blog.watashii » Photoshop

Windows Vista Aurora Effect Using Photoshop (Tutorial)

watashii — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 09:30:48 +0000

Here is a very simple tutorial for remaking the beautiful Windows Vista Aurora wallpaper effect, using Photoshop. Full credit goes to tutorial9 for the steps which I followed.

My PSD source files are available below, if interested. Or click-on to follow my tutorial.

[aurora_watashii.zip] 1.6M
[aurora.png] 411kb (1900×1200)

Step 1

Start with a random image as our background.

Step 2

Apply a Gaussian blur with radius > 100 on the background

Step 3

Goto Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance. Then using the RGB sliders to adjust the color of the background of your choice. You can also change the brightness/contrast settings on the background layer. The background changes are complete after this step.

Step 4

To create the light bands, first create a new layer. Then select the elliptical marquee tool and draw a large rounded outline a shown below. Press spacebar+drag to maximise the ellipse size outside the photoshop canvas.

Step 5

Select the brush tool with any brush size (say 100px), and 0% hardness and fill the edge of the selection marquee.

Step 6

Next, deselect the marquee, and position / free transform the light band. In the layers panel, change the blending layer to Overlay. This will give the light bands a glowing effect.

Step 7

Now repeat Step 4 to create several light bands with different bush sizes, positioning and free transform. You can also reuse existing light bands by duplicating the existing layers.

Step 8

Lastly you can create additional adjustment layers on each light band, like what we have done in Step 3. Press Ctrl+Shift then click (once or twice) on the thumbnail of a light band layer. This will automatically create a selection around your light band. You can then proceed to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance and modify the color of the light bands. Experiment!

Seasons Greetings & Merry Xmas

watashii — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 07:46:58 +0000

To celebrate the Christmas holiday season, i created my own Merry Christmas Tree which came from a short Photoshop tutorial from adobetutorialz.

My PSD source files are available below, if interested:

[christmastree_watashii.zip] 3.9M
[christmastree.png] 2.7M (1900×1200)

Digital Bokeh Effect Using Photoshop

Rainbow Blur Effect Using Photoshop (Tutorial)

watashii — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 05:09:52 +0000

Here is a very simple tutorial for making a really cool rainbow blur effect, using Photoshop. This can be used as a wallpaper, and as you can see, its also decorated my blog header too!

My PSD source files are available below, if interested. Or click-on to follow my tutorial.

[rainbowblur_watashii.zip] 1.6M
[rainbowblur.png] 411kb (1900×1200)

Step 1

Create a new document 1900×1200, or any size of your choice.

Step 2

Create a new layer. Double click on the layer to open the Layer Style options. Enable the Gradient Overlay, and select a radial gradient from dark blue (#12112C) to black as shown below.

Step 3

Create a second new layer, and make sure it’s non-transparent, white or black is fine. We set our foreground and background to black and grey (#777777). Then goto [Filters > Render > Fibres...]. You may play around with the numbers to define the hardness, here I used Variance 20 and Strength 10.

Step 4

Now we apply a motion blur on our texture. Goto [Filters > Blur > Motion Blur...], and apply a distance of 500 pixels. You may like to tweak this value to get the right effect.

Step 5

Double click on the blurred layer to open the Layer Style options. Enable the Gradient Overlay, and select/create a linear gradient using the rainbow colours. Make sure the Blend Mode is Overlay, and the angle should be at 0 degrees.

Step 6

Lastly, using the Lasso tool with a feather of 100px to create a random mask. Goto [Layer > Add Layer Mask > Reveal Selection] to apply the masking effect.

Digital Bokeh Effect Using Photoshop

watashii — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 13:18:43 +0000

Found this awesome photoshop tutorial by abduzeedo for making a wallpaper with a Bokeh effect. A Bokeh (derived from Japanese, ぼけ) is a photographic term that produces an out of focus/fuzzy image, using depth of field techniques.

I followed the tutorial and recreated my own version of the Bokeh. The steps were very short, however the tricky part is making sure each step is followed correctly. Miss a small step, and you’ll end up with a dull looking ‘thing’.

Some undocumented tips:

Step 2, blending options for ellipse should have normal blend mode, 100% opacity, 50% fill opacity.
Step 3, to define the brush preset on the ellipse, you must hide all layers first (or press CTRL & click on layer)
Step 5, colors are: Yellow (#E7DD85), Cyan (#1BDAEB), Purple (#9B3B81), Orange (#D27E34)

My PSD source files are available below, if interested:

[bokeh_watashii.zip] 1.2M

How to turn a photo into a hollywood movie effect

watashii — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 04:36:37 +0000

Today i found a tutorial on how to turn a photo into a hollywood movie effect (using Photoshop).

Above was my attempts! (This feels like the being in the island in ‘Lost’ series, but its actually in shenzhen/china). Check out the original photo after the break…

and my next attempt…