Tutorials

Well, maybe these aren't tutorials so much as my process. I have a few things to show, in some different formats.

Firstly, I'll get this out of the way. I posted these before, and most of you have probably seen these. Some of you, however, may not have seen them.

Eyes and Lips

Secondly, here is a process progression of a mountain picture which can be found in my gallery.





And lastly, here are some Open Canvas WPEs. If you don't know what Open Canvas is, it is a simple but powerful painting program. The newer versions require a cost, but the older versions are probably free. Some of their better features is the ability to save the process of a painting and view it like a movie. Another is the ability to network with other artists and paint on the same canvas, though I've yet to do this.

Open Canvas (453 kb) -- This is the zipped up program.







Click on one of the above three images to download the zipped up event file. Here are some instructions to view them. Firstly, change the language to English by going to Help (alt+H) >> English (E). Then go to File (alt+F) >> Import Event File (I), and then browse to the .wpe which you have extracted from the zip. You'll also want to go to Show (alt+V) and make sure Event Playing with Weight isn't checked, or it will take quite long.

That's about it. All of these are pretty old, so if I made new ones, they'd naturally be better. If there is an interest, I would like to make some new ones.

Wow, nice wpe files! You work with such a small brush, I work with the biggest size I possible can. I should save more wpe files, I find that you can point out more flaws with a picture if you see it being made, focus on one thing at a time as it's being made and what not. Very cool.

Any chance for a tut on those cool gifs u use?...preferably mac compatible.....

@Wormskull: Thanks mate. Open Canvas is a little-known program, but it is so surprisingly powerful considering how small the filesize is.

@Moon_Lunatic: Thanks. I work with a small brush? I hadn't even noticed! Maybe it's because I've worked with pencil for the majority of my life. At any rate, I have to agree with you about seeing the WPE file in order to give help. OC is an excellent learning tool that works both ways.

@jerre Khan: Which Gifs might those be? Like my avatar and sig, or are you talking about something else entirely?

I still have to make some more WPE event files.

yes ur sig and ava, I really like 'em :)...and ur other work as well....maybe make a workshop :p

People at another forum I used to frequent asked me to do just the same thing, and I did. So I guess I may as well just post here what I posted there, because even though it's a year old, it is still valid.

To make the animated GIFs, I did use Imageready, the program that comes bundled with Photoshop. My versions are both version 7, so I don't know how that will work for you or on a mac. The concept should be largeley the same, if some of the technical details aren't.

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This small little tutorial has two parts. Firstly, I go over the steps I took to make the letters. All you really need is a basic understanding of photoshop. Well, of course you need photoshop, too. I suppose some similar program might work too, such as Paint Shop Pro, but It would be more difficult to follow along in that case.



1. Here we have the first stage of the process. This was cropped from a larger image, in a reasonable banner size (520, 115). You may have noticed the darker borders on the top and the bottom. This is, of course, an entirely optional sort of thing. To make it, I simple created another layer on top of the background, and created two rectangle of black. I set the compositing method to linear burn, and set the opacity down to around 30 to 40 %.

2. I flattened that, and created another layer. Taking the paintbrush set to about 5 pixels wide, 80 % opacity, and something like 70 % flow, I painted a basic O shape with white. I wasn't worried about keeping it neat or anything. I created a new layer for each succeeding letter, and made them in the same general way. I have a tablet I will confess, so it makes it easier. A mouse and a great deal of patience might suffice. Importantly, make sure each letter is on a seperate layer.

3. Ok, here I mess up the letters. It's all a matter of style. Whether or not it's any good I didn't know at the time. Yeah, I don't know if I offer much of an explanation on this part. I just tried to keep the lines loose and make something interesting. That's about all. Make sure you remember to work on the respective layers of each letter.

4. I took a bigger sort of step here, I guess. The reason I kept each letter seperate was so I could space them properly. I didn't want to have to worry about that while I was drawing them. So, you just space the letters I suppose. I kept larger spaces in between each individual letter to emphasize their design. Take advantage of negative space. I then add a glow effect to one of the letters. To do that, right click on the layer for said layer, Blending Options>>Outer Glow. Refer to the accompanying screenshot with the settings for that. I used a brighter sort of orange. Didn't want anything to intense. Once I was satisfied with my effects in that, I right-clicked and went to copy layer style. I pasted the layer style on all of the other layers. Now I flattened them. Keep the background seperate from the letters. That is important.



5. Here, I just applied the glow effect again on the single layer. Refer to the settings in the second accompanying screenshot. I wanted the glow a bit wider, a bit more subtle. I used a more reddish orange, too. By doing this glow effect twice, I was able to achieve more versatility than if I had only tried to achieve my result using one instance of the glow effect.

And that's that. For making the letters, that's all you need to know. If you'd like to follow along with the snow animation, I recommend that you have some experience with Imageready, at least to be familiar with all of the controls if nothing else.

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1. First, we make our snowfield in photoshop. Make the new document around 1000, 300 px. Paint the background black so you can see what you're doing. Then, make a new layer. Taking your paintbrush set to 3 px, max opacity and about 30 % flow, use a mild grey. These brush settings should compensate for anybody using a mouse. Draw a tiny little circle with your mouse. Keep the circles quite small. Also, try to make them irregular looking, as in unperfect circles. Vary the size, too.With a tablet, I can fill the whole canvas with ease, but this wouldprobably take too long with a mouse. Once you have a small area (say, 20 %) of the canvas filled with snowflakes, make a 10 % feathered selection around it, and copy and paste it all over the canvas to fill it up. Try not to make it look like it's patterned, either, if you can. Make another layer now, and use a larger brush with white. Make larger snowflakes, irregular circles that is to say, but of a lower frequency. Check the screenshot to get an idea. Then, you flatten all of the snowflake layers together (I hope you remembered to keep the black backdrop seperate). Minimize this document now and go back to the banner.



2. Make a selection around the borders and the basic shape of the wolf. No feather. Refer to the screenshot to see what I mean. Copy this, and paste. It will appear on a new layer. Your layer order at this point, from top to bottom, should be letters, this new selection you just made, then the background. Set the new layer with the selection you just made to about 80 % opacity. Lock it, and leave it like that. The reasoning behind this is that when the snow will be falling, I don't want all of it to appear in front of the wolf heads. It would look flat this way. I want it to sort of look like the wolf is closer, thus less snow would be falling in front of him.

3. Ok, go back to your snowfield document, make a rectangular feathered (10 %) selections around the better part of the document, and drag it into your banner. If the flakes look too large or small to you, go to Edit>>Free Transform and you can make adjustments to the snowfield layer as you see fit. Align this layer's bottom left corner with the bottom left corner of the banner. Don't worry if the layer goes of the visible canvas area; it's supposed to do that. Make then a copy of this layer and move it up and to the right, out of the visible canvas area entirely. Look at the screenshot for an idea of where it should be.



4. Go to File>>Jump to>>Imageready.

5. Make sure the animation pallette is visible. Window>>Animation. May as well make sure the layer and optimize palettes are also visible. OK, the animation palette is a timeline of the animation. Click on the duplicate current frame button in said palette. Here, you want to take the visible snowfield layer and move it down and to the left, off the visible area. Look at the screenshot to see what I mean. Then, take the other snowfield layer that was already off the canvas and move it so that its bottom left corner is aligned with the bottom left corner of the banner. Click on the first frame, and look at the snowflakes. Make sure that the second snowfield in the second frame is in the exact same position as the first snowfield in the first frame. You'll probably have to jump back and forth between the frames a couple of times to perfect it.

5. Now, in the same animation palette, there should be a little rollover arrow in the top right corner. Click on it, and go to tween. Make sure your second frame is selected before doing so. You want Previous Frame, You want to add 10 Frames, in All Layers, and select all three Parameters. Adding less frames will make the snow fall slower, but will take more space in the GIF. Select all frames after the first two have been tweened, and set the delay time to 0.08 seconds (this can be found in the bottom right corner of any frame. Since all are selected, this will be applied to all).

6. Go to the optimize palette. You want to select GIF, selective color pallette, 48 colors, 20 % Lossy, and no dither. Adjust the settings as you see fit, but this seems a fair compromize. The end result should be between 80 to 120 K. It depends on the frequency of the snoflakes in your snowflake field.


And that is that. You can go to File>>Preview In>>(your browser) to see what the filesize will be and what the animation will look like. Go back to Imageready, go to File>>Save Optimized as, and you have your banner.

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I downloaded OC. I unzipped and ran it. I closed it. I ran it again. And then all characters turned into rectangles and crap like % $ # &. Help

Help>English(E)
It's a great program.

i used your tutorial to make my new sig! i didnt animatie it, but i took the glow and layering bits for it ;) i dont have a wacom, so putting the hand made text was too annoying and looked like crap.... so really i just stole the glowyness ^_^

Please don't revive old threads Worm.

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