PSP XI Tutorial: Bright and Simple
A tutorial, using PSP XI, explaining some handy, simple techniques. A lot of tutorials aren't translatable from Photoshop, so I wanted to write a very simple one using Paint Shop Pro!
Making:
→
We'll be starting fromthis cap →
Okay, so after watching season 3 of Parks and Recreation, I knew I wanted to icon Leslie eating waffles - because that is hilarious. XD
♪ step 1: prepare a base
I chose the cap I did for several reasons.
• It was funny, with a clear subject
• The colors were already very nice, with the yellow and blue contrast that I really, really liked.
• I liked the background a lot - the even blue of the hospital wall looks really easy to work with.
I got the cap from this site. So I opened it and took a look. I actually had an idea of what I wanted already, so that decided my cropping. I wanted the big waffle Leslie's nomming on to be sort of the focus, so I tried to get that centered, and I wanted a nice big swatch of blue at the top.
I cropped it in a square, and then resized it down to 100x100px. (I know some people like to work with a bigger canvas, and I do that sometimes, but in this case I wanted to know exactly what it would look like at finished size.) Then, I copied the background and pasted it on top as a new layer. I set that layer to Screen. And we get our base, ta-da!
♪ step 2
Now I wanted to just... ~spruce it up a little. NOTE: one of my biggest problems is over-doing things, so I like to work just a little at a time, slowly sort of build the icon to be what I want. Because of that I use several layers, each making just subtle changes. That's my recommendation, anyway, and it generally works best for me.
So! First, I used a curves layer to add a little bit of contrast. (For a simple explanation of curves, I like this tutorial.)
As you can see, I only did a little, boosting the top-right to add brightness, and pulling the bottom-left down to add contrast. This is a very subtle change, really just to have something to build on.
After that, I added a Hue/Saturation layer. (That's in Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Hue/Saturation/Lightness) I pumped the master up to 19. Yellow up to 21 and Blue to 15. I did this because I wanted to really emphasize the yellow and blue parts of the icon, as well as making the whole thing a bit more saturated.
I still wasn't happy with that, especially with her skin tone, which was a little dull. So, I added another Saturation layer and only moved Red up to 15.
Then, to make it pop even more, with lots of lovely contrast, I used a Levels layer. (Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Levels)
As you can see, you can make a really big difference just by playing around with the sliders. After those layers, I ended up with this:
♪ step 3
After I had stared at it for awhile, I decided that, considering the effect I wanted later, it was a little too bright. This gets even more subtle. XD Okay. The first thing I wanted to do was make it darker and a little flatter. I wanted to give it a washy, blue-ish feel - like I said, blue and yellow are what I was really striving for. So I just made a new Raster layer and filled it with a color from the icon. (In this case, #b5bde3) That's a nice periwinkle color. I set it to Multiply and just eased the opacity down until I found the effect I liked. I ended up at about 18% opacity.
I started playing around with a few different textures, and I found this texture by motorized* and pasted it as a new layer. I moved it around until I found a spot I liked. A little red in the middle with blue around it: like this. I set that to Screen. But that made the icon way too washed out, so I lowered the opacity to around 46%. And voila.
As you can see, though, that takes away a lot of the pretty yellow. So to fix that, I added a Color Balance level (Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Color Balance). Now, these are the numbers I used, but this is really all up to experimentation. My level ended up:
Shadows:
Cyan/Red: +11
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: -13
Midtones:
Cyan/Red: +7
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: -14
Highlights:
Cyan/Red: -5
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: +11
As you can see, I really upped the yellow, with a smidgen of red and then blue and cyan highlights to sort of balance that on - this really fixes a lot, and makes her skin less red. Finally, I add a Brightness/Contrast layer to just barely up the contrast. (Just Contrast: +6).
And I'm really happy with the result! Which is:
As you can see, this is almost exactly like what I had after those saturation levels. But! There is a difference. Like I said, it really helps to experiment. And even though it's subtle, all those levels were needed to get this specific result. I probably could have (should have? XD) left it at the end of step 2, but I was having fun getting it just-so. (You can see the most difference on the right side, I think.)
If you ever do something you really don't like, you can also just delete layers or - if you have to - start over from scratch. (To this end, it's always good to leave your background layer untouched. I sometimes wait to Merge All until the very end, just in case.)
*I had seen it in this tutorial by raiindust and really liked it, so. :3 That's a good tutorial, too, but only for photoshop users.
♪ step 4: textures
Okay, now this was my favorite part. Lovely, fun textures! As I've said all along, my focus was yellow and blue. I decided to use two textures, both by deny1984 (posted to the comm midnight_road.
1.
and 2.
First, I pasted texture 1 (the blue one) as a new layer. However, I didn't want Leslie covered, so I applied a layer mask. (Layers>>New Mask Layer>>Show All) Then I used a small, round brush - just the default - and painted over Leslie in black. I didn't bother being precise, and as you can see in my layer palette, it wound up like:
And you see the layer highlighted? Well, since the mask was a bit sloppy and the blue on the icon was too strong (like this), I set that top layer (the one highlighted in the picture) to Soft Light.
Then I pasted the yellow texture as a new layer, and pulled it down to just below Leslie's hands. That one I kept normal, because everything it was covering I wanted to keep covered.
After looking at the icon, though, I wanted the blue a little stronger. So I did basically the same thing as with the last blue layer. This time, though, to add a little brightness, I moved it so the bottom edge sat right at the top edge of the yellow texture. I could have just masked it off the yellow, but that white splotch, right in the bottom left? That would add brightness, so I wanted that by Leslie. So then I masked away the parts I didn't want, and set it to Soft Light.
As you can see, I masked away everything that covered Leslie again, and I also used a lighter brush to paint over the... I think bulletin board and bars on the right side. In layer masks, black is like 100% opacity, so if you want to erase something completely, use black. The less you want to show through from underneath, the lighter color you use.
♪ step 5: final touches
The first thing I wanted to do was make it a smidge brighter, and maybe smooth out some of the harsher bits of the texture. To do that, I copied a merged layer (Edit>>Copy Merged) and pasted it as a new layer. Then, I went to Adjust>>Blur>>Radial Blur. My settings were:
Blur Type: Spin
Strength (%): 60
And I set the focus/center on the waffle by her right hand (the one on the left side, that is)
The layer looks like this.
Playing around with blurs is one of my favorite techniques and you can get some really cool effects that way. Obviously you don't want to keep it like that, all spun around, so I set the layer to Soft Light, at about 46% opacity. That makes it brighter and a little softer.
Then, I copied a merged layer again and pasted it on top. I took the Soften Brush (found here, if you didn't know), sized very small at a low opacity, and brushed over the line of the yellow texture. If the softened effect is too strong, or if you can't quite get just that line, you can just set that layer's opacity a little lower.
Then, I took another texture - one I use all the time. And I turned it to greyscale.
This:
to
I don't have it saved under who made it unfortunately. D: But! The maker should be listed in my resources.
I pasted that as a new layer and set it to Soft Light, then lowered the opacity to around 46% or so. The white bits add brightness and the darker gray and black bits add shadow.
And BAM! Done! :D
Finished product, tra-la:
Advice: don't just copy this! It's designed to help and show how I made this particular icon, as well as the sort of coloring I use for most Parks and Rec icons I make. I hope it was helpful. :3 Originally posted here.
Making:
→
We'll be starting fromthis cap →
Okay, so after watching season 3 of Parks and Recreation, I knew I wanted to icon Leslie eating waffles - because that is hilarious. XD
♪ step 1: prepare a base
I chose the cap I did for several reasons.
• It was funny, with a clear subject
• The colors were already very nice, with the yellow and blue contrast that I really, really liked.
• I liked the background a lot - the even blue of the hospital wall looks really easy to work with.
I got the cap from this site. So I opened it and took a look. I actually had an idea of what I wanted already, so that decided my cropping. I wanted the big waffle Leslie's nomming on to be sort of the focus, so I tried to get that centered, and I wanted a nice big swatch of blue at the top.
I cropped it in a square, and then resized it down to 100x100px. (I know some people like to work with a bigger canvas, and I do that sometimes, but in this case I wanted to know exactly what it would look like at finished size.) Then, I copied the background and pasted it on top as a new layer. I set that layer to Screen. And we get our base, ta-da!
♪ step 2
Now I wanted to just... ~spruce it up a little. NOTE: one of my biggest problems is over-doing things, so I like to work just a little at a time, slowly sort of build the icon to be what I want. Because of that I use several layers, each making just subtle changes. That's my recommendation, anyway, and it generally works best for me.
So! First, I used a curves layer to add a little bit of contrast. (For a simple explanation of curves, I like this tutorial.)
As you can see, I only did a little, boosting the top-right to add brightness, and pulling the bottom-left down to add contrast. This is a very subtle change, really just to have something to build on.
After that, I added a Hue/Saturation layer. (That's in Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Hue/Saturation/Lightness) I pumped the master up to 19. Yellow up to 21 and Blue to 15. I did this because I wanted to really emphasize the yellow and blue parts of the icon, as well as making the whole thing a bit more saturated.
I still wasn't happy with that, especially with her skin tone, which was a little dull. So, I added another Saturation layer and only moved Red up to 15.
Then, to make it pop even more, with lots of lovely contrast, I used a Levels layer. (Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Levels)
As you can see, you can make a really big difference just by playing around with the sliders. After those layers, I ended up with this:
♪ step 3
After I had stared at it for awhile, I decided that, considering the effect I wanted later, it was a little too bright. This gets even more subtle. XD Okay. The first thing I wanted to do was make it darker and a little flatter. I wanted to give it a washy, blue-ish feel - like I said, blue and yellow are what I was really striving for. So I just made a new Raster layer and filled it with a color from the icon. (In this case, #b5bde3) That's a nice periwinkle color. I set it to Multiply and just eased the opacity down until I found the effect I liked. I ended up at about 18% opacity.
I started playing around with a few different textures, and I found this texture by motorized* and pasted it as a new layer. I moved it around until I found a spot I liked. A little red in the middle with blue around it: like this. I set that to Screen. But that made the icon way too washed out, so I lowered the opacity to around 46%. And voila.
As you can see, though, that takes away a lot of the pretty yellow. So to fix that, I added a Color Balance level (Layers>>New Adjustment Layer>>Color Balance). Now, these are the numbers I used, but this is really all up to experimentation. My level ended up:
Shadows:
Cyan/Red: +11
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: -13
Midtones:
Cyan/Red: +7
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: -14
Highlights:
Cyan/Red: -5
Magenta/Green: 0
Yellow/Blue: +11
As you can see, I really upped the yellow, with a smidgen of red and then blue and cyan highlights to sort of balance that on - this really fixes a lot, and makes her skin less red. Finally, I add a Brightness/Contrast layer to just barely up the contrast. (Just Contrast: +6).
And I'm really happy with the result! Which is:
As you can see, this is almost exactly like what I had after those saturation levels. But! There is a difference. Like I said, it really helps to experiment. And even though it's subtle, all those levels were needed to get this specific result. I probably could have (should have? XD) left it at the end of step 2, but I was having fun getting it just-so. (You can see the most difference on the right side, I think.)
If you ever do something you really don't like, you can also just delete layers or - if you have to - start over from scratch. (To this end, it's always good to leave your background layer untouched. I sometimes wait to Merge All until the very end, just in case.)
*I had seen it in this tutorial by raiindust and really liked it, so. :3 That's a good tutorial, too, but only for photoshop users.
♪ step 4: textures
Okay, now this was my favorite part. Lovely, fun textures! As I've said all along, my focus was yellow and blue. I decided to use two textures, both by deny1984 (posted to the comm midnight_road.
1.
and 2.
First, I pasted texture 1 (the blue one) as a new layer. However, I didn't want Leslie covered, so I applied a layer mask. (Layers>>New Mask Layer>>Show All) Then I used a small, round brush - just the default - and painted over Leslie in black. I didn't bother being precise, and as you can see in my layer palette, it wound up like:
And you see the layer highlighted? Well, since the mask was a bit sloppy and the blue on the icon was too strong (like this), I set that top layer (the one highlighted in the picture) to Soft Light.
Then I pasted the yellow texture as a new layer, and pulled it down to just below Leslie's hands. That one I kept normal, because everything it was covering I wanted to keep covered.
After looking at the icon, though, I wanted the blue a little stronger. So I did basically the same thing as with the last blue layer. This time, though, to add a little brightness, I moved it so the bottom edge sat right at the top edge of the yellow texture. I could have just masked it off the yellow, but that white splotch, right in the bottom left? That would add brightness, so I wanted that by Leslie. So then I masked away the parts I didn't want, and set it to Soft Light.
As you can see, I masked away everything that covered Leslie again, and I also used a lighter brush to paint over the... I think bulletin board and bars on the right side. In layer masks, black is like 100% opacity, so if you want to erase something completely, use black. The less you want to show through from underneath, the lighter color you use.
♪ step 5: final touches
The first thing I wanted to do was make it a smidge brighter, and maybe smooth out some of the harsher bits of the texture. To do that, I copied a merged layer (Edit>>Copy Merged) and pasted it as a new layer. Then, I went to Adjust>>Blur>>Radial Blur. My settings were:
Blur Type: Spin
Strength (%): 60
And I set the focus/center on the waffle by her right hand (the one on the left side, that is)
The layer looks like this.
Playing around with blurs is one of my favorite techniques and you can get some really cool effects that way. Obviously you don't want to keep it like that, all spun around, so I set the layer to Soft Light, at about 46% opacity. That makes it brighter and a little softer.
Then, I copied a merged layer again and pasted it on top. I took the Soften Brush (found here, if you didn't know), sized very small at a low opacity, and brushed over the line of the yellow texture. If the softened effect is too strong, or if you can't quite get just that line, you can just set that layer's opacity a little lower.
Then, I took another texture - one I use all the time. And I turned it to greyscale.
This:
to
I don't have it saved under who made it unfortunately. D: But! The maker should be listed in my resources.
I pasted that as a new layer and set it to Soft Light, then lowered the opacity to around 46% or so. The white bits add brightness and the darker gray and black bits add shadow.
And BAM! Done! :D
Finished product, tra-la:
Advice: don't just copy this! It's designed to help and show how I made this particular icon, as well as the sort of coloring I use for most Parks and Rec icons I make. I hope it was helpful. :3 Originally posted here.