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Lesson Info

Painting & Rendering Fabric Effects

Painting fabric, this is a very short section but I think, again, it's healthy, it's healthy, it's good for you, and I think what it will do is also expand your mind as to some of the possibilities of thinking outside the box with Photoshop. So some of you have seen I have a hair class I teach here at CreativeLive and I have a section where I say hey, why don't you make some hair out of flame? Today I'm saying hey, why don't we make some fabric out of flame? So I'm gonna show you how to do that real quick, and then as many of you know I'm a big believer in the ParticleShop plugin, I think it's amazing. Buggy as heck, I don't care, you save, it's worth the effort, it's worth the pain, it's not that expensive. So I'm gonna show you these two things, and let's talk about the first thing. So I was fortunate enough to work on a book, I like case studies, case studies are always good, called Last Night I Swam With a Mermaid. A photographer named Michael Muller shot it, all these underwater s...

hots, in a pool, and his wife wrote it, it's a kids book, and then he shoots a lot of underwater photography in Tahiti and whatnot, and I got to compile all these images together and make this book, it's a really lovely book, and it was really fun because it's one of the few times in my career where I get some license. They're like, well here, go make something, and so it was fantastic. Well, you know, we live in a society where sometimes there's issues about how people look and what's going on, and the decision here was we need to cover her up. So I'm gonna use the render flame plugin to show you how you can add fabric to an image like this. So, I wanna show it to you, I wanna visually show it to you and then I'm gonna walk you through it. Okay, so what you end up doing is you're gonna use the filter render flame and you're gonna change it from basic mode to advanced to make some changes, and I'm gonna, I know this type is hard to read for some people, it'll be on the handout, this is very basic, I'm gonna walk you through it right now. We're gonna make a new layer, we're gonna draw a path with the pen tool, you must path this out, it needs a path to operate against, and you're gonna play with the settings. You can change the color of the flame, I'm gonna not do that now, and besides, didn't we just go over five different ways of changing color? Yes we did, so you don't need this right now. So, here's where we're gonna do, brand new layer, draw from the top down, this is really important and I'm gonna demo this for you. You draw from the start to the end, very important. You go, you make a new layer, please make a new layer, please do not do this on a flat layer. You need flexibility for this and you're gonna change your mind. You pick the flame, you play with it, you do it 75 different times, okay, this is not a one trick, one stop thing, you're gonna have to get the feel for it. I'm gonna hold off on this for a section on the colorizing and I'm just gonna go ahead and do the path. So, let's take a look at this file. Get rid of our actions, we don't need that. I'm just gonna put a gray layer for a minute so I can show it to you. This is the flame that I've drawn, I'm gonna redo it for you in just a second, I just wanna show you what it's gonna be. Did I say you wanna practice, so I'll build a flame layer, I'll then colorize it, and then because you're never done, ladies and gentlemen, you're never done, you're gonna put a little more on top, colorize it, a little darkening on top, add some white, and, well, do you wanna put some extras on top? Yes, what might that be? Well of course you need to put the waistband back, and of course you're gonna need some bubbles. Excellent. So here we go, new layer, pen tool, start from the top, drag down. How you do this doesn't matter, this is so not precious. Why I say that, is do you know when you illustrate something and you really have to be careful 'cause it's so hard? You don't have to be careful 'cause you can do it 75 times in two minutes. Filter, render, flame. One flame along the path, you're pretty much gonna want that, I'll tell you this right now. I'm on the basic, I can change the length, I can change the width. I'm gonna tell you, you're probably gonna wanna be down here, to be honest. And then I like to go to the advanced. You can make it more cuckoo bear crazy, you can jag it. These are subtle, I don't know if you noticed that, it just went (mimics screeching) it doesn't make that noise, though. All right, you can change it from normal to violent, to flat, that's really pretty, I like that one. And you can randomize shapes, you can change the arrangement. I'm gonna be 100% honest 'cause I don't wanna lie to you guys, I don't know what that is. I can see that it's spreading out more or less but I can't articulate to you what that is. So if I can't do it, I don't know if you can do it, so play with this. I kinda like, look, 72 is wide, that's wide, that's not wide. I'm sorry, I can't explain this. I'm sure someone at Adobe can do it, I can't, and who cares, just play with it, this is fun. All right. Now for the sake of time I'm gonna move on a bit on this, I think this is such a basic concept. Let me turn the path off. There's another path I drew for the little ones. So basically what you're gonna do, this is not precious, please do not be precious with this, is you're gonna draw a bunch of 'em. So I'm gonna pull out one of these and close it back down. So what you'll see here, and I'm gonna put a gray layer just so you can see it, that's my new one, that's this one, oh, and just mask it out a little. And here's another thing, I like to use, command T for transform. And you can scale 'em, you can make tighter ones, you can make, you can move it, you can make it fly. Fly, can you fly underwater? Guess you can now. You can do warp, and really tighten it up to whatever shape, you can liquefy it, anything you want, all right. Now, I'm gonna revert back to history for just a second. So what you have here are some additions that I just wanna discuss. We talked about colorizing. There is my flames drawn, you know how to draw a flame now, justo, and now I did a gradient map, it's a gradient map on normal, and here happens to be the color. If the client wants it more pink later, all right. I can do that, red, pink, okay, whatever you want, completely 100% flexible. Same technique we just used on the other ones. This might hurt a little, you ready for the next section? All right. I'm a channel pulling fool, you know this about me. So what I'm gonna do is, I want a little extra highlight. I'm gonna fill this layer with black just as a base, just temporarily. (gasps) Look. Look what I have, do you remember I said there's stored selections? What if I want a highlight on this fabric, a white highlight or brighter contrast? Because the flame render's only gonna do as much contrast as it has. I can take the green or blue copy, I did the green one for the demo, let's do the blue one. Lisa loves her channels and her levels, command L. What you're doing here is you want a selection. Take your hands off the computer. What the heck am I doing? I'm in channels, I made a copy. What is the purpose of this channel? I wanna paint white highlights, but I don't wanna hand draw them. So I pulled a channel, I'm doing a levels move, I'm making a selection, it's gonna hang out right here. I think that's pretty good, it's tight, it's crisp. I'm gonna hit okay. Now, in the other job, the gals, their color, I used that channel as a layer. I am not using the channel as a layer, I'm using it as a selection, so pay attention, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna make a new layer, I'm gonna say blue for white fill. I'm gonna load that selection, or channel, grab it by its name, drag it to the add a selection icon, or my favorite, hold the command key, it's always this left hand, over the icon for that channel, click on it, and I'm gonna fill with white. Option delete the command, pardon me, command delete the background color is command delete, and now I've just added this really pretty white highlight on it. You all cool with that? Channel pulling for days. Sorry, I get very excited about channel pulling. So that's render, cool? Flame, it's awesome, you could do all kinds of stuff with it, et voila. And you could do as much, as little as you want. Whoo, you ready for the next one? Come on. ParticleShop, I love ParticleShop. So, I'm gonna show you these two handouts. ParticleShop is a plugin that is from Painter, the program Corel Painter, so it's all about paint, and it paints and has brushes. It's a little, oh I'm sorry, could I have my screen up? Sorry. It's a little unwieldy. As I said, it crashes, but it allows me to paint in a way that I don't easily do, and I don't know Painter, I don't. I'd like to know it, but I just don't, so instead I've got a plugin that just does these effects rather quickly, and I like it. As I said, it crashes all the time, so all you wanna do is, you want to do it, save before you start, don't have a ton of things open, save when you're done, and then get rid of it. So, this is a sample of what that layer looked like before I put it in the file, cool? All right, so let's do another underwater function. Awesome. So let's say this is my job and I need to paint, you know how underwater photography's really in and it's very hard to get that water to do what it wants to do in the pool and all that? So here is the original, and on this kind of assignment what I'm gonna do is get rid of the fabric that doesn't suit for me. Okay, so that doesn't suit for me, and now I'm gonna paint, so I'm gonna show you how to do it. It's about 44 bucks, I think, for the basic package, and that's pretty much all you need, you don't need the full package, I have it. Very important, make a merge layer. Command, option, shift E, merge everything up to a top layer. This layer is what I'm gonna paint on and it's gonna disappear when I'm done. It's gonna disappear when I'm done. So I'm not even gonna label it, I know that's shocking. Filter, Painter, ParticleShop, and I'm praying it's gonna work fine 'cause as I said, it is buggy. But worth it, worth every moment of it. Yes, launch ParticleShop. ParticleShop is a freestanding application that will be launched through Photoshop, and when you quit you go back to Photoshop. All right, they have a gazillion million brushes. Most of these brushes are really similar, okay, most of these brushes are very similar and they just have maybe a different color attached to it, so I would not suggest you spend the $ for the entire pack, the ultimate kit, I don't think you need it, I think the standard one will get you where you want. You pick a brush, so they have wedding options and they have something called fine chi, I don't know what that means, but it's fine, I can't look up the whole name, so I have no idea, that's all right. You wanna pick a color over here on the left hand side, I'm gonna pick white, and then I'm gonna come back and I'm gonna paint. Now, you can paint on her, or you can paint off to the side. You have a choice, it's up to you. I'm gonna zoom in and it's got fabric lines to it, it's actually pretty cool, and it is unwieldy, it's very unpredictable. I'm gonna revert, I just clicked on the upper left hand, this is the stuff that took me a while to fill. This will invert the last brush stroke, this will take you back to zero, okay. This is density and then brush size, and then this is color. Directional, lovely, very subtle, do you see how pretty that is? And then I do have a fabric one I want to show you. Fabric, here we go, and I'm gonna do silk scarf. Silk scarf is definitely my favorite, by far. Do you know what I'm, do you see how it works when it goes, it goes (exhales sharply), and in fact for giggles I just wanna show you one other thing. Core pack, and I'm gonna do heat trail. I'm just gonna do an S, it's all I'm gonna do. Do you see how the brush does this wiggle squiggle thing? So I don't understand the mechanics of it, of how it works, which is why I love this thing so much. So I find it very unwieldy and very hard to precision control, so what I do, do you notice I drew off to the side, I didn't draw on her? It's 'cause I can't get it to match. Me, that's me, other people can, that's me, so I'm gonna undo that last one, sorry, undo the last one, and I'm gonna hit save. Very important, please, please, please, please, please, hands off the computer, save only the brush strokes, do not merge it, and you wanna hit okay. Layer one. There it is. (gasps) Oh, it's so pretty. Okay, and why I put it on this layer here, I'll put it in the fabric folder, because now I can command T and I can do whatever I want, warp it, do whatever I need to do, and place it, and mask it, and do whatever I need to. Now, I wanna show you another thing you can do. Color's not quite right, right? So one of the things you can do in Photoshop, let's call it silk scarf. If you click the lock button, if you click the lock button I can fill this with white, or a sample of her color, I'm gonna sample her color. All right, that might work for you. But you know what I think? Sometimes it doesn't work because it's so monochromatic when the whole thing is filled, so what I will do instead of that is I will still lock the layer but I'll use the gradient tool, the gradient tool with that same color, and I'll just click and drag and I'll just color it in some areas. Do you see that? So I just clicked and dragged there and there, and I let that go dark so you still get that tonality. That brush was 30 seconds. 30 seconds to do that. So for this file here, I'd like to just show you what I did, and again, this is like the ugly stuff under the hood, shall we look? A little ugly, but I want you to know how I work because I feel like it's disingenuous to show you something perfect and then have you go home and go, homie, this doesn't work the same way. So here's me thinking. Wedding fine chi, do you remember I said I couldn't see the brush name? Wedding fine chi. All right, I'll copy that. While that's kinda cool, it's a little flat. I want something a little more rolly. I'm just making copies, these are literally, do you remember I said you can take it and transform it? There is the mother, copy, copy, it's the exact same one, only transformed. That's the only difference, and masked in, I'll show you the crappy mask, it's a super crappy mask. 'Cause I don't need a fine mask for this, all right? Silk scarf, my favorite, and instead of painting it on its own layer I just grouped a paint layer, 'cause I wasn't sure. Right copy, it's the exact same piece just copied and transformed. Right side again on top, it's the same piece, it's just copied and transformed. Add a little paint, and add a little silk scarf on top. Cool, you think you could use it? Yeah, maybe, it's pretty rockin' awesome. That took me 10 minutes, okay, 10 minutes to do. Oh, oh, oh, very important. As I looked at this, and don't be afraid of doing this, I looked at this and I thought, this needed a little bit of extra love on it, so I copied the bottom and I liquefied it, and I'm gonna show you that real quick. So what I did is I took a copy of the bottom, just the square, yeah, and I liquefied it and I masked it in really bad, 'cause you didn't need to be precise, and what that did is it just added a little bit of flounce, and if I'm not mistaken I had that on 50% opacity, just to add a little dimension. And why, because it took two seconds, and why not when you can, cool? Awesome, all right let's move on, I'm gonna go back to my keynote, and I have one more to show you. So, (chuckles) I'm about to show you a mistake, because why not, shall we talk about mistakes? It's really healthy. Right, I think it's healthy. Do I have my mistake in here? (gasps) I don't know if I have my mistake in here. All right. I haven't mentioned this, but I'm gonna. Did I say it's a little unwieldy? So when I find shapes I like, I save 'em out as libraries, I save them out as libraries. I find that, some of you are gonna have no trouble, I have some trouble, so when I make some particular fabric bits that I like and I have an image library, I save 'em out just so I can grab 'em for anything. ParticleShop copy five. Can I tell you I have no idea what brush this is? Did you see how many brushes there are? I spent an hour yesterday trying to find the brush, still. It's been two weeks. I still can't find the brush. So this is, let me show you my idiotness. Please, I beg of you, label your layers, and I don't know if I have the layered file, I apologize. I had a little technical glitch here earlier, let me just double check. I don't have it, I apologize. So I can't show you the layered file on, oh yes I did, apology rescinded, here we go. (audience laughs) All right. So, this was something I had been working on for a long time. Earlier I said please practice on your own, on your own time, don't practice these brushes on a job, practice on your own time, so I've been practicing with this. So what I have is a base shot from Adobe Stock, I did a quick extension, and then I started painting and I was like, this is fantastic, I love that sweep, I'm gonna use that sweep for a bunch of stuff, I love the brush. Do you see the texture in the brush? I know it's a white screen, but can you see that? Woof. No idea what brush that was. So please, please, please try to remember to label your brushes, and on a side note, I will often do things like this, I will take the smudge tool and I will, I'm gonna put a gray layer so you can see it. I will use the smudge tool on a layer, we have a whole paintbrush class here at CreativeLive, they'll tell you how to use your smudge tools, but I will often use a very messy smudge tool to fill in underneath the fabric I've painted, 'cause it takes two seconds. Smudge brush and mixer brush, and then I put everybody in, and voila, there is your picture. ParticleBrush, give it a go.