Electrify:
This is a tutorial I got from a fiddling around with the clouds…(the clouds filer, that is). It gives a somewhat electrifying effect to the picture. It may be a bit too long, but its very easy if you follow it well.
Step 1:
Open you image. Use an image with a subject or a specific object that would look good electrified. Goes well with portraits. Now leave that there.
Step 2:
Create a new file. Make it the same size as your image. (e.g., 1024x768). Background colour doesn’t matter.
Step 3:
Make sure your colour swatch is set to default (press D). Then go to Filter> Render> Clouds. Clouds are rendered randomly so different users will have different looking clouds.
Step 4:
Apply the solarize filter by going to Filter > Stylize > Solarize.
Step 5:
Now adjust the brightness and contrast by going to Image > Adjustments > Brightness/Contrast. Reduce the brightness and increase the contrast. Your values should vary around -17 for brightness and +85 for the contrast.
Step 6:
This step involves separating the electricity bolts from the black background. Make sure your Foreground colour in the colour swatch is Black (press D). Then, go to Select > Colour Range. In the colour range dialog box, pump the fuzziness to 200. If you see the corresponding black areas from the image as white in the preview, then you are fine. Otherwise, take the eyedropper and select the black area from the actual image. In other words, all that is shown as white in the preview, will be selected.
Step 7:
Now, Invert the selection by pressing Shift+Ctrl+I or by going to Select> Inverse. This will select the electricity part. Now just Copy the selection by pressing Ctrl+C or going to Edit > Copy.
Step 8:
Create a new layer by pressing Shift+Ctrl+N or going to Layers>New>Layer. Now, paste electricity there by pressing Ctrl+V. Then, delete the background layer by dragging it to the trash box in the lower right corner of the layers palette.
Step 9:
This will leave just the electric bolts and a transparent background (the boxes background). Colour the image by pressing Ctrl+U or by going to Image >Adjustments > Hue/Saturation. Check the box “colorize� and then move the sliders to the colour you desire. I used:
Hue: 234
Saturation: 72
Lightness: 0
Step 10:
Select the electricity again, by ctrl+clicking the layer 1 in the layers palette. Copy it (Ctrl+C).
Step 11:
Go to the original image that you first opened and Paste (Ctrl+V).
The rest is up to you. Change the blend mode in the layers palette to something like maybe overlay. If you feel there is too much of lightning, then, just erase the extra with the eraser tool.
I used the Overlay blend mode and just erased the sides.
Adjustments:
- If you find that while erasing there are boxy edges which don’t really symbolize a theoretical lightning, then just use the smudge tool to smoothen out the edges into tapering tongues…
- Save the electricity as a PSD file for later use. (After completing step 9)
Final:
For all those who didn’t know, this is goobi, which is where part of my username comes from…
Sorry for making such a long tutorial, but had no other way round…If you have any problems feel free to ask.
Thanks to ImageShack for
Free Image Hosting
Electrify (photoshop tutorial)
Linear Mode
