ICON TUTORIAL #1
From this to 
, in ten or less steps!
Ah, my first tutorial. It's a hallmark moment. Bare with me, people.
First, the usual disclaimer. Please, do not be a massive douche bag and copy this tutorial exactly. Get your own image, play around with cropping and colors, whatever. Don't copy my exact icon. That would be unshiny of you.
NOW! Here's what I did. I used Photoshop CS, but I imagine it's pretty easily translated to other programs.
I took this picture of the lovely Michelle Rodriguez, because I am a massive fangirl, and my love knows no bounds. Thank-you. I resized and cropped it, remembering that exact centering things makes the baby Jesus cry. Now, I wanted this picture to be colored, but it wasn't, so I desaturated it. If your icon is already colorized, you can skip the next few steps! If you don't know what the hell I'm rambling about, go away, because it's only going to get worse.
Now, my pretty little black and white icon needed a skintone. I know there are a shitload of different methods for this, but here's what I did! I duplicated the layer (warning: I'm another one of those layer whores), set it to soft light, and went to Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation. Making sure I had Colorize checked, I played around with the settings until I had what looked like a decent skintone. I'm making this tutorial after I made the icon, so I can't tell you what my exact settings were. I suck. Now, I took my handy dandy eraser tool, on a small circle brush, and erased everything but her skin. This looked okay, but I duplicated this layer, and set it to Color at 63%.
Now, Michelle was looking pretty sexy, but I can't take credit for that. To add to the sexyness, I wanted to give her dress some color. I chose green. Why, you ask? Aw, because it's my favorite color, and that's very sweet of you to ask! It also matched the texture I knew I'd be using later.
Go back to your first layer, your black and white base, duplicate it, and drag it to the top. Now go back to Hue/Saturation! Find the color you want the dress to be. Again, I used green. I almost used red, it would have been shiny too. Use whatever suits your mood/flow/chi/energy/sex drive/religious beliefs. Again taking my eraser tool (baby is so good to me >.>), I deleted everything but - you guessed it - the dress. I put this layer on Soft Light.
Here, it becomes a matter of preference. If you're happy with how it looks, great, move on! But I wasn't. So I duplicated my dress layer three times, setting the layers on Soft Light. Just do what seems right.
On top of everything, create a new layer. Set it to Multiply, and flood fill the layer with #C1A88E. Take your ERASER TOOL ZOMG! and erase Michelle. Her skin, her dress, all of it. MAKE IT GO BYE-BYE! This may not be necessary for your image, but it was for mine. I also adjusted the layer opacity to 82%.
The icon is steadily losing its sexyness, no? Don't worry, it'll get better. I took this texture by myrasis, and set it to Overlay at 34%. You may need to adjust the opacity! Experiment, man! Again, I used my shiny stick eraser and deleted Michelle. It just looked better that way. Very subtle. And for once in my life, I went for subtle!
Using the Color Picker, I selected a shade from her dress. In this case, green! YAY SHINY GREEN! Ahem. Create a new layer. In the color I picked, I applied this brush and set it to Soft Light. I don't have the download link, again, I suck. But it was made by the wonderful gender.
Take your Color Picker again. Pick a color. I picked a dark green, also from Michelle's dress. I made a new layer, and actually left this one at normal mode and opacity! At the bottom, I used this brush, which was made by 77words. Again, I don't have the exact link. I *dun dun dun!* suck! And SWEET LORD! MY ICON IS DONE!
Thanks for reading my testimony of crack tutorial, and I hope it helped in some way. Do feel free to comment, question, and I'd love love love to see if anyone makes anything with this! YAY! *throws glitter* Enjoy!
, in ten or less steps!
Ah, my first tutorial. It's a hallmark moment. Bare with me, people.
First, the usual disclaimer. Please, do not be a massive douche bag and copy this tutorial exactly. Get your own image, play around with cropping and colors, whatever. Don't copy my exact icon. That would be unshiny of you.
NOW! Here's what I did. I used Photoshop CS, but I imagine it's pretty easily translated to other programs.
I took this picture of the lovely Michelle Rodriguez, because I am a massive fangirl, and my love knows no bounds. Thank-you. I resized and cropped it, remembering that exact centering things makes the baby Jesus cry. Now, I wanted this picture to be colored, but it wasn't, so I desaturated it. If your icon is already colorized, you can skip the next few steps! If you don't know what the hell I'm rambling about, go away, because it's only going to get worse.
Now, my pretty little black and white icon needed a skintone. I know there are a shitload of different methods for this, but here's what I did! I duplicated the layer (warning: I'm another one of those layer whores), set it to soft light, and went to Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation. Making sure I had Colorize checked, I played around with the settings until I had what looked like a decent skintone. I'm making this tutorial after I made the icon, so I can't tell you what my exact settings were. I suck. Now, I took my handy dandy eraser tool, on a small circle brush, and erased everything but her skin. This looked okay, but I duplicated this layer, and set it to Color at 63%.
Now, Michelle was looking pretty sexy, but I can't take credit for that. To add to the sexyness, I wanted to give her dress some color. I chose green. Why, you ask? Aw, because it's my favorite color, and that's very sweet of you to ask! It also matched the texture I knew I'd be using later.
Go back to your first layer, your black and white base, duplicate it, and drag it to the top. Now go back to Hue/Saturation! Find the color you want the dress to be. Again, I used green. I almost used red, it would have been shiny too. Use whatever suits your mood/flow/chi/energy/sex drive/religious beliefs. Again taking my eraser tool (baby is so good to me >.>), I deleted everything but - you guessed it - the dress. I put this layer on Soft Light.
Here, it becomes a matter of preference. If you're happy with how it looks, great, move on! But I wasn't. So I duplicated my dress layer three times, setting the layers on Soft Light. Just do what seems right.
On top of everything, create a new layer. Set it to Multiply, and flood fill the layer with #C1A88E. Take your ERASER TOOL ZOMG! and erase Michelle. Her skin, her dress, all of it. MAKE IT GO BYE-BYE! This may not be necessary for your image, but it was for mine. I also adjusted the layer opacity to 82%.
The icon is steadily losing its sexyness, no? Don't worry, it'll get better. I took this texture by myrasis, and set it to Overlay at 34%. You may need to adjust the opacity! Experiment, man! Again, I used my shiny stick eraser and deleted Michelle. It just looked better that way. Very subtle. And for once in my life, I went for subtle!
Using the Color Picker, I selected a shade from her dress. In this case, green! YAY SHINY GREEN! Ahem. Create a new layer. In the color I picked, I applied this brush and set it to Soft Light. I don't have the download link, again, I suck. But it was made by the wonderful gender.
Take your Color Picker again. Pick a color. I picked a dark green, also from Michelle's dress. I made a new layer, and actually left this one at normal mode and opacity! At the bottom, I used this brush, which was made by 77words. Again, I don't have the exact link. I *dun dun dun!* suck! And SWEET LORD! MY ICON IS DONE!
Thanks for reading my testimony of crack tutorial, and I hope it helped in some way. Do feel free to comment, question, and I'd love love love to see if anyone makes anything with this! YAY! *throws glitter* Enjoy!