Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Create a Spectacular Grass Text Effect in Photoshop


Step 1

This tutorial is made up of three parts—the background, the text itself, and some final extra effects. So first of all we’re going to make a background. To do this we create a new document in Photoshop. I made mine 1920 x 1200 because I want this image to sit on my laptop background.
We start by drawing a Radial Gradient with the Gradient Tool (G) going from a light yellow-green (#adbf41) to a mid-range green (#328a26). I wonder if I’ve ever written a tutorial that doesn’t start with a radial gradient. :-)

Step 2

Now for this image we want to create a really textured background, faintly resembling paper. So the first thing we need is … a paper texture!
Happily you can grab some really awesome grungy paper textures from Bittbox and they are nice and large too, which is good because this is a huge canvas.
So I can’t remember which texture I used first, but grab one, desaturate it (Ctrl+Shift+U) and stretch it over the top to fit the canvas.

Step 3

Now we set the layer to Overlay and 70% Opacity to blend the texture with our nice green background.

Step 4

Now to get a really distressed look, I then copied this layer, spun it around 180′ and set it to 20%. Then I brought in a few more layers of paper texture (using different textures, mostly from Bittbox) and set them all to faint overlays, one on top of the other.
This was partly for the extra distress, but also because I realised that the textures looked a bit grainy and not small and sharp. So by combining extra textures and then fading it all back, I can get a nicer, sharper overall look.
Anyhow as you can see in the screenshot there are six layers here. Don’t forget if you are a Plus member you can download the PSD file for this tutorial and take a look in there yourself!

Step 5

Now I duplicated the original background gradient, placed the duplicate layer above all the textures and set it to 40% Opacity—this tones back the texture so it’s not quite so grungy!

Step 6

Now we create a new layer over the top and using a large, soft, black brush, add some black to the edges. It’s worth toning back the opacity to about 30% and Overlay. You can then duplicate the layer and run a heavy Gaussian Blur over it (set to about 32px). That way the edges really soften out.

Step 7

OK, we now have a nice background!

Step 8

OK, we are now ready to make some grass text. To do that, we’re going to need some nice pretty grass to cut. After a lot of searching, I finally found this lovely photo on Flickr of grass.
So download the image at full-size and copy it on to your canvas.

Step 9

Next we need some type. So select a font you want to cut out with. I chose Swiss 924BT, which is fat and condensed type. I thought it looked nice and grand. And I’ve written the text "EARTH". That’s because I’m making five of these wallpapers—earth, water, fire, air, spirit … it’s like that cartoon I used to watch as a kid, Captain Planet!
Anyways, so just set your text out in white and set it to Overlay and like 50% Opacity. This layer won’t actually show in the end, it’s just a guide layer.

Step 10

OK, so here’s the text on top of the grass we got earlier.
Now a bit of planning! To make text out of grass, it’s not going to be enough just to stencil out the grass. Rather we need it to look all rough, with bits of grass sticking out the edges. To do that, we’re going to use the letter shapes as a rough guide and then trace roughly around them and periodically jut out to trace around blades of grass.
I’ll warn you now, it’s very tiresome!

Step 11

OK, so here we are tracing. You should use the Pen Tool (P) and frankly, if you’re not handy with it before you start, you will be by the end!
Notice how in the parts where my path juts out, it sort of follows individual blades of grass. That way when you have the final cut-out they will look like pieces of grass sticking out.

Step 12

When you’ve finished your path, it’s best to save it in the Paths Palette. You can do this by switching to that palette and then clicking the little down arrow and choosing Save Path. That way if you need the path again later, you can grab it.
Anyhow, double-click the path to get the selection and go back to your grass layer. Duplicate the grass layer so you still have more grass for the other letters, then invert your selection (Ctrl+Shift+I) and cut away the excess grass. In the screenshot I’ve faded back the duplicate grass layer so you can see the cut out "E" part.

Step 13

OK, so here we have our "E" on the final bakcground. As you can see, it looks only slightly better than if we’d just used the letter to stencil out the grass without bothering to trace. But that’s OK, what it needs is a bit more depth. After all, if that letter was really sitting there, we should see some shadow and sides to it.

Step 14

First of all though, we’ll add some layer styling to give it a bit more of a three dimensional look. The styles are shown below.
Here’s the first set of layer styles…

Step 15

Now duplicate that layer, then clear the layer style off the duplicate, so we can add some more styles. This time add the styles shown below…
Here’s the second set of layer styles… (Note that it’s 51% Opacity so it’ll blend in with the previous layer)

Step 16

So this was all just experimental, and it kinda looks OK, but obviously has a long way to go. Now we’ll add some shadow. For that we’ll use a technique that I demonstrated in a previous tutorial, Using Light and Shade to Bring Text to Life
The idea is to make a three dimensional look. So Ctrl-click the grass layer and then in a new layer below, fill it with black. Then press the down arrow once and the right arrow once and fill it again, then repeat over and over until you get an effect like that shown. I think that was about 15 steps of filling.

Step 17

Now we run a Filter > Blur > Motion Blur on our shadow with a 45′ angle and a distance of about 30. Then set the text to a low opacity of about 50%. You should have something that looks like the screenshot below.

Step 18

Now move the shadow layer down and to the right and magic happens! All of a sudden it looks like the letter is casting a shadow. Pretty neat!

Step 19

Now I duplicated this layer three times. Each time I erased a bit of it away so that as the shadow is closer to the text it gets darker. I set these layers to Multiply.

Step 20

So this text is looking pretty cool, but for that extra bit of depth we should add some bits of grass in the background/shadow area. Rather than cutting out more grass, we can just use this current letter transformed about so that it’s not obvious that we’re hacking it together.
So as you can see below I created a few pieces of grass. They are just cut up bits of our main letter.

Step 21

Now by moving those pieces into the shadow areas, we can make it look like there is grass sticking out and it’s a real 3D object made from grass!
Because these new grass bits are in shadow, you might want to use the Burn Tool (O) to darken them appropriately.

Step 22

So yay, one letter down … four to go! Good thing we didn’t choose a long word like erm I don’t know … laborious!

Step 23

Using the exact same technique … here is the A;

Step 24

and the R and T … you get the picture.

Step 25

And finally, the whole word! The only extra thing I did here was to move the letters apart a little. Each letter is in its own Layer Group which makes moving it around much easier.

Step 26

Now nice as it’s looking, our text is a little lonely and monotonous. So in this last section we’ll add a few more elements to the design. Note we don’t want to overdo it, though, because I want this to be a desktop background, so space it is important (for all my icons!).
So first up, let’s add some extra text. Here I’ve placed a nice quote about the earth and unity taken from the Baha’i faith (that’s my religion!). I love quotes, because it means we get three parts to decorate—the quote, the quotation marks and the source.
The text is in a variation of Swiss which is thinner, but still condensed. Using multiple fonts from the same family (heavy, light, etc) is a good, safe bet for keeping your type looking coherent.
So here I’ve set the quote to Overlay and 50%, then duplicated the text and set it to Screen and 50%. Then I’ve added quotation marks in the same Swiss font, but made them extra large and a bright shade of green. Finally, the source of the quote is in teeny letters and centered vertically. And, of course, the whole quote has been measured out so it’s exactly the length of the main "EARTH" text.

Step 27

Next we’ll add a bit of a highlight to the scene. To do this, create a new layer above all the rest, and using the Gradient Tool (G), draw a gradient of white -> transparent towards the top left. Then set this layer to Soft Light and 50%. This will turn it into a nice subtle bit of lighting.

Step 28

Now we’ll add two eye-catching elements to offset all the green. These will be a brilliant blue butterfly and a little red ladybug. I used the excellent everystockphoto Web site that searches a ton of free stock Web sites for you to find two awesome images to use: Ladybug | Butterfly

Step 29

Placing the images is pretty easy. First the butterfly. We just open up the image in Photoshop, use the Magic Wand Tool (W) to select all the white area, then go to Select > Modify > Expand and expand the selection by 1px to make sure we’ve got it all. Then press Ctrl+Shift+I to invert the selection and copy the butterfly over to our main canvas.
The ladybug I selected needs to be cut out of it’s image. To do that I used the Pen Tool (P) and traced around the little guy and then just cut him out that way.

Step 30

So here are our two extras. As you can see, the lady bug looks a bit weird actually because I did a quick’n'dirty job of cutting him out. But that’s OK because he’s going to be tiny so you won’t be able to see the details anyway.
So paste them in and then shrink them down and place them appropriately. It’s best if they aren’t close together, because that way they’ll balance each other.
I added a drop shadow to each. With the ladybug it’s a very close shadow because he’s small and walking on the grass. With the butterfly, I set the distance to about 10px because he’s hovering in the air and therefore the shadow lands a little ways away.

Final Image


Monday, August 27, 2012

Website Kontes Logo Online Berhadiah Ratusan Dolar


Buat sobat yang punya kemampuan atau ketertarikan di bidang design grafis simak dech info berikut ini. Pernah dengar kontes logo ( logo design contest) , kalau belum di internet ada beberapa website yang menyediakan jasa layanan pembuatan logo design secara online.   Sebagai designer kita bisa mengirim hasil karya desain logo kita yang telah kita buat sesuai dengan keterangan yang diminta klien.

mycroburst.com
Cara Ikutan
Bagaimana cara untuk mengikutinya ? seperti telah saya tulis diatas banyak website yang menyediakan layanan design kontes logo design tersebut, nah kita pilih aja salah satu nya, salah satu rekomendasi saya adalahWWW.MYCROBURST.COM ( selain itu masih banyak lagi) , kita daftar aja ke website tersebut  masukkan data diri yang sesuai degan identitas kita.
Cara Mengikuti Kontes
Disana akan ada puluhan kontes aktif  setiap hari, cari aja yang masih agak lama ( misal 3-5 hari) , baca Brief (keterangan)  yang disediakan, lalu kita mulai buat logo, setelah selesai kirim dalam format Image ( JPEG / PNG) tunggu. Kalau klien senang dengan logo kita maka kita akan keluar sebagai juara dan berhak atas sejumlah uang yang dijanjikan.
Cara Menerima Pembayaran
Pembayaran dikirim melalui Paypal ,buat sobat yang belum mengerti / mempunyai paypal jangan khawatir buat aja akun paypal dan www.paypal.com gratis kok, untuk langkah verifikasi akun paypal bisa sobat cari di internet ( atau mungkin akan saya posting kedepannya )
Bukti Pembayaran
Sudah cukup jelas bukan , tunggu apa lagi segera buat sobat yang merasa kreatif dan menyukai design grafis, manfaatkan bakat dan kemapuan anda untuk meraih beberapa ratus dolar yang jika dirupiahkan cukup menarik bukan.

Saturday, August 18, 2012

Cara Membuat Sampul Majalah Musik dengan InDesign


In this tutorial, we’ll look at how to create a magazine cover in InDesign. You’ll learn how to set up a page layout and add text. This is an introduction to InDesign and no previous knowledge is required. This is a simple project put together to help get you started with InDesign. Let’s get to it!

Final Image Preview

Below is the final design we will be working towards. Want access to the full Vector Source files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join VECTORTUTS PLUS for just $19/month.

Step 1

First, let’s have a look at the common elements of a magazine cover. I outlined the most important parts below in the image for you. The most important element are the main image chosen for the cover and the masthead, which is nothing else than the title of the magazine. Usually below the masthead you can find the main cover line acting as a punch line. Cover lines usually introduce the contents of the magazine. Other elements are a dateline indicating the date and last but not least a barcode.

Step 2

Let’s get started. Open up InDesign and have a look at the main frame of the software. The layout is similar to Illustrator with the toolbar on the left, the palettes toggled on the right and various tools on the top.

Step 3

Let’s look at the toolbar. On top you can find the Selection Tool (V), below the Direct Selection Tool (A). Right after the Pen Tool (P) and below that the Text Tool (T). We have also a Pencil Tool (N) and Line Tool.

Step 4

There is a really neat way to arrange the Toolbar horizontally by clicking on the small arrows on the top left corners.

Step 5

Or you can split the tools into two rows in a vertical fashion by clicking the arrows one more time. If you would like to go back to the original one line vertical bar, just click it again.

Step 6

Go to File > New > Document (Command + N). You will get a pop up window like you see in the image below. To start easily, deselect the Facing Pages button, make sure you selected Letter size and only choose 1 column. The margins are preset and you can leave them like they are.

Step 7

This is the document that you will get. The pink/purple lines are the margin guides and can be turned on and off  (Command + ;).

Step 8

First thing we need is the Rectangle Frame Tool (F). This will help us place our image. Select the Rectangle Frame Tool (F).

Step 9

Now start dragging from the top-left document corner downwards to the bottom-right one.

Step 10

I have selected an image from stock.xchng. Feel free to choose whatever image you like. Make sure that you have created a folder just for your InDesign file and your image. They should be in the same location. Go to File > Place and in the popup window choose the image that you would like to place and hit OK.

Step 11

Since we placed a frame, the image might be too big for it. Without distorting the image, you can fit it proportionally. The tool button for this can be found on the top, next to the align buttons. If you hover over any of the tools, they will reveal their names. Click it once and the image will be automatically fitted.

Step 12

Next we need to move the image around. But we don’t want to move the frame itself. We can do that by selecting the Position Tool (Shift + A). You can find it under the Direct Selection Tool (A). Just click on the black small arrow and the drop down will appear.

Step 13

When you move the mouse now over the image, a hand will appear and you can move the image around within the frame. I made it a little easier for you and set the image to 28% this will set the image size right for the frame. It all depends which part of the image you want to reveal..

Step 14

An important step for a layout is to add bleed. Bleed is an additional amount of image that extends beyond the edge of the page layout to ensure a full color coverage. It is later trimmed off by the printer. InDesign is just as smart as Illustrator and can act like a small calculator for you. Just type literally +18pt to the width and height. By hitting “Enter” it will be added to the frame dimension. (9pt on each side).

Step 15

After that we want your frame to be centered both vertically and horizontally. Select the frame with the Selection Tool (V) and then hit the top left small corner of the Reference Point to set the origin. Then set theX and Y coordinates to -9pt. InDesign calculates in picas and point (or whatever measurements you have set up). Make sure you always type pt behind a number. InDesign will automatically convert them into picas and points (1 pica is equal to 6pt).

Step 16

InDesign has layers just like Illustrator. You can find the Layers Palette on the right edge. Usually the main palettes are toggled there.

Step 17

I set up four layers. One for the background image. Then one for the barcode we will add later, another for some boxes and one for the text. It makes it easier to hide and lock elements that
way.

Step 18

Let’s add some text to our magazine cover. Select the Type Tool (T).

Step 19

Then start dragging a type box by holding down the mouse key and pulling downwards.

Step 20

I typed my text and aligned it left. You can open the Character and Paragraph Palette. I chose a font called Sansation. You can download it here at Dafont.com.

Step 21

I added another Type box just below and right aligned it and set the font weight much smaller. This will be the Selling Line and the Dateline. It helps to drag a guide onto the artboard.

Step 22

Just to show you how you can change the color of the text, highlight it with the cursor and open the Swatches Palette and choose Paper as a color.

Step 23

Towards the middle on your magazine cover layout, I created yet another Type box and added the masthead (title). I chose a font called Astro 867 from Dafont.com. I right aligned it with the margins of our document.

Step 24

I outlined the text boxes I created for the cover. All together I have six text boxes. Colors, fonts, and sizes are totally up to you.

Step 25

To give the text a little bit more punch, you can add a box behind it. Make sure that you will put it on the layer below the text layer. Select the Rectangle Tool (M).

Step 26

Start dragging a box across the entire frame including bleed by holding down the mouse key and dragging downwards and across.

Step 27

Fill the rectangle with black and set the Opacity to 75%. You can do that via the Effects Palette.

Step 28

Just in case you got confused, I took a screen shot of the palettes that are toggled on the right. Of course you can customize them and order them as you wish.

Step 29

Here are the boxes that were added behind the text. I have seven rectangles with various colors and transparencies.

Step 30

Now just to have some more fun, we can add our custom barcode image. I found a place for you where you can create your barcode for free  and download the image. Feel free to choose whatever size and name. I chose a negative instead of a positive and set the value to: "by simona."

Step 31

Back to the InDesign file. Place another frame with the Rectangle Frame Tool (F) just like we did in Step 9. Place the barcode image you downloaded into your folder (Command + D) and into the frame. Next, resize the frame this time to fit the image by clicking on the Fit Frame to Content Button. Place the frame with the barcode into the bottom left corner.

Step 32

Have a look at the final design. Of course this is a very simple layout. I hope nevertheless this will give you an insight into InDesign and maybe if you stick around, there might be some multi-page layout tutorials on the way.

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed the introduction to InDesign and how a magazine cover is set up or better what elements are important to the layout. Please let your imagination go and maybe you will get some ideas for your own magazine.

TV ONE