 25% opacity.
Find a light texture with colors in the same family as your image. I used this one by fightstarr. As an alternative, you can find a texture you like and alter the colors manually, using Color Balance or Hue/Saturation.
I rotated the texture, placed it so that it complimented the image, and used the eraser in places that covered Maria's face. Set the layer to Screen.
I wanted to increase the intensity of the light, as well as the color saturation, so I duplicated the layer and left the opacity at 100%.
To separate the two images, I chopped, scaled, and generally mutilated a paint smear brush that was originally by crystalkirk, if I remember correctly.
Using white (#FFFFFF) at 100% opacity, paint the brush on a new layer. Place the separator over the seam where the two frames meet.
On a new layer, make a rectangular vertical selection, fill it with white, and align at the left side. If any parts of the background look glaring or awkward where the image meets the whitespace, use a small, soft-edged brush to paint in white and hide the spots you don't want.
Choose a gradient. I used this one from crumblingwalls.
Set the gradient layer to Color at 15% opacity. Still, even with the low layer opacity, the tones in her dress have lost a little of their vibrance.
Add a layer mask to the gradient layer, and with a hard-edged brush on 100% opacity, carefully paint over Maria with a medium gray (in this example, #717171).
As a result of the color layer, the greyscale aspects of the image have taken on the tones of the gradient. Add a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer (Hue: 225, Saturation: 25) to counter the color and add some crispness to the highlights and shadows.
Select a prominent color from the icon, and add some tiny text. I opted for Georgia, 1.5 point, and "Let's do the time warp again" in caps. Add an accent brush (I can't seem to remember where this one is from, so if it's yours, please let me know so that I may give credit where credit is due).
And voila, Technicolor Maria. Feel free to use the finished icon, just comment and credit if you grab it.
Be gentle, it's my first time.
I opened Photoshop with the sole intention of getting back to the business of iconing to the alphabet, but then I opened this cap by mistake, and this icon sprung fully-formed from my head.
It's funky and quirky and a little extreme, much like Maria herself, so I thought I'd write a quick tutorial on how it was done.
First, select your image. I used this cap of Maria from "So I Married an Alien". Usually I would've gone with Michael or Kyle or Isabel or... anyone but Maria, but what can I say? I liked the pretty colors.
I cropped my base slightly off center, then toyed with the contrast and clarity (my default image prep process in a nutshell - sharpen, duplicate, set to screen, duplicate screened layer, duplicate base, move to top, lower saturation to 50%, set to soft light). Once that was done, I resized larger than my icon canvas (in this case, 130x130) so that I had room to play around with image placement.
Duplicate the base. Set your art history brush at this stage, then desaturate. With a hard-edged round brush, replace the color in the background with the art history brush, leaving the foreground greyscale. Set the layer to color, 100% opacity.
Dupicate the layer, set to Soft Light at 100% opacity. This will add a little extra depth to the greyscale figure and give the colors a bit more kick.
Duplicate the original base, bring it to the top, move to an appropriate place, and set your art history brush. Then desaturate, and repeat the process of replacing the original color, in the foreground this time.
The background is a little light for my taste. To rectify this, duplicate the new layer, carefully erase Maria so that you're left with nothing but the greyscale background, and set to multiply at 25% opacity.
Find a light texture with colors in the same family as your image. I used this one by fightstarr. As an alternative, you can find a texture you like and alter the colors manually, using Color Balance or Hue/Saturation.
I rotated the texture, placed it so that it complimented the image, and used the eraser in places that covered Maria's face. Set the layer to Screen.
I wanted to increase the intensity of the light, as well as the color saturation, so I duplicated the layer and left the opacity at 100%.
To separate the two images, I chopped, scaled, and generally mutilated a paint smear brush that was originally by crystalkirk, if I remember correctly.
Using white (#FFFFFF) at 100% opacity, paint the brush on a new layer. Place the separator over the seam where the two frames meet.
On a new layer, make a rectangular vertical selection, fill it with white, and align at the left side. If any parts of the background look glaring or awkward where the image meets the whitespace, use a small, soft-edged brush to paint in white and hide the spots you don't want.
Choose a gradient. I used this one from crumblingwalls.
Set the gradient layer to Color at 15% opacity. Still, even with the low layer opacity, the tones in her dress have lost a little of their vibrance.
Add a layer mask to the gradient layer, and with a hard-edged brush on 100% opacity, carefully paint over Maria with a medium gray (in this example, #717171).
As a result of the color layer, the greyscale aspects of the image have taken on the tones of the gradient. Add a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer (Hue: 225, Saturation: 25) to counter the color and add some crispness to the highlights and shadows.
Select a prominent color from the icon, and add some tiny text. I opted for Georgia, 1.5 point, and "Let's do the time warp again" in caps. Add an accent brush (I can't seem to remember where this one is from, so if it's yours, please let me know so that I may give credit where credit is due).
And voila, Technicolor Maria. Feel free to use the finished icon, just comment and credit if you grab it.
Be gentle, it's my first time.