Tutorial: A spiffy avatar
Thu Jun 30, 2005 5:18 pm
I posted this in the request a sig thread before this forum. But now it gets it's own thread!
I will be showing you how I created my Phoenix Suns avatar.
The first step in 95% of backgrounds is to render-clouds. That looks like this. You can press ctrl-F again and again to get clouds you like. If you want them to be a very distinct pattern you can use the burn (to darken) and dodge (to lighten) tools. This isn't usually neccessary for a small avatar.
Next take some brushes. A good place to get them is at Deviant Art. I generally start the bottom off with grunge brushes as they are hidden for the most part. Switch between brushing black and white on different layers. After I set the bottom two to overlay and the top to hard light. Play around between the settings there to get the look you want.
After this I put my Phoenix logo in there and set it to overlay.
Many people stop there and colourize their image. But it provides a better effect if you do brushing overtop of everything else. I wanted to emphazize the orange to purple colour theme, so I used brushes with fairly sharp edges. I wanted lighter orange, so I used white on the left and black on the right. I left the blend modes at normal because the brushes didn't mask my background too much.
Next to get colour I added two colour balance layers. You can get them by pressing on the button I have highlighted in red at the bottom of the next screenshot. Don't move the bars to far to either side of 0 because you will usually get an oversaturated look. To get orange I set midtones to 48, 0, -43; highlights to 26, 0, -37; and shadows to 55, 0, -35. For purple I used midtones at 47, 0, 51; highlights at 39, 0, 33, and shadows at 33, 0, 44. After that I used the gradient tool on the layer mask that automatically pops up and used it in opposite directions on the two masks to blend the colours (if you have questions on layer masks post.) I now have this.
Kind of bland, right? You can solve that with a curves layer. It's located in the same place colour balance layers are. Your curve should usually look like this. Now make a new layer on top of everything and hit ctrl-a (select canvas). Go to edit-->stroke and set it to 1 px, white or black (depending on where you plan to use it and the avatar you have), and inside. You now have a complete avatar that looks like below.
Hope this helps you. I use an expanded method of that to make sigs.
I will be showing you how I created my Phoenix Suns avatar.
The first step in 95% of backgrounds is to render-clouds. That looks like this. You can press ctrl-F again and again to get clouds you like. If you want them to be a very distinct pattern you can use the burn (to darken) and dodge (to lighten) tools. This isn't usually neccessary for a small avatar.
Next take some brushes. A good place to get them is at Deviant Art. I generally start the bottom off with grunge brushes as they are hidden for the most part. Switch between brushing black and white on different layers. After I set the bottom two to overlay and the top to hard light. Play around between the settings there to get the look you want.
After this I put my Phoenix logo in there and set it to overlay.
Many people stop there and colourize their image. But it provides a better effect if you do brushing overtop of everything else. I wanted to emphazize the orange to purple colour theme, so I used brushes with fairly sharp edges. I wanted lighter orange, so I used white on the left and black on the right. I left the blend modes at normal because the brushes didn't mask my background too much.
Next to get colour I added two colour balance layers. You can get them by pressing on the button I have highlighted in red at the bottom of the next screenshot. Don't move the bars to far to either side of 0 because you will usually get an oversaturated look. To get orange I set midtones to 48, 0, -43; highlights to 26, 0, -37; and shadows to 55, 0, -35. For purple I used midtones at 47, 0, 51; highlights at 39, 0, 33, and shadows at 33, 0, 44. After that I used the gradient tool on the layer mask that automatically pops up and used it in opposite directions on the two masks to blend the colours (if you have questions on layer masks post.) I now have this.
Kind of bland, right? You can solve that with a curves layer. It's located in the same place colour balance layers are. Your curve should usually look like this. Now make a new layer on top of everything and hit ctrl-a (select canvas). Go to edit-->stroke and set it to 1 px, white or black (depending on where you plan to use it and the avatar you have), and inside. You now have a complete avatar that looks like below.
Hope this helps you. I use an expanded method of that to make sigs.
Thu Jun 30, 2005 5:23 pm
Sticked due to usefullness rating.
Thu Jun 30, 2005 8:25 pm
Definately a good tutorial, I'm hoping to see more of these from you.
Suggestions:
-teach me how to use brushes
-how to make wallpapers (so much space too fill
)
Suggestions:
-teach me how to use brushes
-how to make wallpapers (so much space too fill
)
Thu Jun 30, 2005 8:44 pm
Nice tut Colin. Already asked how you did it and 'lo and behold, now I know.
Thu Jun 30, 2005 9:04 pm
Good Stuff Coach Colin 
Thu Jun 30, 2005 10:15 pm
Wow, that looks pretty advanced.
Fri Jul 01, 2005 2:22 am
Nice work Colin, I may start to use Photoshop soon
Fri Jul 01, 2005 6:33 am
Nice work. You should make a jersey switch tut!
Fri Jul 01, 2005 10:53 am
I'm submitting this to good-tutorials, hope you don't mind 
Fri Jul 01, 2005 4:42 pm
Its nice to know so much about PS, you can make alot of money off this in the future. Great tutorial
Fri Jul 01, 2005 4:48 pm
Thanks everyone.
If it makes it on post that it did, since I'm leaving tommorow. Check the going away thread.
The G.O.A.T. wrote:I'm submitting this to good-tutorials, hope you don't mind
If it makes it on post that it did, since I'm leaving tommorow. Check the going away thread.
Sat Jul 16, 2005 10:10 am
This realy helps thanks
Mon Dec 05, 2005 9:01 am
nice tut you got bro 
very helpful
very helpful
Mon Jun 12, 2006 7:27 pm
I had a go at making one similar to your PHX one, but with RATM's frontman, 'Zach De La Rocha'. I saved it 5 different times each with slightly different layers moved around. Perhaps you could give me an honest opinion, and which of the 5 is the best?
Here was the original
Here was the original
Tue Jun 13, 2006 6:35 am
I personally like the contrast in the 4th one.
Thu Jun 22, 2006 6:49 pm
I can do better 
Thu Jun 22, 2006 7:22 pm
prove it then, colin is the shit at photoshop
Thu Jun 22, 2006 7:26 pm
Thu Jun 22, 2006 8:30 pm
i rekon nbalive7447774774744 or watever could do better then that
Fri Jun 23, 2006 3:34 am
Wow Monte, you're a real dumbass. Everyone knows you didn't make those, hence the "BBC" tags on them dumbshit.
Fri Jun 23, 2006 3:56 am
lol, totally owned the retarded fuckwit.
Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:05 am
What a big bag of douche goodness.
Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:19 am
Didn't know that someone at Bballcentral was such an idiot...
Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:22 am
Monte could quite possibly be the biggest retard ever.
Fri Jun 23, 2006 4:35 am
He is up there with the likes of melo15boy and dsmbballman