#all it needs now are blur/blend/etc tools and | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

kitconnor · 2 years ago

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hii i was wondering how you blend gifs such as this one? it’s something i wanna start doing but haven’t got the slightest clue how🥹

hi there !! blending is definitely one of the more fiddly aspects of gifmaking, but i'm happy to help !! before i start, here's some tutorials that really helped me out/look really helpful:

difficulty: low (by morningstr) difficulty: intermediate (more tailored to colourful gif blending) (by lamberts) difficulty: intermediate (by yenvengerberg) difficulty: low (by jackarthurdavenport) difficulty: intermediate (by nelsonnicks)

before you start, you should have a basic knowledge in how to colour your gifs, sharpen, etc etc. if you want any information on that, feel free to send me another ask for that.

i use photoshop 2022 for all my creations. and big disclaimer my process is VERY different to to others, but i don’t think it should change too much of your result.

1. create two gifs.

you’re going to start by creating two entirely separate gifs. when you’re blending, i find that it is typically easier if you can get two types of shots (mid, far, close up, that kind of thing) because it makes it easier to blend later on.

here we can see robin is kind of more of a mid shot on the right, but the left shot is zoomed in on her face to make it the focus.

from here, ensure your gifs have the same amount of frames and layers. you can delete the excess frames + layers to get them at the same amount. (eg. one gif had 42 frames, and the other 15, so i selected every layer + frame past 15 and deleted them.)

2. combining your gifs.

this is where it can all get a little hairy quick !! start by selecting all your layers, and putting them in a group. you can then rename that group so you can tell them apart when you duplicate them. then, select all your frames, change the frame delay to 0.05 and go from there.

now, pay attention to this bit. you’re going to take ONE gif over to the other. to do that, click on the four lines i highlighted up ^^ and go to copy frames. make sure all your frames are still selected. then, go to the gif we’re going to place the other gif on, and go to those same four lines but press ‘paste frames’ this time. this menu will come up:

click the exact same one i have highlighted, then press ‘okay’. now, your frames and layers have copied over. you should have two folders, and the gif you were copying will probably be the only one you see, but don’t worry ! your other gif is just underneath.

3. blending your gifs.

this part differs for each creator, but here’s how i do it. select the top layer that you want to blend in, and open this dropdown menu:

you’ll want to select either ‘lighten’ or ‘screen’. choose whichever looks better. your gif will now look like this:

so now we’re going to blend !

because of the negative space behind robin in the gif underneath, i’m going to try and move the top gif into it. how you blend and where is kind of down to just a visual thing. so, i’ll move my layers into that space and then i’ll properly begin blending.

now that i moved both of my gifs it leaves these pesky lines behind:

to blend them out, do the following:

select the folder itself. go down to this bottom bar, and select the circled icon (it’s a layer mask):

now, you have a layer mask. to use it, go over to your brush colours on the side bar (pictured below)

and make sure it’s on black. if it isn’t, you won’t be able to blend. after this, go to the gradient tool (in between the rubber and the blur tool on that same sidebar) and make sure your gradient looks similar to this:

if you need to change it, click on that gradient, go to basics, go the one with the checkers and change the colours to black. now, go back to your layer mask, making sure that your gradient tool is selected and create little increments going across that line. make sure you work horizontally, otherwise it’ll blend your gif away.

then, just keep doing that until you’re getting results you’re happy with. i’ve done a layer mask on both layers, and i’ll show you a tip in case you need to do that as well. but for now, do a rough blend with the gradient tool.

after that, go to the brush tool, and change your brush to a soft round brush, probably on 75-100. you can brush over spots you want to blend, as it allows you to be more particular.

this is what my gif looks like now:

from here, you colour each gif in their respective folders, convert to timeline -> convert to smart object, sharpen and save !! this is my final result:

#*tutorials #completeresources #gif tutorial #blending tutorial #useranne #tuserkay #usernorah #tuserrex #userrsun

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tigerlyla-of-metinna · 2 years ago

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How to repair eyes generated by AI with Photoshop and PainTool SAI

....the tygerlyla way (complicated and tedious) 😅😅😅😅😅

Ai art is astounding! Still, it can't compare to the hard work and beauty of art created by the artist, not to mention the time, sweat, tears, and -maybe some- blood. And Ai art also requires human touch and patience- training the program to come up with the character you want it to replicate... and then it generates those weird eyes, misshapen hands, and speckles that have no right to be there.

So here are my procedures... Be warned: the post is lengthy!

Choose the image and open with photoshop. Brace yourself for the task of fixing that (gorgeous) face.

Fortunately the eye on the left has the correct shape, so lasso that baby, copy paste, and flip it. Then use the perspective warp and fit it to the other side.

Erase the stuff you don't need until the other eye is a close match and looks better size wise. Flatten the image and create a new save.

Now boot the new save with the new eye on PainTool SAI. This is where I do my main repairs.

Create layers for the sclera, iris and pupils. Then start painting over the weird eyes with dark flats first.

For his warm amber peepers, clip a new layer, change the layer mode to Overlay and airbrush the orange at low density (flow)- about 30-40, and do a crescent shape brush strokes on the pupils. Blur the ends and repeat. Then clip another layer (Luminosity or Linear Dodge on PS) use a yellow orange color and create a lighter crescent.

I actually work with my canvas at this angle, easier for me to add details. Create another layer for fixing around the eyes. Eye dropper tool helps matching the colors of the fixed eyes and the ai image. Lots of blurring and shadows going on here. Once satisfied with the repairs, save the image and return to PS.

Now we fix the rest of him with a healing brush or spot brush tool, and zap those excessive moles. I also use a body hairbrush to create those thick eyebrows (after making em, change the layer to soft light to blend with the image's colors)

And this is where I use all available photo enhancement tricks at my disposal (skin smoothing plugins, 3LUTS, Liquify, etc.)

And it's done!

Thank you for making this far! Hope this helps fellow artist dabbling in ai programs.

#emhyr var emreis #ai art #stable diffusion #wip #witcher 3 #photo edit #photoshop #paintool sai #artist on tumblr #art tutorial #art help #art tips #photoshop tutorial #paintool sai tutorial

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ailee-art · 3 years ago

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hi! i love the snowy landscape process video you posted!! i was wondering if you could talk about about the brushes/textures (??) you used during painting the landscape? I've been trying to paint more but i find myself overapplying the blur tool too much instead of blending manually, but i found your process to use it really well.

Sure! I'm putting this under the cut though, because it got a bit long. 😂

So specific tools and software doesn't actually really matter, but for the record, what I used there is *checks video* Clip Studio Paint's gouache brush, the big textured brush I believe came from Ahmed's brush pack, (which was made for photoshop but can be imported into CSP) it's one of the oil brushes with the texture scale turned down, I believe. Then the lasso tool, an airbrush tool for some softness and color overlays and such, and CSP's "gauze cloud" as the textured brush for the snowy fog around the top of the mountains. I briefly used a blending tool on the sky, but tbh.. I don't really like blending tools. But my main goal there was to just soften that back into a gradient. Oh and a little bit of the finger smudge tool in the water. Which is actually way more tools than I'd normally use. Usually best to stick to only a few, tbh. You want your render to be at least somewhat consistent.. Not that it's a Rule. I mean use however many a piece demands, it doesn't really matter. The point is you don't want to over-complicate the process unnecessarily, or let playing with brushes distract from focusing on the piece itself. Anyway. To get to the point.

Beginners are commonly warned against using blur/blending tools and airbrushes, because overblending is a very tempting and common tendency when you start out. You can lose form and texture. And when everything is really soft, even the slightest hard edge stands out simply by contrast, which can encourage more overblending. So it's common to be kinda scared of hard edges lol.

But hard/firm edges are super important! They're important for composition, defining form, creating visual interest, etc. And even in areas of softness and rest you can create interest with texture and brushstrokes and color vibration and all that good stuff, which is why manual blending is usually preferred. But it is partly a matter of style. The best area for blur specifically would probably be if you wanted that out-of-focus effect. (but in such a case I think using smth like gaussian blur on an entire layer, rather than a blur tool, would be best... but I digress.)

If you find yourself overblending, my advice would be to confiscate your blur/blending/airbrush tools for a while lol. It's actually only just recently that I started using them at all. And even then I mainly use airbrushes, and rarely touch blending tools. But I feel more comfortable with it now, because I'm not using them to blend away my problems lol. I use them more deliberately now, rather than using them as a crutch to make something look smooth and pretty to compensate for my lack of fundamentals or something. Not that I'm totally free of that, though lol. My fundamentals are still not very strong, and I still think I overblend too much. General rule of thumb: If you're still learning the basics, it's best to stick to the basics. Tools are tools, there's no shame in any of them, but some you have to be a bit careful with. So when it comes to blending tools and airbrushing, I'd recommend trying to limit your use of them, especially at the start. Learning to blend manually is important, and it also gives you far more control.

Pay attention to your reference. The main places I'd use soft brushes and/or blending tools are things like soft gradients in the sky or water, or to establish some base color gradients over which you can do more textured detail work, or ambient occlusion. And try to stick to the principle of contrast. Soft edge, hard edge, soft edge, hard edge. Simplicity, complexity. That constant back and forth rhythm creates visual interest.

Okay idk if any of that answered your question, but I'll stop here. Feel free to let me know if I need to clarify something. And sorry if you were hoping for brevity 😂

I hope it helped, though?

I'm going to leave you with Marco Bucci's video on edges. I'd also highly recommend checking out his other videos, they are all very very well done. Seriously quality information. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnhj5efzN_w

#asks #art Qs #not art #krownest

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kadywicker · 5 years ago

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detailed giffing + basic coloring tutorial for beginners

so a lot of gif/coloring tutorials are pretty outdated or not that detailed & i wanted to put my own out there! in this:

how to get the screencaps for your gifs

how to make a general gif

basic coloring (no psds here, it just gives you a basic idea for making colors pop and look nice. you can look up how to use psds, but i prefer making my own for every gif as it’s much more personal, gratifying, and creative. there’s nothing wrong with using psds as long as you don’t claim them as your own, it’s just not my personal thing)

how to save a gif

we’ll be going from this:

to this

what you need:

photoshop (cc 2019 is what i’m using, but this works with any version of photoshop really as long as you download a version with the timeline feature) i won’t add download links here since i don’t want this deleted, but you can look some up on tumblr or use the pirate bay (current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) & follow the instructions there.

for windows: potplayer/kmplayer (both use literally the exact same instructions) this tutorial uses potplayer but kmplayer uses like literally the same instructions, it just doesnt work right on my computer

for mac: mplayer. this tutorial does NOT cover this so find a tutorial on tumblr on how to take screencaps with mplayer & then skip to the “how to make a general gif” section. though, again, i’m on a pc so i have no idea if this is entirely accurate for mac.

if you’re downloading from youtube: clipconverter

if you’re Definitely Legaly torrenting: utorrent + the pirate bay (again, current url is pirateproxy.blue as of 4/29/2020) or another torrent site + you should really consider getting a VPN when torrenting (i use privateinternetaccess but you can find one that suits you)

note: download an adblock of some kind, disable automatic downloads on your computer, & download an antivirus program if you want because some sites are sketchier than others! this is ESPECIALLY crucial on sites like piratebay. keep your computer safe babes.

1. screencapping

there’s several ways to get screencaps on photoshop, but this is the easiest imo and i’ve never done the whole convert video frames to layers thing. like i said, you’ll need potplayer or kmplayer. i’m using potplayer. important note: don’t accidentally download viruses here! read each screen carefully & make sure you’re not hitting accept to download any secondary programs.

1. download your .mp4/.mkv. you can go to youtube & find a clip/scene/whatever and use clipconverter to download it. just make sure you download it at 720 (or higher) as anything lower than that will give you a poor quality gif. you can also download using somewhere like the pirate bay, but for this you need utorrent & i would HIGHLY recommend using a vpn if you live in a country where torrenting copyrighted content is illegal, as your internet provider may flag your ip address if you don’t & you torrent too often.

2. download potplayer/kmplayer & get it set up

3. create a screencaps folder. i always put mine on my desktop. in your screencaps folder, make a folder for however many gifs you want in your set. i just have one for mine so:

4. open up your .mp4/.mkv

5. hit ctrl + g to bring up the screen capture pop-up & set your settings to these. click the button w/the three dots next to the storage option & select the folder you created for your first gif

6. navigate to the scene you want to gif. when you’re there, pause it and hit the start button on the consecutive image capture screen, then play the video. how many screencaps you need depends on the size of your gif. for larger gifs (so like 540px wide gifs), you’re probably going to want to keep it below 30 frames. for smaller gifs (268px wide or less) you can maybe stretch it to 60, depending on how much coloring you add. you can always delete screencaps later though in photoshop, so don’t worry about it too much. for this gif, i only had 17 frames because the scene was really short lmao

7. go to your screencap folder you made & delete any unnecessary frames. it’ll look like this:

8. repeat the process for any other gifs, making new folders in your “screencaps” folder, numbered for however many gifs you’re making. make sure to change the folder you’re loading the images into on the image capture pop up though so they don’t all go into folder 1.

2. making a simple gif (+sharpening)

1. first, you need to load your screencaps. when you open up photoshop, go to file > scripts > load files into stack

2. when the window pops up, switch the “file” option to “folder”

3. click browse and find your screencap folder for your first gif (in my case, desktop > screencaps > 1) once it’s all loaded, click “OK”

4. it’ll take a minute to load all your screencaps into photoshop. when they do, go to the upper bar on photoshop > windows > timeline

5. when the timeline bar shows up, click “create frame animation”

6. hit this button and click “make frames from layers”

7. hit the button again and click “reverse frames”

8. click back onto your first gif. then select the rectangular marquee tool and set it to whatever gif size you want. the width for 2 small gifs next to each other is 268px, the width for full size gifs is 540px. most people use 268x150 px for gifsets of 4+

9. use the marquee tool to select what area you want for your gif, like this. it’s up to you how to crop it! get creative!

10. go to image > crop

11. now that your image is cropped, go to image > image size. change the size to your desired gif size (in this case 268x150). hit “OK”. then make sure it’s zoomed in to 100%

12. now, you COULD just save this gif, but they look way better sharpened. so you need to convert this to a smart object. to do so, first select all your layers in the righthand layer window. to select all the layers, click on your top layer, hold shift, and scroll down to your bottom layer & click on it as well while still holding shift

13. next, you need to select all your frames. go back to the options button from part 6 > select all frames

14. next, we’re going to create an action to make your life 100x easier when it comes to sharpening gifs in the future. to do so, go to the actions icon (may look different on different versions of photoshop, but basically just find the actions window)

15. create a new action with this button. name it something. i named this one “sharpen tutorial” and hit “record”

16. click this button to convert to video timeline

17. go to filter > convert for smart objects

18. go to your single created layer and right click and click duplicate layer. this helps get rid of the transparent border around the gif.

19. go to filter > sharpen > smart sharpen & use these settings

20. go to filter > blur > gaussian blur. set it to these settings.

21. go to your second layer with the filters on it & right click on the gaussian blur filter to select “edit smart filter blending options” and set the opacity to 50%. you can mess around with this for different levels of sharpness. the closer to 0%, the sharper your gif will be.

22. hit the stop recording button on your sharpen action. now you’ll have an action to use next time you make a gif! after you’ve followed all the steps 1-13 you simply go to actions, click on your saved sharpening action, and hit play instead & it’ll do steps 14-21 in a few seconds. here’s a pic of the stop button on the actions window

23. our gif is now sharpened! you can end with this & skip to the saving a gif section, or you can continue to coloring. here’s what we have so far.

3. coloring

now on to coloring. this is pretty basic coloring and it probably won’t work if you follow my numbers exactly, as every single scene is different color + lighting wise. but this is just an example of the kind of thing you could do. basically, if you’re making vibrant gifs, you want to up the brightness + contrast + vibrance and make the colors already present pop. if you want anything more complicated (pale gifs, changing the colors to make, say, quentin’s shirt in these gifs red instead of blue), you’ll have to find other tutorials or experiment on your own. learning how to color & finding your style takes time! you can download psds if you want, but imo those kinda take the fun out of making gifs? that’s just me though.

after each step, i’ll show you what the gif looks like.

1. i usually start with a curves layer. i usually don’t mess with the color curve options, just this one:

2. next, i do a brightness/contrast layer

3. next, i do a vibrance layer. make sure not to make it TOO saturated or it’ll look bad.

4. next i do a color balance layer. this is where it really starts differing depending on what color you want your gif to be.

5. next we move to the selective color layers, which are arguably the most powerful. here you can make colors pop, change colors, etc. it’ll take lots of practice & messing around with, but here’s what i did with this gif. this one is making yellow + blue pop

6. next, i did two more selective color layers editing the blue tab to make the blue pop even more

7. i still wasn’t quite happy with it, so i added another selective color layer to edit the blacks + neutrals + greens

8. for good measure, i added one more brightness/contrast layer

9. and the gif is done! however, you can play around with various adjustment layers until you’re happy. again, this is just an example of how to do basic coloring. it’s a skill like any other & takes practice. to keep consistent coloring in a gifset,

9b. you may want to make a psd of this coloring. to do so, you need to put all your adjustment layers in a folder, delete your frame layers, and click file > save as. save it as a .psd. then you can open it and drag it onto any other gifs you make, adjusting the coloring accordingly but still with the same vibes. you don’t have to do this, but it makes life easier. here’s how to use your saved psd, though obviously you’re using your own in this case and not a downloaded one.

4. saving your gif

1. on photoshop cc 2019, you go to file > export > save for web (legacy). for other versions, you can just go to file > save for web. use these settings. the gif size limit is 3mb per gif, so make sure your file size is under that. if it’s not, you’ll need to delete some frames or some adjustment layers.

2. now, photoshop is a bit of a pain & this gif timing will not be right. so you need to open your newly saved gif. then you hit this button + select all frames

3. click this button & select “other”. tumblr gifs are typically .05-.08. my photoshop is glitchy and i have to set mine to .1-.15 or they’re WAY too fast. but usually, go with .05-.08 unless yours ends up glitching too.

4. save it like you did the first time and ta-da! you’ve made a gif!

#gif tutorial #photoshop tutorial #edit tutorial #coloring tutorial #yes im using the magicians its my hyperfixation and i get to choose the gifs

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jewishbarbies · 4 years ago

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BOOK COVER TUTORIAL (MANIPS)

this tutorial will focus on manip covers like the one shown above.

time to edit: 3+ hours

please like/reblog if you found this helpful if you have any questions/comments, my ask is always open NO QUESTION IS TOO ‘DUMB’ TO ASK!

note: this tutorial is to show you how I made the edit above and explain how/why I did these things to get this result. it will not apply to every manip edit, which is why i encourage contacting me if you run into a snag.

now, let’s get started!

first, you need something you want to manip (re: banner) and a picture to replace whatever you’re going for. you want to make sure the colors/tones/angles of the two photos are as similar as possible. also, photo quality should be as high as possible for the highest quality results. for the manip pictured above, I used the poster on the left and this photo:

align the photos as best as you can. try lowering opacity or setting the top photo to ‘screen’ to better place and adjust the angles/size. once you have it where you need it, it’s time to erase. for making seamless skin transitions, I lower opacity on the eraser, make it a little large, and erase slowly. don’t be afraid to take your time with this, but remember you can always come back to it and adjust as needed later. you can also adjust the original background photo if needed as well, as I did to make the face better align with the neck and torso.

my image looked like this:

I added brightness, vibrance, hue/saturation, and exposure layers to adjust the coloring and shading of the face so it better matched the original:

next, i added gradients to the space below the chin for a shadow effect, using a black gradient with a low opacity adjusted with a low opacity eraser. then i added a yellowish gradient and erased the excess to keep the color along the top line of her face and added two brightness layers to give it a glow effect to match the original.

with layers:

without:

the next part is one of my favorites! i’ve never been very good at using the blur tools and such for changing backgrounds, so I started duplicating background layers and erasing them down/stretching them to cover things I wanted out of the picture. it’s patch work and can be stressful at times, but i’ve found it’s the best way for me to get the background I want.

the patch work layers look like this:

the end result looks like this:

i left the DC symbol there so i could add my text beneath it, like this:

for text, i recommend using textures even when you wish to keep it white. it can help it blend a bit better with the background and not look so edited. here, i added a photo of a white wall with vines growing on it as a texture and then a green gradient to give it a glow effect that would blend it with the glow around the top of his head.

example:

i did the same with my author name at the bottom so they looked similar and blended in with the edit. after that, I added some psd’s and a texture for color depth and a grainy effect like on all my edits.

the coloring phase is the most taxing, stressful part of this kind of cover edit. any psd or layers you add to change the colors will heavily depend on the shading/coloring of each photo of the manip and it may take several different psd’s and/or layers to get it ‘right’ (ie. to your liking). this is also the phase where you make adjustment edits to your manip like erasing pieces that don’t fit color/placement wise, etc. don’t be afraid to add dark gradients on a lower opacity for shadows to cover smaller blemishes you can’t figure out how to edit out.

my end result:

I hope this helps you & happy editing! xo

#ocappreciation #allaboutocs #occommunity #tutorial #mine #my tutorial #my edits #/okay to reblog

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dicennio · 5 years ago

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Here are few tips to color manga panels. This is not a tutorial bc I’m a loser but I hope it helps someone in someway~

FIRST: You need to now the basics regarding cleaning manga, once you get your manga cap ready we can start.

1) I prefer to get ride of all the gray scales because this way your coloring look less messy. When you leave the grayscale the outcome isn’t bad per se but you can see it throught the coloring you know?

2) Once your manga cap is ready select your layer > go to channels > load channel as selection > supr

3) Duplicate your original layer, set the layer blend in multiply and then you can add your base colors between the orig layer and the duplicated one!

4) To make your workspace more friendly separate each color into groups and name them!

5) Once you’re done putting the base colors you can start adding shadows. I tend to choose a color slightly darker than the one I use for the base

6) add a new layer > set it in multiply > add the shadows here. You can add as many shadow layers as you want.

6) Smudge tool is your friend when woking with shadows, I use it a lot bc it helps to blend the colors / make your shadows look more smoth (or if you’re super lazy you can select your layer > filter > blur > gaussian blur)

A FEW NOTES

I put all the base colors before I start shading AND I don’t care about the amount of layers I use to add shadows

When it comes to add highlights I always add them when the shadows are done. Usually white > soft light blend mode

I redraw most of my manga caps bcs I don’t like sfx sounds, to redraw certain patterns/lines clone stamp tool is your fried.

When it comes to coloring eyes I usually redraw them again so I can color them properly:

here’s a lil tutorial on how coloring eyes:

Once your entire coloring is done you can start to play with saturation, levels, curves etc. I tend to do this procces in a new document, to do it so I save the colored page as png and then I open it again to add some effects/textures/etc.

I can’t think in anything else to add, so if yall wanna know something and I can help just let me know and I’ll add here asap~

#I'm sorry if this isn't /that/ helpful tbh #these are just basics but if it helps someone then GOOD.#bc as i said im a loser who is still improving #but i repeat if you wanna know something specific just reply here and i'll try to add it~#gfx asks

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momogaoka · 5 years ago

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Header Coloring Tutorial

(Requested by anonymous)

What you need:

Adobe Photoshop (any version)

VLC Media Player/ KMPlayer / any player with screengrab capabilities

Mood music (optional)

Here I will be showing you how I make my headers, specifically in a pastel coloring style. This is a long image-heavy post! You can find the whole tutorial under the cut.

0. Put on some background music.

I like to listen to Tatsuro Yamashita's music when I make pastel GIFs/edits because I feel like his songwriting is pastel-colored. (He's also an amazing musician overall. I highly recommend his 1980 album Ride On Time!)

1. Find the image/scene you want to use.

When finding scenes to screengrab, I recommend working with video files that are 1080p or higher. 720p is adequate, but if you have the option to get a copy in 1080p, do it! Avoid working with anything lower than 720p.

To screengrab, open the video file in VLC / KMP / etc. then take a screengrab of the scene you want to use. Each player has different controls for taking screengrabs; go to Settings to find out the keyboard shortcuts.

The screengrab we're using for this tutorial is from Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon Classic Episode 15. Here is the "raw" version:

2. Open your screengrab in Photoshop.

Open Photoshop, then click File > Open > [your screengrab]. Usually VLC / KMP will save the file in your Pictures folder.

3. Crop the image.

Click the Crop Tool, then type in your desired width and height in pixels (px). For headers, it doesn't really matter what size you pick as long as the aspect ratio is 16:9. This online aspect ratio calculator is incredibly useful.

(Disclaimer: I realized only after taking all the screenshots for this tutorial that the example I'm using doesn't have a 16:9 aspect ratio. My apologies. Anyway, do as I say, not as I do. LMAO)

4. Sharpen your image.

Initially, in the Layers panel, you should have one layer named Background. Right-click this layer, then click Duplicate Layer. Then click the eye next to the Background layer to make it invisible.

Now click the Background copy layer. On the menu bar at the top of the screen, click Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen. These are my settings:

Sometimes the difference isn't so readily apparent, but when an image is sharpened, it goes:

(This next step is optional.)

To achieve a sharp look but with softer edges, duplicate the Background copy layer. Click the Background copy 2 layer. Then click Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur. These are my settings:

At first the image will get all blurry, so set the Background copy 2 layer's opacity to 30%.

5. Create these four adjustment layers as your base.

This is the base I use for almost all of my edits. It helps set the "look" I'm going for.

(I learned this from this tutorial by @completeresources.)

Above the Layers panel, you'll find the Adjustments panel.

a.) Click Levels (top row, second from left). This adjustment will lighten the image considerably and sort of wash out the colors.

These are my settings:

When you're done, click the arrow at the bottom to return to the Adjustments list.

b.) Click Selective Color (bottom row, rightmost).

Click the drop-down button next to Reds and choose Blacks (at the very bottom of the list). Then move the Black slider (bottom slider) up to 100%. This will "protect" the blacks in your image once you start going crazy with the coloring later.

c.) Click Vibrance (middle row, rightmost).

Set the vibrance to around 30-40. I went with 35 here. This will make the colors pop just a tiny (almost invisible) bit.

d.) Click Gradient Map (bottom row, second from right).

Click the black-and-white option, then OK.

In the Layers panel, change the Gradient Map's blending option from Normal to Exclusion. Then set the opacity to 10%. Now the image will look slightly faded.

Now let's compare the image before and after these adjustments:

6. Adjust the coloring.

So first of all, I just have to say that Selective Color is my best friend. I use it all the time (way too much).

As you can see, the most prominent color in the image is light purplish-pink. I was really feeling the pink, so I wanted to make the image even more pink. To do this, click Selective Color, then select Magentas from the list. I don't have a fixed formula for coloring, so all I really do is play around with the sliders until I find the color I want. Experiment as much as you like. After fiddling with the sliders, these are the settings I ended up with:

Now the purplish parts are essentially gone.

But the yellow-green of the trees is still a little too striking for me, so I clicked Selective Color again, then selected Yellows. I fiddled with the sliders again and ended up with this:

Now the trees don’t clash as much with the pink anymore.

I'm still not completely sold on this coloring at this point. Now I want to add a bit of blue. So I adjusted the Color Balance (middle row, third from left).

These are my settings:

And this is the image:

Some of the purple bits have returned, though they're not as prominent as they were before. The image is still mostly pink.

7. Add one last Gradient Map. For the final step, add a Gradient Map just like last time. But instead of setting the blending option to Exclusion, this time set it to Overlay with the opacity at 10%.

And now here is our finished header:

8. Add a divider. (optional)

If you want an asymmetrical divider or a torn paper divider, here's what you have to do.

a.) Asymmetrical divider - Click the Polygon Tool and make sure the Sides are set to 3 and the color is white (#ffffff).

Now draw a triangle over the header. Make it slightly bigger than the image itself. Then click the Move Tool and check the Show Transformation Controls box so you can adjust the size and placement of the triangle.

This is how the header looks with this type of divider:

b.) Torn paper divider - In the Layers panel, click the New Layer button (second from left, next to the trash can) and set the blending option to Screen.

Then select the Brush tool and pick a brush that could imitate torn paper edges. (The brush I used here is from @completeresources’ 20k celebration pack.) Then draw over the image. Fill in any gaps if necessary.

This is how it looks with the torn paper divider:

9. Save your header. Click File > Save for Web & Devices. Alternatively, you could also click Ctrl + Alt + Shift + S. Make sure it's set to JPEG, then click Save.

Now your header is ready to use!

So that's how I make my headers, but this is definitely not the only way to color images. There are so many more tutorials out there for other styles of coloring. Keep studying and keep experimenting until you find the style that you really like.

I hope this tutorial helped!

#coloring tutorial #header tutorial #photoshop tutorial #itsphotoshop #yeahps #allresources #completeresources #pastel coloring #mine: all #mine: tutorials

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dawnsedits · 4 years ago

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hi! i love your edits and i want to get into gif making. if you could give me some tips on how to start or what stuff you use it would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!!! I’ll give you some general tips and some links and if you want more details about anything, feel free to send in another ask!

Programs

You’re best off with Photoshop, bc that’s got a lot of tools for coloring and whatnot, and that’s what pretty much every tutorial on this website uses. There’s full Photoshop, which is a monthly subscription, or Photoshop Elements, which is a one-time fee but with fewer tools (and I pay for it, so idk where to download it for free or anything). If you don’t want/can’t get Photoshop, there are websites you can use for free (that’s where I started, don’t remember what it was called tho), but your tools will be limited (which is fine! As I said, it’s where I started, and it was still plenty of fun). The rest of this will generally assume you’re using Photoshop, though some of it applies universally

Getting Footage

This post will tell you a lot more about how and where to download stuff than I ever could. You can also screenrecord YouTube and, for shows, the channel’s website, though this will be limited in the content you can find. 1080p is best for both making high quality gifs and saving space on your computer, though if you’re recording YouTube I recommend finding 4K footage if possible, and 720p will work as well

Making the Gifs

Here’s a post compiling all sorts of resources! It’s got links to tutorials and resource blogs. If you want more, you can go to my main blog (@castieldawnchester, tho when that changes, just check this blog’s title for my current user) and search #resources or #tutorials

Sizing

First off, the most basic of basics: Sizing. A single gif needs to be 540px wide; two gifs in a row need to be 268px; and for three gifs, the outer two need to be 177px, with the middle gif being 178px. The height is pretty much up to you - my two go-to heights are 260px or 225px. (If you want examples: 225px, 260px, 360px, 540px [do not do this one unless you want Really Heckin Big gifs]). With this in mind, crop away!

For headers, however, you’ll want a 16:9 ratio - mine are 640x360.

Sharpening

Once it’s cropped (and only after it’s cropped, it’ll be useless if you try to sharpen it beforehand), you’ll want to sharpen it. Go to Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen, and these are my settings:

Then add a gaussian blur by going to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur. I use a radius of 1px, then set the opacity to 20%. Feel free to adjust both the sharpen and the blur to your personal preferences!

Text

Basic captioning is usually done in Calibri or Arial or a similar font. Bold and italicize it. Add a stroke and a drop shadow (do this by clicking on the text layer, then going up to Layer > Layer Style). I make it size 17, stroke width set to 2, and my drop shadow settings are:

Feel free to adjust any of that to your personal preference!

And the fancy edit text is entirely up to you! Mess around with sizing, colors, opacity, all the different panels under layer style, and the layer blending modes to your heart’s desire. If you can’t find a font you like already installed in Photoshop, you can find more online

Basic Coloring

This tutorial is specifically about curves. A curves layer is only my first of several steps for coloring, but it’s probably the most vital imo

But a thing to remember about coloring tutorials is that everyone colors differently. Some people don’t use curves, for example, and I don’t really use photo filters bc I prefer color balance. It also depends if you want natural coloring, vibrant, pale, black and white, or whatever, and even then, everyone has different styles. My own style is a mishmash of different tutorials and my own preferences (I actually changed it a bit just a few weeks ago). So I recommend looking at a variety of different coloring tutorials, trying them out, and picking out the bits you think make your gifs look the best.

With all that in mind, these are my layers for coloring:

I work from the bottom up. (Ignore that curves copy, it’s a leftover from an action I need to get rid of.) For curves and levels, I just hit auto.

For exposure, I add some exposure to make the gif a little brighter, and some gamma correction to make the blacks pop a little more. For brightness/contrast, I add a little of both. (But be careful with both of these layers - making your gif too bright will ruin the gif’s quality.)

For vibrance, add a little saturation (don’t go too far or you’ll ruin the quality - I tend to stay below +10) and some vibrance. I do this before color balance specifically bc it makes it easier to see what colors need balancing. For that, it’s pretty self-explanatory - if your gif is too yellow, drag the slider over to the blue; if it’s too green, drag it to magenta; etc. The changes to this layer will also be small.

(Coloring is like that, usually, in my experience. Beyond the curves layer, and perhaps the levels layer depending on the scene, it’s basically less is more - the combo of the layers will give the look you want and make a drastic difference, but each individual layer will look like only a tiny change.)

Finally, selective coloring. Selective Color 2 is to adjust for skin tones, and I only use red and yellow. For both, lower the cyan a little bit, and increase red and yellow. Then Selective Color 1 is specifically for the blacks. Go to blacks and increase black by +30, then drop the layer opacity to 30% - this’ll make your gif look a little more HD. Feel free to fidget with this layer!

(If you want me to do a full tutorial with pictures and examples, just ask!)

Fancy Coloring

This can be whatever you want - vibrant, pale, changing the colors, etc. For that, I suggest finding tutorials, bc I won’t really be able to help.

But for effects like this gifset or this one, I use gradient maps and gradients. Mess with the colors, the blending options, and all the little settings to get whatever look you’re going for. (Again, if you want a full tutorial, I can absolutely do that!)

Exporting and Posting

The general speed for gifs is .05, tho I use .04.

The max size is 10mb (though I’ve noticed for headers that they seem to freeze if they’re above 5mb). Keeping it smaller will make it easier for Tumblr to load tho (cause we all know how functional this website is).

And tags!! Are!! Important!! Believe me. Unless you have a billion followers, your gifset will get a mere handful of notes and flop epically on your own. Find gifmakers who track tags, find source blogs, and tag them. There are fandom-specific blogs, character-specific blogs, actor-specific blogs, ship-specific blogs, and blogs for movies/shows/whatever in general - it might take some digging for smaller fandoms, but I guarantee you there’ll be someone you can tag. The first five tags are generally the most important, bc beyond that, there is zero guarantee Tumblr’s lOvElY search function will be able to find your post.

And lastly...

Don’t Get Discouraged

Giffing can be time-consuming, and given the current lack of reblogging on Tumblr, it can be hard to have a post do well. It depends on the fandom too - tiny fandoms, dead fandoms, the super massive fandoms, your post will likely go even more unnoticed than usual.

But if you’re having fun, don’t give up. It’s worth it! You made a thing you like! And you enjoyed doing it! That’s the point! Keep learning, keep growing, keep playing, keep giffing. Someone will always love your content, even if that someone is you.

I’m going to stop now, bc the SPN finale is nigh and I’m ready to die (hehe that rhymed), but as I said, if you want more, go search around on my main blog, or send in some more asks!

#someone asking me for giffing tips really made my night THANK YOU #tutorial #tips #anon #dawn answers stuf

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ifishouldvanish · 5 years ago

Text

Editing tips, I guess?

Hey uhhhhh, so I've gotten lots of new followers over the past few weeks and wanted to do some kind of thank you?? Also, I have seen a fair share of "omg HOW" in the tags on my edits (which??? always make my day?? my week??? my life????)

Anyway, I thought I'd share some of my ~techniques with y'all? So here goes:

(lmao this got really fuckin long so cuuuuuut)

1. Make EVERYTHING a Smart Object

Okay, maybe not EVERYTHING, but seriously. Do it. It will save ur editing life. You ever shrink something down and then an hour later change your mind and decide you want it bigger? If you're not using a smart object, it’ll get blurry when you scale it back up and you’ll be fuCKED!

To make a layer/group a smart object, just right click on it in the layers panel and select "convert to smart object". This makes Photoshop store the layer's original data in a separate space for safe keeping (an embedded .psb file, to be exact) -- so you can shrink it and enlarge it as many times as you want without any lossiness.

As soon as I paste/place a screencap, texture, or whatever into my document, the first thing I always, ALWAYS do is convert it to a smart object!!

Why, you might ask?? Continue to item No.2 :)))

2. Harness the POWER of Smart Objects!!

The reason I am obsessed with Smart Objects is because I am obsessed with making any edits as non-destructive as possible. If you use “Image > Adjustments > Levels/Selective Color/etc” on a regular layer, that’s a destructive edit. Same goes for any Filters (such as blur/sharpen) and transforms (Warp, distort, perspective). You lose the original data that was there and the only way it can be undone is with ctrl+z. Might not seem like a huge deal at first, but if you keep chugging along for an hour and decide, “hmm, maybe i went too hard on that levels adjustment after all...” your only options are deleting the layer and starting over, or uh... hoping it’s still in your history panel.

However, it's really easy to avoid destructive edits when you use smart objects!! Because all those adjustments, filters, and transforms become “Smart Filters”. Smart Filters have all the non-destructive advantages of performing these adjustments via adjustment layers, but have the added bonus of ONLY effecting the layer they’ve been applied to, instead of cascading down and effecting all the layers beneath. (Which can be a good thing sometimes, but that’s a whole other topic)

Smart filters are attached to their ‘parent layers’, and can be hidden, deleted, or modified (by double-clicking their names) at any time:

Can I hear a wahoo???

Other cool things about Smart Objects:

You can copy a Smart Filter with all its settings to another layer by alt+click+dragging it over

You can change the order in which Smart Filters are applied by clicking and dragging them around

You can edit a smart object independently/in a sort of 'isolated' mode by double-clicking on its thumbnail!! I like to use this for edits that are specific to a given screencap-- like cutting out the background and any initial adjustments, like levels and selective coloring. Once you’re done editing the contents of the smart object, hit ctrl+s and it will automatically update in the main document!

But really, the biggest thing for me here is psychological. I know I’m much more willing to try things and experiment when I know that I can easily go back and tweaks things at any time. Otherwise, I’d stick with adjustments I don’t really like all that much simply because it would take too much time/effort to redo them.

3. Don't even THINK ABOUT using the eraser tool or I will STOMP YOU to death with my hooves!!

Use a layer mask instead. Please I am begging you. It all comes back to making your edits as non-destructive as possible. If you erase something, it's gone forever. When you mask something, you can make changes to which parts are visible/not visible as often as you want.

For the newbies or the otherwise unacquainted, a mask is a greyscale ‘map’ attached to a layer (or layer group) that controls its opacity. Black areas give the layer 0% opacity, white areas will give it 100% opacity, and you can use shades of grey to achieve partial transparency. You ‘draw’ on these layers with the your trusty brush and paint bucket tools.

You can create a mask by selecting a layer and then clicking the little mask icon at the bottom of the layers panel (it’s the one with the little circle inside the box). Draw black on the parts you want to hide, and if you erase too much on accident? Just paint back over it with white!

I love masks, and sometimes i will throw an already masked layer inside a layer group and apply a second mask to said group. This way I have two masks that can be edited independently from each other. Like layer mask-ception.

So anyway, yes. Eraser tool? Don’t know her.

4. Try using channels to create masks!

This is a technique that works REALLY well for cutting out complex shapes, such as wispy hair (or feathers!) -- provided there's strong contrast between the subject and the background, and the background isn't too busy.

This is also a fantastic method for capturing alpha transparency. For example: If you have a neato paint stroke/splatter/watercolor texture you want to use as a mask, but has a solid background that’s getting in the way of things. This method will capture all the semi-opaque areas flawlessly!!

While editing your image (which you had better have made into a Smart Object!!!) do the following:

Switch from the "layers" panel to the "Channels" panel.

Toggle through the R, G, and B channels, and decide which one has the most contrast for the areas you are trying to mask.

Ctrl+Click that channel's thumbnail. This will create a selection marquee.

Switch back to the layers panel

Click on the target layer/group (the one you are trying to mask)

Click the mask icon at the bottom of the panel (the one with the circle inside a box)

Release the selection and invert the mask if necessary

If you're using this method to cut out a subject from its background, you probably won't want alpha transparency. In this case, select the mask thumbnail and use a levels adjustment on the mask itself to bump the contrast until you have more of a cutout effect!

It sounds like a lot of steps, but it’s really simple! So I made this handy GIF: (click to view from beginning)

Sometimes you won’t want to use this method for the entire image, but just a specific part. For example, if you’ve cut out a character with some other method (magic wand, manual brushwork), but are having a hard time with their hair in particular. Use this method to create the selection, but instead of converting the whole selection into a mask, use the brush tool to apply the mask only where you need it! You can invert the selection itself with shift+ctrl+i.

5. Outlining text

The font I used here is Salomé, which is actually a solid typeface with no outlined version. But you can make virtually any font into an outlined version if you so desire!

There's two possible methods here, actually:

The Easy Way:

Add a stroke layer effect to the text layer (by selecting the layer, clicking the little “fx” button at the bottom of the layers panel, and choosing “Stroke...”)

As far as settings go, aligning the stroke to the inside usually yields the best result/maintains the integrity of the letterforms.

Make the color of the text itself match the background.

If necessary, use the lighten/darken blend modes to create the illusion of transparency.

If you need true transparency (which I didn't until I decided I wanted to apply a gradient over the text), you'll have to try something else-- The Also Easy But Less Than Ideal Way:

Right click the text layer in the layers panel and select "convert to shape".

Now you can edit the fill/stroke the same way you would any other vector shape.

Again, you’ll want to set the stroke alignment to ‘inside’. For vector shapes, those settings are a little hidden. You’ll wanna open up that little dropdown in the toolbar with the line in it, and click “More Options”.

This is semi-destructive, so if you're working with a lot of text you might have to edit later, consider duplicating and hiding those text layers first so you'll have a 'backup' of it.

And while I’m on the topic of text...

6. Try breaking up your text layers!

I know a lot of people like to draw a neat little text box to put their text in, and then they center it all nice and neat and probably use a small font size to make it subtle and stuff... and that’s cool. Everyone’s got their different styles and things they like to emphasize in their edits and there’s absolutely merit to that sort of thing (case and point: the bulk of my dear @herzdieb’s work), but. Listen.

I love typography. I love a good typeface. The stroke widths, the letterforms, the ligatures, the serifs... I get like, horny on main for a good typeface. I like to make the text on my edits BIG, so that those details can shine. I also like doing interesting things with the text. Jumbling words/letters around, distorting them, deconstructing them and just... letting the text really ~interact with the rest of the composition instead of just kinda politely floating on top of it.

I’m not saying you have to do that kinda stuff. Or that I think neat little floaty text boxes are boring, or lazy, or whatever. It’s just... personally, I get really inspired by type. Fun type treatments are one of those things I LIVE FOR, something of a ~signature of mine, and I encourage everyone to just... try it? To use text as more of an integral Design Element and less of a... idk. A caption?

So if you have a quote, or even just a word... put each word (or letter) on its own text layer. And then: make ‘em different sizes. Make the words so big they don’t fit on the canvas. Rotate each one at a fun angle. Scatter them around. Go nuts. Use masks to chop parts of the letterforms off. Make ‘em overlap. Just have at it. Or, as the kids these days are saying: go absolutely fuckin feral.

If that really just isn’t your style, or doesn’t work/make sense for the edit you’re doing, fine. Delete all the layers and just do a text box or whatever. But. I’m tellin u.

Give it a try.

At least once.

Just... a lil taste.

7. Understand the difference between lighten/darken vs screen/multiply

For a while in my photoshoppin' youth, my understanding of these blend modes basically amounted to "darken makes things darker, and multiply makes things really darker", and vice versa for lighten/screen. But there's an important difference between how these blend modes work, and if you understand them, you can use them more... strategically? I guess?

Darken and Lighten are kinda misnomers tbh, because they technically don't really darken or lighten anything. What they actually do is make it so that only the areas of the layer that are darker or lighter than the content of the layers beneath them are visible. This produces some pretty nifty layering effects that you can't achieve with screen and multiply.

Here’s an example: (if you’re reading this on a phone with the brightness dimmed down you probably won’t be able to see the differences)

Without any the texture applied, you can really see the noise/graininess of Crowley’s jacket in the screencap. You can also see the ‘seam’ where Crowley fades into the background-- the jacket is a green-ish black, while the background it’s fading into is more of a purple-black.

With the texture set to ‘Screen’, the whole image becomes lighter across the board. Crowley’s jacket gets lighter, and so does Aziraphale’s jacket and the pink cloud thing. This does little to nothing to obscure the poor image quality and disguise that ‘seam’.

But with the ‘Lighten’ blend mode, ONLY the dark parts of the image appear lightened, and not only do they appear lightened, but they get kinda equalized. Notice how the patchy jpeg artifacts on Crowley’s jacket disappear, how that color seam smooths out, and how the brightness of Aziraphale’s jacket and the pink cloud doesn’t change at all.

This isn’t to say that lighten/darken are better and that you shouldn’t use screen/multiply. They each have their uses. But most often, I find myself using lighten/darken because the way they work is honestly really helpful? And just cool af?

8. Masking individual frames on gifs

If you ever feel like torturing yourself by making a gif that has frame-by-frame masking, my advice is don't try to mask each frame from scratch. You'll get patchy/wobbly results from the masks being slightly different on each frame.

Instead, mask the first frame, then alt+click and drag that mask onto the next frame. Make any minor adjustments to the new mask as needed, and repeat for each frame. This saves time and more importantly, keeps the masking consistent on areas with little to no movement, which makes a HUGE difference in how smooth the final product will be.

If you look at the edges of the animation, they’re nice and steady and consistent. It’s only the parts that have a lot of movement (like the back of his neck) where you can see any ‘ghosting’/wobbly-ness happening.

Sometimes the mask will move when I copy it to the next frame. Like, for the whole document. It gets nudged 20 pixels down or to the left or s/t every time. I have yet to figure out why, but I’m betting it has something to do with shooting myself in the foot with the frame 1 propagation settings at some point during editing?? ANYWAY, when this happens, just unlock the mask from its layer (click the little chain icon between their thumbnails) and move it back into place.

In these cases, I also like to pick a spot with a hard edge (such as the shoulder in the above gif) as a reference point of where it needs to be moved to. It kinda sucks having to do this for every frame, but you already signed up for some suckage when u decided to mask every frame of a gif, so I mean... 👀

9. Don't be afraid/too intimidated to do manips as needed!

Manips can be tricky if you're really striving for realism. There's light sources and color grading and perspectives to reconcile!! But when you're doing an artsy Edit with a capital E, odds are those kinds of discrepancies will be thoroughly camouflaged by all the levels, black and white, etc adjustments you're doing!

Something I run into often is, "I like this screencap, but the top of their head/hair is chopped off :(" But if I go back through all the screencaps from the scene, there's usually another frame where the camera is planned/zoomed out enough that I can steal the rest of their head/limb from it! And since it's from the same scene/shot, the lighting and color grading should already be a perfect match!

A super simple example:

So I wanted to use this picture of David and Michael for this edit, but 1) They’re standing on the wrong sides for their characters, and 2) part of David’s arm is covered up by Michael’s.

Of course, the easiest course of action would be to just mirror the photo so they’re on the correct sides, but 1) mirroring faces tends to yield wonky results, and 2) that still wouldn’t give me a perfect, free-standing cutout of Crowley to place wherever I want in my composition (as opposed to being forced to awkwardly position him off the edge of the canvas to hide the fact that the other arm is missing)

Fortunately, it only took all of like, two (2) minutes to draw a crude selection around his good arm, copy and paste it into a new layer, flip it around, and add any necessary masking to get the shape right.

My point here isn’t to teach y’all how to do manips, or to pass this off as an impressive example of one. Because it’s really, REALLY not. My point here is to demonstrate that even something as tiny and simple as this can really open up your options for what you can actually do with an edit/composition.

So next time you’re feeling limited/inconvenienced by the crop of a screencap, just... you know. Consider whether or not it’s worth attempting a quick and dirty manip to fix it.

Another Example:

Sometimes you’re torn between two screencaps. You like one element from Screencap A but also want some other element from Screencap B. What to do? Just frankenstein ‘em together. Layer one on top of the other, get them lined up, and mask out the necessary parts.

It’s easy to get hung up on stuff like “Uh... should Crowley’s shoulder be doing that?” but let me assure you that like... the people looking at the final product are none the wiser to your butcherwork and will not notice. Especially if you’re going to add a bunch of contrast and color adjustments later on. (in fact, sometimes I’ll apply those adjustments first so I’m not distracted by any discrepancies that are going to come out in the wash anyway)

“I dunno... 🤔🤔 doesn’t seem anatomically correct... 🤔🤔🤔🤔” thought no one.

Point is... point is... dolphins you can get away with a LOT more than you think you can. Don’t let the desire to make these kinds of manips perfect get in the way of just... making them good enough. The bar isn’t that high, I promise.

10. Know what inspires you

What types of edits get you EXCITED? What kind of work do you see on your dash and go, "oh, I'm reblobbin' THAT!!1!"

I know for herzdieb, she's all about emotional pieces. She likes matching words/lyrics/poetry to on-screen moments and punching you in the feels with both. She hears a song, or reads a poem, and the lightbulbs go off for her, and she does her thing.

As for myself, I just live for the aesthetics of an edit. The colors, the fonts, the composition. I almost never know what text/screencaps I'm going to use when I start an edit. I just see a font I like, or a color palette, or a texture, and think, "I wanna use that!"

And once you know what inspires you, collect that inspo! I hoard textures and fonts. I have them organized into neat lil folders. When I wanna make an edit, that’s where I start. I just browse through them all until one or two start calling my name. Herzdieb collects songs and quotes and poems. Maybe your thing is color palettes, or aesthetic-y photos. Or whatever.

The point here is make the kinda stuff you like/want to see. Not the kinda stuff everyone else is making or the kinda stuff you notice gets the most notes.

11. Be able to let go of things that aren't working

I often begin an edit with a rough idea of the style, colors, or layout I'm going for. And I almost always end up doing... something totally different.

So don't get too fixated on what your initial ideas are. Be open to experimenting and just let the edit be what it wants to be. If something looks nice, do it. If it doesn't, don't try to force it just because, "well, I was inspired by this piece that did xyz and I wanna try it too".

When you see a certain effect that inspires you, just keep it in mind as a possible solution for the next time you make something-- don't make it into a benchmark, or some imaginary 'goal' you have to meet for This Edit You Are Working On Right This Moment. In fact, sometimes the elements I end up ditching are the very ones I started with, that initially sparked my inspiration. And that's okay. Inspiration can be a moving target, and if your vision for something changes, let it.

You wanna know what inspo reference I was looking at when I started that “Temptation Accomplished” edit?

Fucking this: https://search.muz.li/YTdiNjkwN2Rh

You might be thinking, “how the fUCK was that the inspiration??!! Your edit looks nothing like that at all!” ...and you would be 100% correct, and that is 100% my point. I spent a good hour or two trying to incorporate that cutout text layering effect before finally accepting the fact that it just wasn’t working for the edit I was making. And it wasn’t until then that it actually started to come together.

12. Be patient, and take the time to explore all your options!

I’m not gonna lie, y’all. I spend hours on my edits. I usually complete them over the course of 2-3 days/sittings. I rarely have a plan. 99% of the time I'm just throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. When I get stuck (when, not if), it helps to step away from it and come back later with a fresh perspective/set of eyes.

Every single edit I've posted, I have at some point felt like giving up on because I thought it looked like garbage (and not just because I was being self-deprecating/doubting myself, but because at those points, they simply weren't finished/something about the composition just wasn't working for me)

Work through those moments, and if necessary, take a break/sleep on it. It's always after I've exhausted my early ideas that the really good ones start to come to mind!

Here’s how the character poster edits I did progressed:

In Classic Me™ Fashion, I literally started off with just... textures I liked, and a font that I liked. Now, there were obviously a lot more ‘steps’ involved in both designs, but hopefully at the very least this gives a sense of how things get from point A to point B.

So uh... thanks 4 comin 2 my TED talk. I hope u learned at least one (1) cool new thing or maybe just feel vaguely inspired by this rambling mess?

#idk what to tag this...#photoshop #i guess?#tutorial #maybe?#w/e

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marcarella-pizza · 5 years ago

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Colouring/ Shading/ Lighting for Digital art

HI! Hello~ I’m here and I have a teeny tiny tutorial for you today (courtesy of dear Melito who actually wants my help??? I’m??? Blessed??? I realise that there’s a lot of you who have no clue who the fuck this person I’m referring to is, oh well, not my problem — ur missing out on hella great cake.)

So I have a timelapse of everything (below, duh, in case you can’t scroll) and I’m also gonna make comments on it cus ya know, these vids are only a minute long and thirty fucking megabytes like Jesus Christ.

So without further ado-do!

Should I have added music? Probably??? Ehhh the deathly silence can comfort you. (Wow what a mood.)

The Run Down:

Is rundown one word or two??

When colouring, I break it up into three main steps: base, line and “Hiding All My Fuck Ups”

(First) Base

I’ve never made it to first base... or any base

When colouring, use a non translucent brush to colour in everything. As in, so it’s completely solid??? Where’s my English today?

For every different colour, put it on another layer! I tend to do the skin colour first. You can go over lines that will be covered with another colour... did that make sense?

That’s it, I just felt the need to have three steps at least.

Line

As in... line art.

What I do is I lock my layer — that means when I try to add colour, colour will only be applied to the area that’s been drawn on.

I usually colour pick the colour I used for the base, and the line looks very pale when done (I do this with a non translucent brush too)

I then adjust the layer with lineart so the colour looks darker and more saturated. For my program (Medibang) I go Filter > Hue > Max out the saturation and lower the brightness > save. Sometimes I may do it again if it’s not dark enough.

If you can’t edit the colour then there’s another way! Duplicate your lineart > select the layer on top > change blending/ layer type to “Multiply” (it multiples the colour... duh)

If THAT doesn’t work I have one last suggestion before I sadly admit idk — duplicate line art > select top layer > colour the entire think a dark colour or black > lower the opacity

Line art done! (This time I wanted six steps — 6 is my fav number)

“Hiding All My Fuck Ups”

I rely on this too much okay?

I can actually further split this into two; shading and “I’m Kidding Myself” — let’s begin!

Shading

To shade, I work from bottom layer up!

What you’re gonna do, is select your bottom colour, (or any really but ORDER HELPS) and lock the layer.

Why? That way it’s easier to colour without going over the lines! (Your building on the foundation you set essentially)

With a semi translucent brush (FYI, translucent brushes are thinks like “blur” or “smudge” that purely affect what’s there and do not add anything) I use the watercolour brush set at 15-20% opacity.

I’ll eyedrop the base colour that I’m shading, and with the colour wheel, tru and find a darker version of that. NOTE: when looking for a darker colour, I don’t go to the black, I try and find a more saturated colour OR a darker HUE — black is a curse, I don’t ever use pure black or pure white — give your work the colour it deserves UwU

With the watercolour brush, I literally run the darker colour over all lines that indicate a shade (imagine a light somewhere and what that light touches is what you mainly focus on)

For clothes, I follow the creases I’ve drawn

For hair, I tru to imagine the hair in three main shapes and run the colour over the perimeters of those

Then it’s time to blend! I usually just eye drop the base colour again for this, and trace (lightly, our tablets have pressure sensitivity — same going for steps 1-8) the line that divides the light from the dark, adding a middle ground since the watercolour brush is only semi transparent.

For adding blush to skin: create new layer above skin layer > set to multiply, again, if you can’t do this then you follow same steps as before with line art) > using an Airbrush like brush (soft, no sharp edges, kind blurred), colour the skin areas that need blush.

Skin areas that need blush; areas with LOTS of blood vessels (head... the OTHER head...) areas with thinner skin (elbows, knuckles, knees)

If your skin layer was on the bottom, your blush will only appear on top of the skin and not the other layers!

Just be careful about the areas outside the drawing — you may need to do some tiny erasing

Finally, merge all the colours together. Sometimes different layer types don’t like to merge together without screwing up your other layers, to avoid simply merge them one at a time from bottom up.

As in, second last one and last one merged together, then the one above that merged with the last one — merge everything with the last one... AM I MAKING SENSE?!

I’ll usually merge the lineart with the colour too — I just didn’t here for some reason

“I’m Kidding Myself”

Here we add stuff that hides flaws and merges the character with a background if you have one!

I use three types of layers for this, if your program doesn’t use these then see if they have similar functioning ones (I’m always experimenting so this isn’t set in stone) if your program has nothing then... this will be a little harder, you’re gonna have to do this by hand somehow.

I use these kinds of blending layers; Multiply, Overlay and Add

First I prevent getting the colour on anything BUT the character; magic wand tool > select the empty space > hold ctrl/shift and keep tapping to add or remove areas > invert if you need in order for the art piece to be selected

You can see this when my background when blue, I’m basically highlighting my art of Yuri

Colour this entire space on a new layer. The colour I use doesn’t change here on out (except in the video I do cus I lose the colour but that’s aside the point). When choosing a colour, consider the colour of light — I use human colours??? Colours you find on a person essentially.

As a general rule of thumb; for every new thing, new layer, it gets a little harder here. I also use a semi translucent (watercolour) brush again for everything!

Now we have a silhouette of Yuri — I set this to multiply, it’s essentially like a highlighter marker pen but darker?? This is so that I may adjust the entire colour to fit the lighting colour

New layer (NL), I set to Overlay. Overlay is like multiply except bright! Remember what I did when shading? Yep, rinse and repeat! Afterwards, adjust the layer’s opacity setting so that it fits better with the image.

I’ll also make the brush really tiny and go over hey areas to highlight such as the edge of the nose, chin and jaw — I’ll also add shine to the eyes.

NL, set to Add. I only ever use this layer if I want to achieve “blinding lights” sort of looks. So when the lighting is immense, I have a white background, or the background is incredibly bright.

I use add layer scarcely, to blemish any lines and make it look more refined. I’ll also adjust opacity if need be.

NL, I’ll use the airbrush set too REALLY BIG (1000 usually) and if I have a background, will try and add light to it by making this layer multiply too. I’ll add darkness in the side or corner of the background etc.

NL do the same thing with Add except also make a point for where the light is coming from.

NL, I’ll use a mix of Add and Overlay to add sparkles, fragments, light spots etc depending on image type of need be

Using a Fluffy pastel brush (it’s textured) I also use pure white. This is the only time I ever do.

I’ll add reflection to eyes, jaw and nose. For hair, I’ll pick out a few strands of hair where it’s darker and throw in some loose lines. Clothes are rarely outlined and only where light touch. I use this limitedly.

Ctrl + D ;) to deselect the lasso tool — I don’t usually merge the layers after this because it’s usually too messy and I’m done anyway so I save it, however you CAN put them all in a FOLDER if need be. (I have a few in my vid, the entire thing is in a folder tbh)

Voila! That’s it!

I hope this has been of some help or use! And that this makes SOME sense... I’m absolute shit at explaining everything...

This was incredibly fun to do tho and I spent two hours typing this all! Wow!

Okay thanks for reading! (Hope this helped Melitooooooo, don’t forget the wedding cake ~ v/ important part of marriage you know)

#art #digital art #yoi #yuri plisetsky #art tutorial #tutorial #colouring tutorial #how to colour #colour and shading #how to draw

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alltoowsll · 5 years ago

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Hey! Can you do a tutorial how to make headers?😘

Hey there, sweetie! I’m so sorry for answering late. I don’t really have much time to make a tutorial right now (y’know, school, exams bla bla) so I’m just gonna give you tips. It’s just basically a bunch of textures, gradients, coloring and that’s all. (also i’m not good at explaining myself so pls excuse me) First of all, I usually choose a HQ picture. It really works. Then I apply some coloring layers like curves, brightness, color balance, vibrance, etc. Also I make some layers and color the skin, clothes, hair, eyes of my character. So first make one, for example; the skin. Pick a color for the skin, paint it and then set that layer to color and lower the opacity to 20%. Then duplicate the same layer and set it to soft light blending mode with an opacity between 25 to 50%, just like this:

And repeat the same process with the clothes, hair, eyes (for the eyes you will need to color them white, set that layer to color and then again duplicate it and set it to soft light; and then make another layer and color the iris and repeat the same process) lips, etc... at the end it should be looking like this (I made this as an example just so you can check the difference when it’s colored and when it’s not):

and then I cut out the person of the background, you can use any method. I personally love to do it with this little thing called pen tool:

and so once you’ve cut out the background, you will need to make a new canvas, the sizes i use for headers are 800px x 430px. then go to layer > new fill layer > solid color. pick the color you want, drag your other pic to this new canvas and then put the textures you want to use. you can check textures on deviantart and yeahps (there’s a lot of sites i use to download textures but tbh it’s almost 3am so i can’t remember all of them, if you want send me another ask and i’ll send you the complete list)

so basically you will just need to play with the blending mode of those textures and that’s all! i also recommend you to use gradients, the b&w mode or just black and set it as soft light. and that’s all, color again if you want to and just sharpen the image, not the whole header, duplicate the layer and then use gaussian blur and lower the opacity (just to make it smoother) and you’re basically done!

and these are my saving settings:

and that’s all. i’m sorry if some things weren’t well explained, i’m literally running lmao but if you have any questions pls send me an ask or dm me so i can explain you better:)

#drunkontay13 #answered #ps asks

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theredpaladin101 · 6 years ago

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Voltron Editing Tutorial

Aight so someone asked, and now I’m here. I have made YouTube tutorial videos before here, but I’ll go into more depth on what to do, how to get started, and what I do personally.

For this, I will be showing you how to make a simple color edit (A request I received of Black Paladin Lance) but I will still describe briefly how you can do Altean/Galra edits (which implies to other edits like outfit changes and more!)

So let’s get started

So lemme get this out of the way - my program is called Clip Studio Paint EX, a $100+ art program with many features, including manga, 3D models, animation, and more. Of course, you can use other programs like Clip Studio Paint Pro and SAI (I have used both before) but this tutorial will follow with EX.

First thing you need to do is figure out what to edit, then get a screenshot. Now, you can either go to Netflix and clip out a screenshot, or find an image on Tumblr/Instagram/other (Note: For the best edit, make sure the image is as clear as possible)

I use Netflix, but I also sometimes go to @voltronreference who posted quite a lot of Voltron screenshots.

Once you find your image, something you’ll want to do is put the image on a completely new image with the size 1600x900 (or 1600x1000)

Now this part can be tricky. If you use @voltronreference ‘s screenshots, transporting it to another image is easy, as seen below. (To copy and paste, all you need to do is press Ctrl+c then Ctrl+v like usual)

However, if you get a screenshot from Netflix, the image size is probably somewhere in the two hundred. What you’ll need to do is shrink the image before you copy and paste it as seen below.

Once you have the image how you want, you can start editing!

Now, this next part is completely up to you! When editing, you have a choice to either only edit what you want to change or the entire thing (Not including Background). I personally edit the entire character so that everything blends together smoothly, but some editors only edit what they change, and that’s completely okay (just make sure everything blends together well).

For edits including changes like Altean/Galra ears or outfit changes, you’ll need to create a new layer above the image.

If it’s just a color edit, you can completely skip the sketch and jump straight to outlining.

For Voltron edits, the best tool to use is the Line Tool between 2-4 thickness (3 is the perfect thickness for me almost every time, but sometimes you need thicker/thinner lines)

Now all you have to do is outline the character as seen below.

Once you have completely outlined your edit, you can begin coloring. (Note: make sure your colors match your background) If you don’t change the background at all, you keep the same colors except for the ones you’re changing. For the ones you are changing, you can either find another scene with the same background and colors you need (Ex. You need black for Lance’s armor, so find Shiro wearing his armor in the training deck)

You can either color by hand or use the Select and Fill Tool, as seen below.

If you use this tool, you’ll need to go back and color in the little nooks the Select Tool couldn’t reach. (Note: Best way to color is by setting each group of colors in different layers (Ex. One layer for hair and eyelashes, another layer for clothes (or three to four layers for clothes, your choice), and a layer for skin) as to avoid constant coloring over and needing to recolor certain areas. My order of layers if Hair, Clothing, then Skin.)

A little fun token for you: Make a separate image for colors for individual characters - the basic colors, as seen below.

Once you got everything colored, you can move onto shading. What you do here is create a completely new layer above all except the outline, and turn it to Multiply. This setting makes the colors darker and colorful depending on the shade color you use. I always use this shade of grey below.

All you do here is take your Line Tool and outline the shaded areas of your image (Note: You can add your own shades to make it look better, for sometimes Voltron didn’t shade at all/enough) Then use your Select Tool and Fill in your shaded areas (of course go back and fill in the nooks)

Step back and take a look at your edit so far. Does it need a color fix? Any more shading? Once you have everything you like, here comes the fun part (not really)

Sometimes, the background will still have traces of the character you just colored over, as seen below.

Going back to the original image layer, all you do it color over the patches with the same color behind it and blur it together to make everything blend better. Once you checked around the entire character for those patches, you’re almost done!

Going to your Filter Tab: Blur for your shading layer, you will select one of the two options - You will select the first options, which is just Blur, to blur your shading in with the colors better. Or, you will go down to Gaussian Blur and take the strength all the way down to 2.00 - as this gives the least amount of blur, which is the best option in a lot of far away characters.

Now, keeping the same Blur choices above in mind, you can do one of those with the outline, or not blur it at all. Just go by what you think is the best option to achieve the closest Voltron style as possible.

And Bingo!! Your edit is complete!

Now y’all know how to make a Voltron edit (at least how I do it), and even though it looks difficult, if you keeping working on this you’ll be dishing out edits in thirty minutes!

I hope this helped. If you have any questions or want more details or want to know how to make other edits (Altean/Galra, outfits, character changes, etc.), send in an ask and I’ll explain further. Good luck!

#voltron #voltron legendary defender #voltron edits #voltron edits tutorial #my work

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