Tutorial: Light Textures
Light Textures: Basic Guide
Because I've never written one, but basically because
belenen requested it, I'm writing a short and very basic tutorial to how to use light textures. I use Photoshop 7.
For this tutorial, I started with this picture of Angelina Jolie. I cropped it down to 100x100.
Then I sharpened (Filter>>Sharpen) once, duplicated the base layer and set it to Screen, duplicated it again and set to Multiply and then lowered the opacity to 75% because it was a little too dark. Order of layers from bottom to top is background layer, screen layer, multiply layer. Side note: This combination of Screen/Multiply is my new favorite and a good alternative to Screen/Soft Light. If you use this combo and the icon is too light, move the multiply layer to the top. If it is too dark, move the screen layer to the top. You can always adjust the opacity from there.)
So now that the base is ready, it's time to find a light texture we can work with.
Trial & Error
The secret to working with light textures is that it is a lot of trial and error. You will probably have to try several textures before you find one that works with your icon. Personally, I like using light textures on black and white images the best, as an easy way to throw in some color, but you can obviously use them on colored images as well. When your base is ready, open up the texture that you want to use, hit Ctrl+A then Ctrl+C, then select your base and hit Ctrl+V.
Blend Modes
The basic rules about working with light textures is to use blend modes Screen or Lighten. Always try these first. Most textures that you have will work perfectly on these. If neither of these work, feel free to try anything else, to see what results you get, but don't be surprised if they all look bad.
Examples
This texture is easy. Throw it on, set it to screen, you're done. It looks great. Don't let its easiness keep you from using it.
Remember what I said about Trial and Error? When I was preparing for the tutorial, I wanted to give an example of a texture that looked bad, and we'll get to that in a minute. The funny thing? I open up this texture:
Put it on the base and set to Screen.
Ew. I was right, it doesn't look good. It's too busy, there are lights in bad places, it just looks poor. So I tried it on Lighten.
Huh. It actually looks good! Who knew? So you just never know what it will happen until you try it.
And like I said, sometimes it just doesn't work.
=
Clearly? This blows. One thing you can try, is erasing the texture where it covers the subject of your icon, which would look like this:
I think it still looks stupid, so then? You just DON'T USE IT. Don't force it to work.
Alternative Blend Modes
If you find that Screen and Lighten do not work, try something different.
=
Ew. Run away! RUN AWAY.
You could try it on
Overlay :
or
Multiply:
... but I'm not completely sold on it.
And I'll show you what this texture looks like on a different base, with other blend modes:
Saturation:
Color :
Again, these aren't your usual light texture look, but it really depends what you are trying to acheive.
Try Linear Dodge:
=
Rotating
Sometimes the texture will look wrong to begin with, but if you rotate it, it ends up looking great.
When you just put this texture on Screen:
Clearly that's not good, since the light is right over her face. So try rotating it 180 degrees (Edit>>Transform>>Rotate 180 degrees)
Looks good, right?
And again, I'll demonstrate the rotating on a different base.
Put it on Lighten
Clearly this just isn't right, so I try rotating 90 degrees clockwise (Edit>>Transform>>Rotate 90 degrees CW).
Because of where her dress is, you can tell that there's a car in the texture, so it looks kinda funny. So then I flip it vertically (Edit>>Transform>>Flip Vertical).
Double Textures
You can also try using two textures. Just make sure that the ones you use are simple (one, maybe two, simple lines) and are the same or at least complimentary colors. Like these two:
Both textures on Screen, the second one rotated, just like shown earlier:
There you go. :) Let me know if anything is unclear or if you have any other questions.
Because I've never written one, but basically because
belenen requested it, I'm writing a short and very basic tutorial to how to use light textures. I use Photoshop 7.
For this tutorial, I started with this picture of Angelina Jolie. I cropped it down to 100x100.
Then I sharpened (Filter>>Sharpen) once, duplicated the base layer and set it to Screen, duplicated it again and set to Multiply and then lowered the opacity to 75% because it was a little too dark. Order of layers from bottom to top is background layer, screen layer, multiply layer. Side note: This combination of Screen/Multiply is my new favorite and a good alternative to Screen/Soft Light. If you use this combo and the icon is too light, move the multiply layer to the top. If it is too dark, move the screen layer to the top. You can always adjust the opacity from there.)
So now that the base is ready, it's time to find a light texture we can work with.
Trial & Error
The secret to working with light textures is that it is a lot of trial and error. You will probably have to try several textures before you find one that works with your icon. Personally, I like using light textures on black and white images the best, as an easy way to throw in some color, but you can obviously use them on colored images as well. When your base is ready, open up the texture that you want to use, hit Ctrl+A then Ctrl+C, then select your base and hit Ctrl+V.
Blend Modes
The basic rules about working with light textures is to use blend modes Screen or Lighten. Always try these first. Most textures that you have will work perfectly on these. If neither of these work, feel free to try anything else, to see what results you get, but don't be surprised if they all look bad.
Examples
This texture is easy. Throw it on, set it to screen, you're done. It looks great. Don't let its easiness keep you from using it.
Remember what I said about Trial and Error? When I was preparing for the tutorial, I wanted to give an example of a texture that looked bad, and we'll get to that in a minute. The funny thing? I open up this texture:
Put it on the base and set to Screen.
Ew. I was right, it doesn't look good. It's too busy, there are lights in bad places, it just looks poor. So I tried it on Lighten.
Huh. It actually looks good! Who knew? So you just never know what it will happen until you try it.
And like I said, sometimes it just doesn't work.
=
Clearly? This blows. One thing you can try, is erasing the texture where it covers the subject of your icon, which would look like this:
I think it still looks stupid, so then? You just DON'T USE IT. Don't force it to work.
Alternative Blend Modes
If you find that Screen and Lighten do not work, try something different.
=
Ew. Run away! RUN AWAY.
You could try it on
Overlay :
or
Multiply:
... but I'm not completely sold on it.
And I'll show you what this texture looks like on a different base, with other blend modes:
Saturation:
Color :
Again, these aren't your usual light texture look, but it really depends what you are trying to acheive.
Try Linear Dodge:
=
Rotating
Sometimes the texture will look wrong to begin with, but if you rotate it, it ends up looking great.
When you just put this texture on Screen:
Clearly that's not good, since the light is right over her face. So try rotating it 180 degrees (Edit>>Transform>>Rotate 180 degrees)
Looks good, right?
And again, I'll demonstrate the rotating on a different base.
Put it on Lighten
Clearly this just isn't right, so I try rotating 90 degrees clockwise (Edit>>Transform>>Rotate 90 degrees CW).
Because of where her dress is, you can tell that there's a car in the texture, so it looks kinda funny. So then I flip it vertically (Edit>>Transform>>Flip Vertical).
Double Textures
You can also try using two textures. Just make sure that the ones you use are simple (one, maybe two, simple lines) and are the same or at least complimentary colors. Like these two:
Both textures on Screen, the second one rotated, just like shown earlier:
There you go. :) Let me know if anything is unclear or if you have any other questions.