Glow And Lighting effects

Image Preview

Step: 1First, get a stock photo of a high jumper going over a bar. You’ll need to cut her out. I find Illustrator’s Pen tool (P) is much better than Photoshop for cutting out photos, so use this if you have it. 

Use the Pen tool to put a path around her. Only roughly round the hair in a block for now. We will refine that in Photoshop.

If you don’t have Illustrator, just cut her out in Photoshop as normal and skip to Step 3.

Step: 2

Copy and paste the athlete into Photoshop.Cmd/Ctrl + click on the photo layer to create a marquee selection around her. With the Quick Selection tool (W), Alt + click to refine the selection around the hair. 

Step: 3

With the marquee selection still around the athlete, create a layer mask. Select the mask in your layers and press Cmd/Ctrl + Alt + R to bring up the Refine Mask menu. Adjust each of the settings until you’re happy. 

Step: 4

Select a white brush and use your layer mask to remove some of the soft edges around the athlete. Don’t pull it in too tight though, otherwise it will be obvious that your photo has been cropped. 

Next, use the Clone Stamp (S) to remove the bar and its shadow on the athlete’s hips and legs.

Step: 5

Open the Adjustments panel and add a Gradient Map adjustment layer to apply a black-and-white gradient map. Press Cmd/Ctrl + Alt + G to apply a clipping mask to it based on the photo below it in the layer stack. 

Step: 6

Before you start adding details, it’s very important to determine the mood of the piece. Once you’ve established this, all the other elements will only help accentuate what’s already there. 

To do this, first create a Gradient fill layer above the background, using a Radial gradient as shown. Next, add a Levels adjustment layer with a clipping mask to the athlete layer, to accentuate the shadows on her.

Step: 7

Now that you’ve established some atmosphere, it’s time to add some colour. Double-click on the Gradient icon on the Gradient Fill layer, and click on the Gradient Editor. Use the sliders to add some different hues. 

Add some Gradient Map adjustment layers and Solid Color fill layers to the photo to create some complementary hues, using a blending mode of Color so only the athlete’s hue is adjusted.

Step: 8

Create some thin, angled gradients using thin and largely transparent Gradient fill layers like those shown here. This should create a kind of beam that zooms into infinity. If necessary, use a layer mask with a black brush to mask some parts of the photo.

Step: 9

It’s now time to indicate some movement, so add some Radial Gradients and mask the superfluous parts.

Step: 10

Add some glows, sparkles and other details around the athlete. First, draw round the outline of your high jumper – including the outlines of her limbs, clothes and clothing detail – with a thin white brush. Then rough out some sparkles. Next, apply an Outer Glow layer style from the bottom of the Layers panel. 

Step: 11

Next, go into Illustrator and create a series of radial lines (if you don’t have Illustrator, go to Step 12 and use radiallines.ai from the project files).

To do this, use the Line tool (/) to create a cross. Select both lines, right-click and go to Transform > Rotate. Set your angle to 45° and click Copy. Repeat this step and rotate by 22.5°, 11.25°, 6.25°, and so on. Make sure you reselect your original lines each time you rotate. 

Step: 12

Copy and paste the radial lines and place them to your liking (or import radiallines.ai). Add a layer mask, then Outer Glow and Color Overlay layer styles to create shimmery pink lines. Remove parts of the lines with a black brush on the layer mask. Repeat this using different a yellow Color Overlay style to enhance the effect.

Step: 13

Now we are going to add a simple star field. Select a hard brush and create some dots on your canvas in a new layer. Once you have a decent amount start duplicating, scaling, rotating and applying different levels of opacity to cover most of the canvas in a way that’s visually interesting.

Step: 14

With your brush tool, create some more details to accentuate movement and atmosphere. Use Adjustment Layers such as Color Balance to tweak your hues.

Step: 15

Save your creation as a Jpg. Open the file and Apply some light noise. This makes the project feel a little less ‘digital’ by giving the whole image some extra texture. 

The Dark Knight Rises Poster-Tutorial

Final Result

• City Background: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1286649
• Police Car: http://jennlaa-stock.deviantart.com/art/Police-car-2-285439713
• Batman: http://singtolife.deviantart.com/art/Batman-254930654
• Mist/Fog Brushes: http://neonescence.deviantart.com/#/d1l4v2h
• Debris Brushes: http://zigabooooo.deviantart.com/art/Debris-Brush-Set-104719100
• Batman Logo Brushes: http://vishalrokez.deviantart.com/art/Batman-brushes-213216416
• Broken Glass Brushes: http://frozenstocks.deviantart.com/art/Broken-Glass-132680423
• Rain Brushes: http://spiritsighs-stock.deviantart.com/art/Rain-15251819
• Lens Flares Brushes: http://www.psdbox.com/stock/high-quality-optical-flares/

Step 1

On this first step we’ll  blur a little the background to create the bokeh effect.First open the city background,crop it,then go to Image>Image Rotation>Flip Canvas Horizontal.After this let’s bring the blur Filter>Blur>Gausian Blur and set the Radius to 5%.

Step 2

Now let’s add the police car. After that play with the mist brushes around the car. Then use the debris brushes for the explosion effect.

Step 3

Let’s bring our main character in the picture.So here is our batman. The stock is .png so not to much work for cut.After,we create the rain effect with our brushes.

Step 4

It’s time to change some tones.I chose this blueish tone for this,using the setings from the image.Also you can use the broken glass brushes for the police car.

Step 5

In this step we’ll create a vignette effect using the Lens Correction filter.So here is the amount i used for this one.

 Step 6

Here we add the title of the poster and the logo of batman.The font i used was Franklin Gothic Medium.I added also a lens flare between the logo and the title.

Step 7

In this final step we use the burn&dodge techinique from the Manipulatin Secrets section and add some sharpness to our work.Have fun.

Final Result

Lighting Effect Using Custom Brushes in Photoshop CS5

Final Image Preview

Start working by creating a new document (Ctrl+N) in Adobe Photoshop CS5 with the size 1050px by 1680px(RGB color mode) at a resolution of 72 pixels/inch. Click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of theLayers panel and select Gradient Overlay.

Blending Options>Gradient Overlay

Click in the color bar to open the Gradient Editor and set the color stops as shown. Click OK to close theGradient Editor dialog box.

We’ve got the next background:

Create a new layer and select the Paint Bucket Tool (G) to fill the new layer with #3B4E6C color.

Insert the mask on the layer by choosing Add layer mask on the bottom part of the Layers panel and select after that Filter>Render>Clouds. Select after that the Soft Round brush from Brush Tool (B).

Paint in the mask using this brush to clean up the top part of the canvas as shown. The brush’s color is black.

Create a new layer and select the Soft Round.

Use this brush to represent many dots with #536874 color.

ind a stock photo with a model represented on it, I used this photo from Shutterstock. I would like to thank theauthor of this photo, or if you prefer, you can substitute similar image of your own.

Remove the background using your favorite tools like Pen Tool (P), Magic Wand Tool (W), Magnetic Lasso (L) or even a simple Filter>Extract and insert it on a new layer in our main document.

Create the next new layer on which we’ll use again the Soft Round brush.

Use this bush to insert more dots of green color. Place the layer under the layer containing the model’s image (on the Layers’ panel).

Set Fill to 48% for this layer and click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and select Satin.

We’ve got the next result:

Make sure now that the layer with the model is selected and click on the bottom part of the Layers panel toCreate new fill or adjustment layer, select from the list Curves.

Adjust the curve shape as shown to make a little color corrections.

Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and click between the model’s layer and the Curves adjustment layer in the Layers panel to create a clipping mask.

We’ve got the next result:

Create a new layer and select the Soft Round brush.

Use this brush to paint on the model certain places as shown. The brush’s color is #070424 (set Opacity to 40%in Options bar).

Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and click between layers in the Layers panel to create the next clipping mask.

We’ve got the next result:

Set the Blending mode for this layer to Difference.

Create a new layer and use here the earlier mentioned Soft Round brush.

Use this brush to paint the model on the indicated positions as shown. The brush’s color is #E0FF4C (brushOpacity – 40%).

Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and click between layers in the Layers panel to create aclipping mask.

We’ve got the next result:

Set Fill to 50% for this layer click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and selectVivid Light.

Create new layer and use the Paint Bucket Tool (G) to fill it with #8177A1 color.

Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and click between layers in the Layers panel to create aclipping mask.

We’ve got the next result:

Set Fill to 12% for this layer click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and selectHard Mix.

Create a new layer and select for it the Soft Round brush mentioned earlier of black color to represent shadows on the model. Apply a different Opacity value.

Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) and click between layers in the Layers panel to create aclipping mask.

We’ve got the next result:

Set Fill to 87% for this layer click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and selectSoft Light.

Create a new layer and paint with the Soft Round brush the indicated positions on the model’s body.

The brush is of white color and yellow one with different brush Opacity value.

Set Fill to 45% for this layer click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and selectSoft Light.

Create again a new layer, using here the same Soft Round brush for representing many dots of different diameters.

The brush is of #849C3E color.

Click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and select Outer Glow.

Add Satin

We’ve got the next result:

Choose the Pen Tool (P), set the drawing mode on Shape Layers in Options bar and draw the next shape of#B5DC5B color as shown.

Set Fill to 63% for this layer and change the Blending mode to Screen.

Use also the previous tools to represent one more shape of the same color. Set Fill to 43% for this layer and change the Blending mode to Screen.

Using the same tools (Pen Tool (P)) we have to represent the third shape of the color #76E4FF.

Set Fill to 36% for this layer and change the Blending mode to Linear Dodge.

Set Fill to 36% for this layer and change the Blending mode to Linear Dodge.




Insert the mask on the layer by choosing Add layer mask on the bottom part of the Layers panel and choose the Soft Round brush of black color.

Use this brush to paint in the mask to clean up the central part of the canvas, leaving shadowy only the edges.

Combine in a group all the layers (press CTRL button to select the necessary layers and hold on the left mouse’s button while dragging the selected layers on Create a new group icon from bottom part of the Layers panel).
Make a copy of the got group. Rasterize te group’s copy (press CTRL+E to Merge Down). Apply on the rasterized layer the next filter Filter > Blur > Gaussian blur.

We’ve got the next result:

Set Fill to 29% for this layer click on Add a layer style icon from bottom part of the Layers panel and selectLinear Dodge.

Put together all the layers (including the rasterized layer of the group’s copy and the main group, rasterizing it also preliminary). Apply on the rasterized layer the next filter Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp mask:

We’ve got the next result:

Our Dynamic Lighting Effect Using Custom Brushes in Photoshop CS5 is finished!