maker activity (no. 25)

[bussbuss]

Comments

[daynawashere]

8. Another Vibrance +100 layer set to Color. Result.

9. I'm bothered right now with how the background on the right is brighter and more orange than on the left, so: Selective Colouring! I masked it so it's just over the right side of the background and the rose to make those reds bolder without affecting her skin. Result.

10. Now some Selective Colouring to work on the skin, which is looking a bit green right now. Set that layer to Color to minimize pixelization. Result.

11. Obsessive nitpicking - there are a few pink pixels on the shadowed part of her face that I want to get rid of. I used the eyedropper tool to pick an orange colour (Hex Code #d07124) that matched her skin tone in the shadow, and painted over the pink pixels, and set the layer to Color.


12. Okay, now I've decided that Belle and her clothing etc are too bright compared to the background, so I used a Curves layer to darken it, and masked it to only be on Belle and not the background.


13. Color Balance to make things less red!


lol, too long for two comments...

[daynawashere]

14. You probably think we're almost done, but there are still 14 more layers, and things are going to get way worse before they get better... why can't I just leave things alone, this looks fine, etc etc. Bear with me. New Color Fill layer of a peachy colour (#ffd7ac) set to Multiply, 30% Opacity. Result.

15. Another Color Fill layer of a slightly darker peach colour (#ffb463) set to Multiply, 20% Opacity. Result.

16. Vibrance +100 Set to Color. Result.

17. Trust me, I said it'd get worse before it got better :P Now to touch up some individual areas of colouring. Let's start with the rose stem, which is looking more yellow than green. Paint over just the stem on a new layer with a bright green like #5aff00. Set that layer to Color, 20% Opacity. Result.

18. Let's make the rose more red using a Curves Adjustment Layer; mask it so it's just on the rose itself. Result.

19. Now let's make the background more purple. Pick a dark purple colour like #250452 and paint it just on the background. Set to Screen, 40% Opacity. Result.

20. Add a Photo Filter adjustment layer to mute all the colours a bit. I just used the automatic Warming Filter (85) with a Density of 25%, Preserve Luminosity checked. Result.

Almost done for real this time...

[daynawashere]

21. That made the stem less green again, so let's do some Color Balance this time, masked so it's just on the stem. Result.

22. I want her dress to be more blue, so I picked a royal blue (#0d4291) and painted over the straps of her dress on a new layer, set to Color 40% Opacity. Result.

23. New layer. Clone Stamp (Ctrl-Shift-Alt-E). Desaturate, and Gaussian Blur however much you like. I did it with a radius of 10. This layer is going to increase the contrast, but I already think her hair is dark enough, so I erased this layer from her hair. Set the layer to Soft Light

 -> 

24. Almost done, I promise! Again, because it was for this challenge where it was supposed be really bright and light, I wanted to take the colouring a bit further. I picked a dark brown colour (#170e00) and set it to Screen, 100% Opacity. Result.

25. Then I picked a dark blue (#000217) and also set it to Screen, 100%. Result.

26. All this colouring has made the background really pixelly, so I copy-merged on a new layer (Ctrl-Shift-Alt-E) and used the blur tool to smooth out the background.


27. And, last step, increasing the contrast. With a new Hue/Saturation/Lightness adjustment layer, make Saturation -100 and set it to Soft Light. Resize to 100x100 and you're done.



And here's the link to the PSD again, because this probably made very little sense. Anyway, hope you find it useful? :)

Edit: Looking at the final icon again, I think I might have boosted the Vibrance one more time but forgot to save that in the PSD and therefore forgot it from the tutorial. This is basically it, though :P

[erzsebet]

Thank you so much for doing this! I never would have thought to change the Vibrancy layer to Color, or to play around with the Clone Stamp tool, so I'll definitely have to play around with this! :D