Tutorial 16: Objects Level: Beginner If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me. Click here for more tutorials
This is one of my favorite things to do when editing. Images can turn out so much better when you take the time to add little details like these!
Step 1: Finding Objects
To start, open trusty Google and type in your key words. Remember what we covered with the previous tutorials, but if you don’t remember: use keywords from your assignments to search on Google. For this tutorial we are going to do “hats”.
Type in “hats” into Google, then hit enter. When the page loads, click on “Images” at the top. Now you have a wide variety of hats to look at and possibly add to your pictures. However, you can’t just add any hat to your image. Most of the hats here are either at the wrong angle for you, not the right style, or are too small. Besides changing keywords and just looking harder for the other problems, the size problem can easily be remedied. Once you know the basic size of your model and her head, you can start searching for hats. You want to change the sizes based on how large your image is, and maybe, just maybe, you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat.
For the sizes, follow the same rules as the background searching. Go to “Search Tools” and then “Size”, move your mouse down the drop down menu to “Larger than…” and select your option. You will rarely go to 2 MP but you will want something in between! Next, if you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat, you can try another method of searching. While it greatly limits your results, sometimes a term as broad as this can lead to enough useful results. Move your mouse over to the “Color” section now and then drop down to “Transparent”. This should bring up images that now have a transparent background and are now easier to use. No worrying about cutting them out properly when it’s done for you!
Once you find suitable objects right click and open them into a new tab. Remember that just opening them doesn’t always load the image properly, so make sure to click “View Image” and study the object, then save if you like it. Remember to find several options in case something doesn’t work out.
Tips:
Don’t forget to use synonyms or add more or less keywords
Also include “stock” or “clip art” to get more images or more specific types.
Places like DeviantArt and other stock websites offer great selections for images.
As said in the background one, avoid a stock website’s watermarked images they use as a preview. Find a free stock website instead, or you can pay to unlock it, or keep looking.
The same with backgrounds, don’t scale up too much. You want to avoid doing that as much as possible. Scaling down isn’t an issue since it’s an object so feel free to do this!
It is possible to take an item that someone is already wearing/using and add it to your photo. It takes more work though as you will have to correct issues, erase more, and so on just to get it to work, so use caution when attempting this.
Don’t forget to only use HQ items! Sometimes the small stuff can be overlooked, but for large things, like dresses, please do not use bad quality items.
Step 2: Cutting and Manipulating
(I am using the same basket I used back in Candy Queen as my example.)
After finding suitable objects you need to open them into your image. Either load them into a script stack with your original image (PS), click and drag them onto the new image (PS uses the images/ Gimp uses the tabs), or open them into a new layer (Gimp).
Once they are open you need to cut them out (unless you did the transparent search option). It depends on the type of item that determines how you cut them out.
If they are a simple shaped object with no holes, feel free to use whatever method you prefer. For me, in PS, I prefer to use Quick Selection. You can also use the Scissors Select Tool (Gimp) or the Magnetic Lasso (PS). Both follow the shape of the object, so it should be useful to you when cutting out simple shapes.
Tips for Quick Selection:
Clicking and dragging across the shape should select all of it (and possibly extra)
The bigger the brush, the bigger the selection. For more delicate selections or corrections, make the brush very tiny, zoom in, then begin working.
Keep your brush on the “+” sign mode. This allows you to add more to your current selection.
If you need to remove part of something, use the “-“ brush.
The other items you may have to cut out are fur and transparent objects.
For fur: It is almost impossible to cut out objects perfectly with fur. There are some ways to do it that kind of work, and there are ways to fix it if it doesn’t. My suggestion is cut out the furry object, erase any background that is left, then go in and color drop the fur, open several new layers, then begin drawing new fur (place one color on one layer so they stack and blend better). This is the easiest method to deal with fur, and it is better than spending 20+ minutes trying to cut out the fur perfectly (it won’t happen).
For transparent objects: If you haven’t noticed yet, transparent objects on a colored background stay colored even after cutting them out. There’s no real trick/method to fixing this, and the only thing I can suggest is to either make the object not transparent (coloring it in) or finding a transparent object with a transparent background. If I find a way to fix this, I’ll update this guide.
Lastly, when I need to select something with holes I use the color picker tools for both PS and Gimp. Hopefully you are working on a solid background, otherwise cutting the object out with color picker will be quite hard for you. Just like cutting out your sim, select your background, grow/expand, and then hit delete. (Or don’t grow/expand and instead erase the edges yourself.)
Once your object is out of its background, it’s time to manipulate it so it fits your image.
The first thing you need to learn is how to control the object.
For Gimp:
The tools you will use frequently when manipulating (I don’t use shear, which is why it’s skipped):
Move Tool – Allows you to move the object around
Rotate Tool – Allows you to turn/rotate your object
Scale Tool – Allows you to make your object smaller or bigger (if you want the width and height to remain even, don't forget to click on the chain link right next to the numbers)
Perspective Tool – Allows you to mess with the perspective (so making something appear farther away or more turned)
Flip Tool – Allows you to flip the object horizontal or vertical
Filter > Distorts > Warps – This tool will be covered more in depth week 3, but this allows you to add curves and flowing movements to your light objects. Turn up the Deform Radius to affect the object better. Deform Amount affects how fast it warps. Click remove, then move over an error to erase it.
And of course the erase tool.
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.
I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand. It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s take my Rotate Tool and start turning it.
This weird pop up and box around your object will appear. You can mess with the settings in the pop up to achieve what you want, but I prefer to use the box around my object to manipulate it.
The clicking and holding on the box, then moving it around adjusts the angle the object is at. Clicking and dragging around the circle in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale tool just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective tool. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
For PS:
There isn’t an exact tool to manipulate, it’s actually a shortcut!
To activate this tool, stay on your object layer and hit “Ctrl + T”. This brings up your transform box. Now, to start manipulating your object you need to right click.
Your options (I don’t use skew which is why it’s skipped):
Free transform - allows you to rotate and scale freely
Scale - allows you to make it bigger or smaller. Click the “link” button at the top to keep the object even while you adjust it. (If you want the width and height to remain even, don't forget to click on the chain link right next to the numbers. I marked the location in the image.)
Rotate – rotates/turns your image
Distort – Rarely use this. Weird combo of Perspective and warp tool.
Perspective - Allows you to mess with the perspective (so making something appear farther away or more turned)
Warp – My favorite tool. Allows you to make something appear sideways or make objects curved. This is also the tool that gives your loose objects that flowing/wavy movement.
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.
I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand (Make sure to hold Ctrl, then click and hold to move it without PS relocating it. Let go of the left click button before letting go of Ctrl or it will slingshot back into place). It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s select my rotate option, or stay on Free Transform (you always start in Free Transform), and start turning it.
Clicking outside the box, holding, and then moving your mouse rotates the image. Clicking and dragging the “+” around in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale option just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective option. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
Back to both programs
Once you’re done manipulating your object you do the last few parts. For people who are doing an object like mine, something that is to be held, we need to make sure that she is actually holding the object! There is a quick trick to this. First off, if your sim isn’t cut out of her background this will be hard to do, but it’s possible.
Select your sims outline (Alt + Left Click for Gimp, Ctrl + Left Click for PS) and then go to your objects layer and turn down the opacity so you can see through it. We are now going to erase part of the handle so it appears she is holding it. You can do this for any object that is going to be held. Just place over the hand, position it properly, then erase wherever the hand would be. Sometimes you don’t erase everything due to the hand position, so we turn down the opacity to see what we are doing.
The last thing you want to do is take care of your objects edges. Blurring or smudging them takes care of any roughness from cutting them out and allows them to blend into their background better. When we learn shadows and highlights, don’t forget to add those as well!
Alright, last two are almost done. One heck of a day. @_@
I have one last important tutorial to get up, and it's about blending your sims and objects through colors. I also have a bonus tutorial going with it. The blending one is more of a last minute thing though, so feel free to get started on your assignments if you haven't already (I hope you did o-o). If you're waiting to submit, double check your assignment for any errors. Everything we covered this week will be looked for in your assignment. If you didn't use something, that is okay, but for those who did we are keeping an eye out.
Don't submit yet, but work on your assignments still.
Also, I completely forgot to close Challenge 1, but Challenge 1 is now closed!
Scores will be up either tomorrow or the day after.
Here's to hoping I don't have random interruptions again. >_>
Thank you! I put a ton of work into that one. I even made the hair. I found a way to copy and paste the mesh of the bun in one of the EA hairs to build it up.
Well, you did an exceptional job You should be proud!
@LeslieM25 I was wondering where you found the hair. You did a very nice job creating it. I was thinking of doing something similar to yours, then I saw yours posted, no way I could have done it justice in comparison. I really like the picture.
Thanks you guys! I'm going to post the hair on my tumblr if anybody wants it.
I will certainly take a look at it
Beauty obtains attention, but personality is what captures the heart. ♥
If you are still having trouble with something in this guide, or need more help, please post here or contact me.
This is one of my favorite things to do when editing. Images can turn out so much better when you take the time to add little details like these!
Step 1: Finding Objects
To start, open trusty Google and type in your key words. Remember what we covered with the previous tutorials, but if you don’t remember: use keywords from your assignments to search on Google. For this tutorial we are going to do “hats”.
Type in “hats” into Google, then hit enter. When the page loads, click on “Images” at the top. Now you have a wide variety of hats to look at and possibly add to your pictures. However, you can’t just add any hat to your image. Most of the hats here are either at the wrong angle for you, not the right style, or are too small. Besides changing keywords and just looking harder for the other problems, the size problem can easily be remedied. Once you know the basic size of your model and her head, you can start searching for hats. You want to change the sizes based on how large your image is, and maybe, just maybe, you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat.
For the sizes, follow the same rules as the background searching. Go to “Search Tools” and then “Size”, move your mouse down the drop down menu to “Larger than…” and select your option. You will rarely go to 2 MP but you will want something in between! Next, if you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat, you can try another method of searching. While it greatly limits your results, sometimes a term as broad as this can lead to enough useful results. Move your mouse over to the “Color” section now and then drop down to “Transparent”. This should bring up images that now have a transparent background and are now easier to use. No worrying about cutting them out properly when it’s done for you!
Once you find suitable objects right click and open them into a new tab. Remember that just opening them doesn’t always load the image properly, so make sure to click “View Image” and study the object, then save if you like it. Remember to find several options in case something doesn’t work out.
Tips:
Don’t forget to use synonyms or add more or less keywords
Also include “stock” or “clip art” to get more images or more specific types.
Places like DeviantArt and other stock websites offer great selections for images.
As said in the background one, avoid a stock website’s watermarked images they use as a preview. Find a free stock website instead, or you can pay to unlock it, or keep looking.
The same with backgrounds, don’t scale up too much. You want to avoid doing that as much as possible. Scaling down isn’t an issue since it’s an object so feel free to do this!
It is possible to take an item that someone is already wearing/using and add it to your photo. It takes more work though as you will have to correct issues, erase more, and so on just to get it to work, so use caution when attempting this.
Don’t forget to only use HQ items! Sometimes the small stuff can be overlooked, but for large things, like dresses, please do not use bad quality items.
Step 2: Cutting and Manipulating
(I am using the same basket I used back in Candy Queen as my example.)
After finding suitable objects you need to open them into your image. Either load them into a script stack with your original image (PS), click and drag them onto the new image (PS uses the images/ Gimp uses the tabs), or open them into a new layer (Gimp).
Once they are open you need to cut them out (unless you did the transparent search option). It depends on the type of item that determines how you cut them out.
If they are a simple shaped object with no holes, feel free to use whatever method you prefer. For me, in PS, I prefer to use Quick Selection. You can also use the Scissors Select Tool (Gimp) or the Magnetic Lasso (PS). Both follow the shape of the object, so it should be useful to you when cutting out simple shapes.
Tips for Quick Selection:
Clicking and dragging across the shape should select all of it (and possibly extra)
The bigger the brush, the bigger the selection. For more delicate selections or corrections, make the brush very tiny, zoom in, then begin working.
Keep your brush on the “+” sign mode. This allows you to add more to your current selection.
If you need to remove part of something, use the “-“ brush.
The other items you may have to cut out are fur and transparent objects.
For fur: It is almost impossible to cut out objects perfectly with fur. There are some ways to do it that kind of work, and there are ways to fix it if it doesn’t. My suggestion is cut out the furry object, erase any background that is left, then go in and color drop the fur, open several new layers, then begin drawing new fur (place one color on one layer so they stack and blend better). This is the easiest method to deal with fur, and it is better than spending 20+ minutes trying to cut out the fur perfectly (it won’t happen).
For transparent objects: If you haven’t noticed yet, transparent objects on a colored background stay colored even after cutting them out. There’s no real trick/method to fixing this, and the only thing I can suggest is to either make the object not transparent (coloring it in) or finding a transparent object without a transparent background. If I find a way to fix this, I’ll update this guide.
Lastly, when I need to select something with holes I use the color picker tools for both PS and Gimp. Hopefully you are working on a solid background, otherwise cutting the object out with color picker will be quite hard for you. Just like cutting out your sim, select your background, grow/expand, and then hit delete. (Or don’t grow/expand and instead erase the edges yourself.)
Once your object is out of its background, it’s time to manipulate it so it fits your image.
The first thing you need to learn is how to control the object.
For Gimp:
The tools you will use frequently when manipulating (I don’t use skew, which is why it’s skipped):
Move Tool – Allows you to move the object around
Rotate Tool – Allows you to turn/rotate your object
Scale Tool – Allows you to make your object smaller or bigger
Perspective Tool – Allows you to mess with the perspective (so making something appear farther away or more turned)
Flip Tool – Allows you to flip the object horizontal or vertical
Filter > Distorts > Warps – This tool will be covered more in depth week 3, but this allows you to add curves and flowing movements to your light objects. Turn up the Deform Radius to affect the object better. Deform Amount affects how fast it warps. Click remove, then move over an error to erase it.
And of course the erase tool.
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.
I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand. It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s take my Rotate Tool and start turning it.
This weird pop up and box around your object will appear. You can mess with the settings in the pop up to achieve what you want, but I prefer to use the box around my object to manipulate it.
The clicking and holding on the box, then moving it around adjusts the angle the object is at. Clicking and dragging around the circle in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale tool just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective tool. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
For PS:
There isn’t an exact tool to manipulate, it’s actually a shortcut!
To activate this tool, stay on your object layer and hit “Ctrl + T”. This brings up your transform box. Now, to start manipulating your object you need to right click.
Your options (I don’t use skew which is why it’s skipped):
Free transform - allows you to rotate and scale freely
Scale - allows you to make it bigger or smaller. Click the “link” button at the top to keep the object even while you adjust it.
Rotate – rotates/turns your image
Distort – Rarely use this. Weird combo of Perspective and warp tool.
Perspective - Allows you to mess with the perspective (so making something appear farther away or more turned)
Warp – My favorite tool. Allows you to make something appear sideways or make objects curved. This is also the tool that gives your loose objects that flowing/wavy movement.
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.
I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand. It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s select my rotate option, or stay on Free Transform (you always start in Free Transform), and start turning it.
Clicking outside the box, holding, and then moving your mouse rotates the image. Clicking and dragging the “+” around in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale option just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective option. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
Back to both programs
Once you’re done manipulating your object you do the last few parts. For people who are doing an object like mine, something that is to be held, we need to make sure that she is actually holding the object! There is a quick trick to this. First off, if your sim isn’t cut out of her background this will be hard to do, but it’s possible.
Select your sims outline (Alt + Left Click for Gimp, Ctrl + Left Click for PS) and then go to your objects layer and turn down the opacity so you can see through it. We are now going to erase part of the handle so it appears she is holding it. You can do this for any object that is going to be held. Just place over the hand, position it properly, then erase wherever the hand would be. Sometimes you don’t erase everything due to the hand position, so we turn down the opacity to see what we are doing.
The last thing you want to do is take care of your objects edges. Blurring or smudging them takes care of any roughness from cutting them out and allows them to blend into their background better. When we learn shadows and highlights, don’t forget to add those as well!
Will read this later, this looks really cool. I can't wait to get started
Beauty obtains attention, but personality is what captures the heart. ♥
I had no idea you could search images by size. I thought the image I had for assignment 2 would be big enough, but for what I wanted to do it isn't. Back to the drawing board I go.
The last tutorials will be up in a bit. I am doing formatting and uploading now.
Also, I have just tried the new cutting method I mentioned forever ago, and it works wonders. Like I said, it can't be used for CAS pictures (You can try, but good luck with it), but for in game pictures this is revolutionary. I will be working out the kinks as the author was hard to understand and Gimp was a pain to figure out ihatethatprogramsomuch, and I still need to test how it reacts with black/white hair, clothes, accessories, etc. Once I figure that out I can release it. I hope you guys enjoy this new cutting method! (You have no idea what I went through to find this and then get it to work. A hug is appreciated! xD)
Tutorial 25: Blending Part 2 (Gimp) Level: Beginner If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me. Click here for more tutorials
One thing you may have noticed while working with backgrounds is that your sim doesn’t match it! They stick out like a sore thumb or don’t match the tone of the background in general.
The way to fix this is through the use of gradients, levels/curves, hue and saturation, or filters. You can use any method you like, and some are easier than others (or work better in general). (These can all be used on backgrounds too, not just sims).
The one I recommend to use for blending sims and objects is your levels/curves to adjust them to the lighting and color of the image (then you can do filters/gradients to give it another blend. Make sure to adjust opacity). Its main purpose is to adjust the colors, darkness and brightness, of your images.
Make sure you are on your sims layer, then go to your “Colors” tab, then move down and click on either levels or curves. Both do the same thing, but one is usually easier for some. I find curves to be easier to deal with because there are less things to mess with. I’d suggest understanding curves first, then attempting levels later.
This window will pop up, and as you can see there is just a line going through it. There are several options here that can alter your photo, they just aren’t visible yet.
To adjust your sims color you need to grab the line at any point, and then drag it up or down to get what you want. To start with, we want out model to be darker to match her environment, so grab the line and move it down.
As you can see, she is now darker. Now we need to start giving her a blue tone to match her environment. Blues/purples are meant for cold/wet environments, and reds and oranges are meant for warm/sunny environments. Remember that whenever you have an ice or fire edit!
To give her a blue tone you need go up to “Channel”. Here you can see the colors that are available for you to edit. Each one will give different colors depending on what was altered in another. For now, we want to mess with blue, so click on “Blue”.
Grab the line and move it up. If you move it down, your sim gets a sickly yellow color. Also, if you happen to make a second dot on your line, don’t freak out. Click and drag it to the very top or bottom of your line and pull it off, or yank the dot from where it’s currently at (pulling slowly just moves the line). This will remove any dots you don’t want/need. Adding multiple dots allows you to play more with the curve and achieve different looks.
My sim is still a bit too purple and stands out still, so let’s go to another channel. I know that red and blue make purple, so I’ll be heading to red next. I’ve already tried moving it up, but she turns red, so I instead move down again. I noticed she was starting to get too dark as well, so I went back to “Value” and adjusted the strength of the curve to make her lighter.
My sim is pretty much done now. She blends pretty well with the background and doesn’t really need any more color changes. Since the water usually has a hint of green though, I’ve decided to adjustment the green curve by dragging it up a bit. All done!
Tutorial 25: Blending Part 2 (Photoshop) Level: Beginner If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me. Click here for more tutorials
One thing you may have noticed while working with backgrounds is that your sim doesn’t match it! They stick out like a sore thumb or don’t match the tone of the background in general.
The way to fix this is through the use of gradients, levels/curves, hue and saturation, or filters. You can use any method you like, and some are easier than others (or work better in general). (These can all be used on backgrounds too, not just sims).
The one I recommend to use for blending sims and objects is your levels/curves (which act like filters). It’s main purpose is to adjust the colors, darkness and brightness, of your images.
Make sure you are on your sims layer before moving forward. Now, there are three ways to get to your levels/curves: under your “Image” tab, if you have the adjustments window open, or at the very bottom of your layers window. Doesn’t matter where you activate it from. Levels and curves do the same thing btw, but one is usually easier for some. I find curves to be easier to deal with because there are less things to mess with. I’d suggest understanding curves first, then attempting levels later.
Click on curves from one of the options. This window will pop up, and as you can see there is just a line going through it. You can see that there are several options and even color picker tools. We aren’t getting into those, but feel free to mess with them. (Don’t forget to hover to see what the description or name is.)
To adjust your sims color you first need to clip the layer to your sim. If you don’t clip the filter will affect everything beneath it, including your background. This is great for wide affects, but we’re only worried about our sim right now (or objects). To do this, either select the clipping option on the curves window, or right click on your new curves layer and select “Create Clipping Mask”.
It should now look like this:
Now that it’s clipping, it’s time to adjust the colors. Grab the line at any point, and then drag it up or down to get what you want. To start with, we want out model to be darker to match her environment, so grab the line and move it down.
As you can see, she is now darker. Now we need to start giving her a blue tone to match her environment. Blues/purples are meant for cold/wet environments, and reds and oranges are meant for warm/sunny environments. Remember that whenever you have an ice or fire edit!
To give her a blue tone you need go up to where it says “RGB” and click it. Here you can see the colors that are available for you to edit. Each one will give different colors depending on what was altered in another. For now, we want to mess with blue, so click on “Blue”.
Grab the line and move it up. If you move it down, your sim gets a sickly yellow color. Also, if you happen to make a second dot on your line, don’t freak out. Click and drag it to the very top or bottom of your line and pull it off, or yank the dot from where it’s currently at (pulling slowly just moves the line). This will remove any dots you don’t want/need. Adding multiple dots allows you to play more with the curve and achieve different looks.
My sim is still a bit too purple and stands out still, so let’s go to another channel. I know that red and blue make purple, so I’ll be heading to red next. I’ve already tried moving it up, but she turns red, so I instead move down again. I noticed she was starting to get too dark as well, so I went back to “RGB” and adjusted the strength of the curve to make her lighter.
My sim is pretty much done now. She blends pretty well with the background and doesn’t really need any more color changes. Since the water usually has a hint of green though, I’ve decided to adjustment the green curve by dragging it up a bit. Since this is on a new layer I can also adjust the opacity and make the effect less harsh.
Quick cheat:
This method is an easy way for you to adjust the color of your sim, objects, or even your background without messing with the levels or curves.
You get to this method, called Photo Filter, through the same way as your levels/curves, so go through your “Image > Adjustments” tab, clicking the button at the bottom of the layers box, or clicking on “Photo Filter” in your adjustment box.
This box will pop up. The filter determines what it will do to the image. You can hit the arrows and choose a filter. They come in several versions, even an underwater mode, so pick and choose. You can also do your own filter by clicking on the color square and choosing from the color selection. The density is basically opacity, so it will determine how strong the filter is when applying it. “Preserve luminosity” keeps the brightness and highlights preserved, so don’t turn this off unless you feel it’s necessary.
Also, don’t forget to clip the layer as I showed you with the curves. That’s pretty much it to this quick method.
Tutorial 24: Combining Backgrounds (Both) Level: Beginner If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me. Click here for more tutorials
This tutorial is about combining backgrounds! It’s not always possible to combine backgrounds, and they don’t always turn out right, but knowing how to combine them is useful for the future!
To begin, you will need several backgrounds that you think can blend together well. I’ve never done more than 2, but sometimes you may get lucky and be able to do more! Who knows! (Be creative and have fun!)
Once you’ve decided on your backgrounds, load them into your program (don’t forget the trusty Ctrl + left click when trying to select multiple!). There are several ways combining can be done. You can change the top layer to multiply (as I taught you in the second cutting method), change to screen if the background for the top layer is dark, or you can lower opacity. Sometimes you may even be able to do soft light, overlay, etc. but they don’t blend the backgrounds well and it will require erasing, etc. (or sometimes it doesn’t work regardless). Don’t be afraid to try the other blending modes as well! You never know what may work.
I’m going to show you how I combined my Ursula background.
First, I decide on which background I want to be the base for my image. Then I hide the backgrounds I don’t want to look at right now and then align the base and first image how I want them to be. I broke a rule here and scaled my main background up and out. The background was of high quality and there’s so little detail in the image that I could get away with it. You can’t really do this with cities, buildings, rooms, gardens, or anything with a lot of detail and that is why I say to avoid it (you will rarely deal with empty space). You can’t expand it too far either or it will lose the rest of its quality. So scaling just a bit with empty images is okay, but keep an eye on the quality before making a final decision.
Anyways, I want something at the bottom because I feel the main/first background is extremely empty and boring.
My first layer is ready for the bottom, now I just need to figure out how to blend it. I want to try my multiply technique first, so we’ll rearrange the layers and put the base image on top first. I then go up to the layer mode (on my base image) and hit “multiply”.
Meh…..the effect seems too dark to me and the edges don’t blend well. I don’t give up immediately though, I grab my eraser brush or mess with the opacity and try to fix it first. If you erase edges, don’t forget to use the fuzzy brush and turn down your opacity and/or flow so you can control the amount erased. Also, remember to erase the layer beneath the base image since you are on the “multiply” mode. I could also attempt the curves/levels technique and/or adjust the top layers darkness/contrast to match my bottom image.
Erasing didn’t really work. The edges were still too dark for me so I had to keep erasing, eventually erasing the majority of the image.
Lowering the opacity didn’t work either. The image still has lines! I take my eraser and erase the edges, and it’s much better looking now but still doesn’t suit what I want.
I then tried to alter with curves. Didn’t work either, and neither did brightness and contrast since the image is on multiply. Oh well!
None of those options work, so now it’s time to choose another blending mode. Undo everything you just did to the two layers, including moving the two layers around. Your base image should now be on the bottom again.
Here I show different modes and what I did to help them. Some worked very well, and some didn’t! Everything depends on the types of backgrounds you are using.
You can also try select tools to grab what you want, then delete the rest and blend your backgrounds that way. There's endless possibilities, so don’t be afraid to spend a while looking for the perfect combination!
I think the blending of backgrounds is my favorite tutorial by far.
@PeaceSign101 You're welcome! I'll try to get it done as soon as possible. I'll make sure it's by tonight. It's not too difficult. Is there anything else you need me to show you, or is it just combining two images?
Sorry this took so long guys! Everything is now up, including a bonus tutorial as a thank you for being patient.
You can now submit your assignments, but please double check your assignments before submitting them. The expectations has stepped up just a tiny bit, and we are scoring harder than last week (but not too hard).
Please make sure to use the tutorials to your full advantage, and please ask any questions or ask for help when you need it! If you need an extension, please ask! (If we get a lot of people asking, I will extend it for everyone.)
Awesome job Mizzie! Hopefully I can do my tutorials justice like your very informative ones xD ^^;
Promise me you'll try and correct any grammar mistakes though ? :c
@Eliavah Of course! I'll also ask about areas I'm confused at. xD
Did I do the blending tutorial well? :O I discovered more ways to combine them as well. xD
Also here is an example of a digital artist who cuts out objects and backgrounds from other games to create his work! He basically does what some do with sims, but with real life models c: Some comic artist do this as it saves time on creating (not all though) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19B92z6ekDw
This is a lot more advanced in depth work as he isn't just cutting the object, but is also drawing fine details on it, and highlighting / shadowing. But he is using the objects he cut out as a basic base. . if that makes sense. Though I just want to show you guys what you can achieve with years of practice, and hours of work! And this stuff doesn't only have to be applied to sims.
A lot of digital artist (if anyone is interested) use real life backgrounds, adapt, color change, draw in stuff etc.
Here is another example ! ; http://sandara.deviantart.com/art/Abandoned-Station-steps-485883788
Obviously you don't have to do something this extreme if you don't want to. But for those who are interested in this type of work these guides are the very very first steps! C:
@Mizzie ; It's perfect c:
I also like the object tutorial and teaching warp and perspective.
Let me tell you, *VERY* useful tools. In drawing too. The advantage of digital art is intstead of erasing and redrawing if something looks off, you can use warp and perspective!
@Eliavah Yay! ^-^
I feel like I should go into more depth with those tools, but I can't think of an example I have that uses all of them so perfectly. *taps chin*
@MizoreYukii loved the tutorials! They go into just the right amount of detail, and don't ramble on. Really helpful, especially the bonus one which I'll be using in a lot of future assignments I think:) (but not my current one as I don't think it would suit the background)
I've really put my all in to this and tried quite a few new things in the process. I know I haven't pulled everything off flawlessly (looks at hair drawing) but I hope my effort counts for something! Hopefully the smaller details I've put into the work won't got unnoticed either. Overall I'm proud of this and I hope you really like it
The inspiration for this image was actually one of the images posted with the assignment (of the Elven lady) and I thought, hey, why not give fantasy a shot. It's basically meant to show her transformation from corruption and evil (the mask in her hand) to beauty and purity etc.
(Oh, and a little story about her clothing - or lack off it. When I first started editing this image (which was before all the tutorials were up, oops!) She was completely nude. I didn't even take notice of it while I was completing the hair drawing. I decided to do some CC hunting but eventually came to realise that the whole almost-completely-naked thing worked perfectly as she's meant to be stripping off her outershell. Anyway, some edited in undergarments later and I've found that her clothing also works perfectly as I can show of the water effect on her torso and arms)
P.S. I'm still confused whether or not you can view the whole image. I've put it in a public album on my Imugr account so hopefully that should work?
P.P.S. Sorry to ramble, but the wings being cut off was not a mistake. In CAS I couldn't zoom far enough out, and the pose/wings just didn't seem to want to work in game. So if points are deducted for that I won't be surprised.
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Level: Beginner
If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me.
Click here for more tutorials
This is one of my favorite things to do when editing. Images can turn out so much better when you take the time to add little details like these!
Step 1: Finding Objects
To start, open trusty Google and type in your key words. Remember what we covered with the previous tutorials, but if you don’t remember: use keywords from your assignments to search on Google. For this tutorial we are going to do “hats”.
Type in “hats” into Google, then hit enter. When the page loads, click on “Images” at the top. Now you have a wide variety of hats to look at and possibly add to your pictures. However, you can’t just add any hat to your image. Most of the hats here are either at the wrong angle for you, not the right style, or are too small. Besides changing keywords and just looking harder for the other problems, the size problem can easily be remedied. Once you know the basic size of your model and her head, you can start searching for hats. You want to change the sizes based on how large your image is, and maybe, just maybe, you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat.
For the sizes, follow the same rules as the background searching. Go to “Search Tools” and then “Size”, move your mouse down the drop down menu to “Larger than…” and select your option. You will rarely go to 2 MP but you will want something in between! Next, if you don’t want to put in the effort to cut out the hat, you can try another method of searching. While it greatly limits your results, sometimes a term as broad as this can lead to enough useful results. Move your mouse over to the “Color” section now and then drop down to “Transparent”. This should bring up images that now have a transparent background and are now easier to use. No worrying about cutting them out properly when it’s done for you!
Once you find suitable objects right click and open them into a new tab. Remember that just opening them doesn’t always load the image properly, so make sure to click “View Image” and study the object, then save if you like it. Remember to find several options in case something doesn’t work out.
Tips:
- Don’t forget to use synonyms or add more or less keywords
- Also include “stock” or “clip art” to get more images or more specific types.
- Places like DeviantArt and other stock websites offer great selections for images.
- As said in the background one, avoid a stock website’s watermarked images they use as a preview. Find a free stock website instead, or you can pay to unlock it, or keep looking.
- The same with backgrounds, don’t scale up too much. You want to avoid doing that as much as possible. Scaling down isn’t an issue since it’s an object so feel free to do this!
- It is possible to take an item that someone is already wearing/using and add it to your photo. It takes more work though as you will have to correct issues, erase more, and so on just to get it to work, so use caution when attempting this.
- Don’t forget to only use HQ items! Sometimes the small stuff can be overlooked, but for large things, like dresses, please do not use bad quality items.
Step 2: Cutting and Manipulating(I am using the same basket I used back in Candy Queen as my example.)
After finding suitable objects you need to open them into your image. Either load them into a script stack with your original image (PS), click and drag them onto the new image (PS uses the images/ Gimp uses the tabs), or open them into a new layer (Gimp).
Once they are open you need to cut them out (unless you did the transparent search option). It depends on the type of item that determines how you cut them out.
If they are a simple shaped object with no holes, feel free to use whatever method you prefer. For me, in PS, I prefer to use Quick Selection. You can also use the Scissors Select Tool (Gimp) or the Magnetic Lasso (PS). Both follow the shape of the object, so it should be useful to you when cutting out simple shapes.
Tips for Quick Selection:
The other items you may have to cut out are fur and transparent objects.
Lastly, when I need to select something with holes I use the color picker tools for both PS and Gimp. Hopefully you are working on a solid background, otherwise cutting the object out with color picker will be quite hard for you. Just like cutting out your sim, select your background, grow/expand, and then hit delete. (Or don’t grow/expand and instead erase the edges yourself.)
Once your object is out of its background, it’s time to manipulate it so it fits your image.
The first thing you need to learn is how to control the object.
For Gimp:
The tools you will use frequently when manipulating (I don’t use shear, which is why it’s skipped):
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.
I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand. It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s take my Rotate Tool and start turning it.
This weird pop up and box around your object will appear. You can mess with the settings in the pop up to achieve what you want, but I prefer to use the box around my object to manipulate it.
The clicking and holding on the box, then moving it around adjusts the angle the object is at. Clicking and dragging around the circle in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale tool just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective tool. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
For PS:
There isn’t an exact tool to manipulate, it’s actually a shortcut!
To activate this tool, stay on your object layer and hit “Ctrl + T”. This brings up your transform box. Now, to start manipulating your object you need to right click.
Your options (I don’t use skew which is why it’s skipped):
- Free transform - allows you to rotate and scale freely
- Scale - allows you to make it bigger or smaller. Click the “link” button at the top to keep the object even while you adjust it. (If you want the width and height to remain even, don't forget to click on the chain link right next to the numbers. I marked the location in the image.)
- Rotate – rotates/turns your image
- Distort – Rarely use this. Weird combo of Perspective and warp tool.
- Perspective - Allows you to mess with the perspective (so making something appear farther away or more turned)
- Warp – My favorite tool. Allows you to make something appear sideways or make objects curved. This is also the tool that gives your loose objects that flowing/wavy movement.
These tools allow you to accomplish what you are aiming for with your object. Most of the time it just takes a little work and not a whole lot to get the look you are going for.I will explain what I did with my basket, and this should help you understand how to manipulate other objects.
The first thing you want to do is figure out what you are doing with your object if you haven’t already. For me, the basket will be held by my model, Suyin. Other objects could be near the sim or on the sim, or something else in the scenery could be using the object. Knowing where the object is going and what it is doing is important.
Next, I move my basket over my sims hand (Make sure to hold Ctrl, then click and hold to move it without PS relocating it. Let go of the left click button before letting go of Ctrl or it will slingshot back into place). It looks odd at the angle it is currently at though, so let’s select my rotate option, or stay on Free Transform (you always start in Free Transform), and start turning it.
Clicking outside the box, holding, and then moving your mouse rotates the image. Clicking and dragging the “+” around in the middle determines how wide the rotation for the object is.
Now that I’ve adjusted the object, I need to move it back over her hand and see if it’s what I want. It’s rotated too much, so I adjust it before moving on. I then adjust the size with the scale option just a tiny bit.
My basket is pretty much the way I want it now. But if I want to make it appear like it is pushed more towards the front, I need to use the perspective option. One thing you will notice is that the perspective tool is a bit strange and may be confusing in the beginning. If you’re not careful, you can distort the object and make it look terrible, but just remember to undo and try again. Practice definitely makes perfect when it comes to this tool!
Back to both programs
Once you’re done manipulating your object you do the last few parts. For people who are doing an object like mine, something that is to be held, we need to make sure that she is actually holding the object! There is a quick trick to this. First off, if your sim isn’t cut out of her background this will be hard to do, but it’s possible.
Select your sims outline (Alt + Left Click for Gimp, Ctrl + Left Click for PS) and then go to your objects layer and turn down the opacity so you can see through it. We are now going to erase part of the handle so it appears she is holding it. You can do this for any object that is going to be held. Just place over the hand, position it properly, then erase wherever the hand would be. Sometimes you don’t erase everything due to the hand position, so we turn down the opacity to see what we are doing.
The last thing you want to do is take care of your objects edges. Blurring or smudging them takes care of any roughness from cutting them out and allows them to blend into their background better. When we learn shadows and highlights, don’t forget to add those as well!
I have one last important tutorial to get up, and it's about blending your sims and objects through colors. I also have a bonus tutorial going with it. The blending one is more of a last minute thing though, so feel free to get started on your assignments if you haven't already (I hope you did o-o). If you're waiting to submit, double check your assignment for any errors. Everything we covered this week will be looked for in your assignment. If you didn't use something, that is okay, but for those who did we are keeping an eye out.
Don't submit yet, but work on your assignments still.
Also, I completely forgot to close Challenge 1, but Challenge 1 is now closed!
Scores will be up either tomorrow or the day after.
Here's to hoping I don't have random interruptions again. >_>
I will certainly take a look at it
Will read this later, this looks really cool. I can't wait to get started
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Also, I have just tried the new cutting method I mentioned forever ago, and it works wonders. Like I said, it can't be used for CAS pictures (You can try, but good luck with it), but for in game pictures this is revolutionary. I will be working out the kinks as the author was hard to understand and Gimp was a pain to figure out ihatethatprogramsomuch, and I still need to test how it reacts with black/white hair, clothes, accessories, etc. Once I figure that out I can release it. I hope you guys enjoy this new cutting method!
Oh and have a hug and a cookie!
*Noms cookie* Thank you!
Level: Beginner
If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me.
Click here for more tutorials
One thing you may have noticed while working with backgrounds is that your sim doesn’t match it! They stick out like a sore thumb or don’t match the tone of the background in general.
The way to fix this is through the use of gradients, levels/curves, hue and saturation, or filters. You can use any method you like, and some are easier than others (or work better in general). (These can all be used on backgrounds too, not just sims).
The one I recommend to use for blending sims and objects is your levels/curves to adjust them to the lighting and color of the image (then you can do filters/gradients to give it another blend. Make sure to adjust opacity). Its main purpose is to adjust the colors, darkness and brightness, of your images.
Make sure you are on your sims layer, then go to your “Colors” tab, then move down and click on either levels or curves. Both do the same thing, but one is usually easier for some. I find curves to be easier to deal with because there are less things to mess with. I’d suggest understanding curves first, then attempting levels later.
This window will pop up, and as you can see there is just a line going through it. There are several options here that can alter your photo, they just aren’t visible yet.
To adjust your sims color you need to grab the line at any point, and then drag it up or down to get what you want. To start with, we want out model to be darker to match her environment, so grab the line and move it down.
As you can see, she is now darker. Now we need to start giving her a blue tone to match her environment. Blues/purples are meant for cold/wet environments, and reds and oranges are meant for warm/sunny environments. Remember that whenever you have an ice or fire edit!
To give her a blue tone you need go up to “Channel”. Here you can see the colors that are available for you to edit. Each one will give different colors depending on what was altered in another. For now, we want to mess with blue, so click on “Blue”.
Grab the line and move it up. If you move it down, your sim gets a sickly yellow color. Also, if you happen to make a second dot on your line, don’t freak out. Click and drag it to the very top or bottom of your line and pull it off, or yank the dot from where it’s currently at (pulling slowly just moves the line). This will remove any dots you don’t want/need. Adding multiple dots allows you to play more with the curve and achieve different looks.
My sim is still a bit too purple and stands out still, so let’s go to another channel. I know that red and blue make purple, so I’ll be heading to red next. I’ve already tried moving it up, but she turns red, so I instead move down again. I noticed she was starting to get too dark as well, so I went back to “Value” and adjusted the strength of the curve to make her lighter.
My sim is pretty much done now. She blends pretty well with the background and doesn’t really need any more color changes. Since the water usually has a hint of green though, I’ve decided to adjustment the green curve by dragging it up a bit. All done!
Level: Beginner
If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me.
Click here for more tutorials
One thing you may have noticed while working with backgrounds is that your sim doesn’t match it! They stick out like a sore thumb or don’t match the tone of the background in general.
The way to fix this is through the use of gradients, levels/curves, hue and saturation, or filters. You can use any method you like, and some are easier than others (or work better in general). (These can all be used on backgrounds too, not just sims).
The one I recommend to use for blending sims and objects is your levels/curves (which act like filters). It’s main purpose is to adjust the colors, darkness and brightness, of your images.
Make sure you are on your sims layer before moving forward. Now, there are three ways to get to your levels/curves: under your “Image” tab, if you have the adjustments window open, or at the very bottom of your layers window. Doesn’t matter where you activate it from. Levels and curves do the same thing btw, but one is usually easier for some. I find curves to be easier to deal with because there are less things to mess with. I’d suggest understanding curves first, then attempting levels later.
Click on curves from one of the options. This window will pop up, and as you can see there is just a line going through it. You can see that there are several options and even color picker tools. We aren’t getting into those, but feel free to mess with them. (Don’t forget to hover to see what the description or name is.)
To adjust your sims color you first need to clip the layer to your sim. If you don’t clip the filter will affect everything beneath it, including your background. This is great for wide affects, but we’re only worried about our sim right now (or objects). To do this, either select the clipping option on the curves window, or right click on your new curves layer and select “Create Clipping Mask”.
It should now look like this:
Now that it’s clipping, it’s time to adjust the colors. Grab the line at any point, and then drag it up or down to get what you want. To start with, we want out model to be darker to match her environment, so grab the line and move it down.
As you can see, she is now darker. Now we need to start giving her a blue tone to match her environment. Blues/purples are meant for cold/wet environments, and reds and oranges are meant for warm/sunny environments. Remember that whenever you have an ice or fire edit!
To give her a blue tone you need go up to where it says “RGB” and click it. Here you can see the colors that are available for you to edit. Each one will give different colors depending on what was altered in another. For now, we want to mess with blue, so click on “Blue”.
Grab the line and move it up. If you move it down, your sim gets a sickly yellow color. Also, if you happen to make a second dot on your line, don’t freak out. Click and drag it to the very top or bottom of your line and pull it off, or yank the dot from where it’s currently at (pulling slowly just moves the line). This will remove any dots you don’t want/need. Adding multiple dots allows you to play more with the curve and achieve different looks.
My sim is still a bit too purple and stands out still, so let’s go to another channel. I know that red and blue make purple, so I’ll be heading to red next. I’ve already tried moving it up, but she turns red, so I instead move down again. I noticed she was starting to get too dark as well, so I went back to “RGB” and adjusted the strength of the curve to make her lighter.
My sim is pretty much done now. She blends pretty well with the background and doesn’t really need any more color changes. Since the water usually has a hint of green though, I’ve decided to adjustment the green curve by dragging it up a bit. Since this is on a new layer I can also adjust the opacity and make the effect less harsh.
Quick cheat:
This method is an easy way for you to adjust the color of your sim, objects, or even your background without messing with the levels or curves.
You get to this method, called Photo Filter, through the same way as your levels/curves, so go through your “Image > Adjustments” tab, clicking the button at the bottom of the layers box, or clicking on “Photo Filter” in your adjustment box.
This box will pop up. The filter determines what it will do to the image. You can hit the arrows and choose a filter. They come in several versions, even an underwater mode, so pick and choose. You can also do your own filter by clicking on the color square and choosing from the color selection. The density is basically opacity, so it will determine how strong the filter is when applying it. “Preserve luminosity” keeps the brightness and highlights preserved, so don’t turn this off unless you feel it’s necessary.
Also, don’t forget to clip the layer as I showed you with the curves. That’s pretty much it to this quick method.
Let me finish posting this last tutorial and I'll get right on it.
Thank you so much Mizzie! You're the best
Level: Beginner
If you are still having trouble with something in this tutorial, or need more help, please post here or contact me.
Click here for more tutorials
This tutorial is about combining backgrounds! It’s not always possible to combine backgrounds, and they don’t always turn out right, but knowing how to combine them is useful for the future!
To begin, you will need several backgrounds that you think can blend together well. I’ve never done more than 2, but sometimes you may get lucky and be able to do more! Who knows! (Be creative and have fun!)
Once you’ve decided on your backgrounds, load them into your program (don’t forget the trusty Ctrl + left click when trying to select multiple!). There are several ways combining can be done. You can change the top layer to multiply (as I taught you in the second cutting method), change to screen if the background for the top layer is dark, or you can lower opacity. Sometimes you may even be able to do soft light, overlay, etc. but they don’t blend the backgrounds well and it will require erasing, etc. (or sometimes it doesn’t work regardless). Don’t be afraid to try the other blending modes as well! You never know what may work.
I’m going to show you how I combined my Ursula background.
First, I decide on which background I want to be the base for my image. Then I hide the backgrounds I don’t want to look at right now and then align the base and first image how I want them to be. I broke a rule here and scaled my main background up and out. The background was of high quality and there’s so little detail in the image that I could get away with it. You can’t really do this with cities, buildings, rooms, gardens, or anything with a lot of detail and that is why I say to avoid it (you will rarely deal with empty space). You can’t expand it too far either or it will lose the rest of its quality. So scaling just a bit with empty images is okay, but keep an eye on the quality before making a final decision.
Anyways, I want something at the bottom because I feel the main/first background is extremely empty and boring.
My first layer is ready for the bottom, now I just need to figure out how to blend it. I want to try my multiply technique first, so we’ll rearrange the layers and put the base image on top first. I then go up to the layer mode (on my base image) and hit “multiply”.
Meh…..the effect seems too dark to me and the edges don’t blend well. I don’t give up immediately though, I grab my eraser brush or mess with the opacity and try to fix it first. If you erase edges, don’t forget to use the fuzzy brush and turn down your opacity and/or flow so you can control the amount erased. Also, remember to erase the layer beneath the base image since you are on the “multiply” mode. I could also attempt the curves/levels technique and/or adjust the top layers darkness/contrast to match my bottom image.
Erasing didn’t really work. The edges were still too dark for me so I had to keep erasing, eventually erasing the majority of the image.
Lowering the opacity didn’t work either. The image still has lines! I take my eraser and erase the edges, and it’s much better looking now but still doesn’t suit what I want.
I then tried to alter with curves. Didn’t work either, and neither did brightness and contrast since the image is on multiply. Oh well!
None of those options work, so now it’s time to choose another blending mode. Undo everything you just did to the two layers, including moving the two layers around. Your base image should now be on the bottom again.
Here I show different modes and what I did to help them. Some worked very well, and some didn’t! Everything depends on the types of backgrounds you are using.
You can also try select tools to grab what you want, then delete the rest and blend your backgrounds that way. There's endless possibilities, so don’t be afraid to spend a while looking for the perfect combination!
@PeaceSign101 You're welcome! I'll try to get it done as soon as possible. I'll make sure it's by tonight. It's not too difficult. Is there anything else you need me to show you, or is it just combining two images?
@Amazingamphy @PeaceSign101 @BobSkellington @ayeden @PurpleKenzie19 @Gemmabubbles @Minstrel @BabyCarrotz
Sorry this took so long guys! Everything is now up, including a bonus tutorial as a thank you for being patient.
You can now submit your assignments, but please double check your assignments before submitting them. The expectations has stepped up just a tiny bit, and we are scoring harder than last week (but not too hard).
Please make sure to use the tutorials to your full advantage, and please ask any questions or ask for help when you need it! If you need an extension, please ask! (If we get a lot of people asking, I will extend it for everyone.)
Thank you, and please remember to have fun!
Promise me you'll try and correct any grammar mistakes though ? :c
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Did I do the blending tutorial well? :O I discovered more ways to combine them as well. xD
This is a lot more advanced in depth work as he isn't just cutting the object, but is also drawing fine details on it, and highlighting / shadowing. But he is using the objects he cut out as a basic base. . if that makes sense. Though I just want to show you guys what you can achieve with years of practice, and hours of work! And this stuff doesn't only have to be applied to sims.
A lot of digital artist (if anyone is interested) use real life backgrounds, adapt, color change, draw in stuff etc.
Here is another example ! ; http://sandara.deviantart.com/art/Abandoned-Station-steps-485883788
Obviously you don't have to do something this extreme if you don't want to. But for those who are interested in this type of work these guides are the very very first steps! C:
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I also like the object tutorial and teaching warp and perspective.
Let me tell you, *VERY* useful tools. In drawing too. The advantage of digital art is intstead of erasing and redrawing if something looks off, you can use warp and perspective!
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I feel like I should go into more depth with those tools, but I can't think of an example I have that uses all of them so perfectly. *taps chin*
Yup! I love Warp. xD
I've really put my all in to this and tried quite a few new things in the process. I know I haven't pulled everything off flawlessly (looks at hair drawing) but I hope my effort counts for something! Hopefully the smaller details I've put into the work won't got unnoticed either. Overall I'm proud of this and I hope you really like it
The inspiration for this image was actually one of the images posted with the assignment (of the Elven lady) and I thought, hey, why not give fantasy a shot. It's basically meant to show her transformation from corruption and evil (the mask in her hand) to beauty and purity etc.
(Oh, and a little story about her clothing - or lack off it. When I first started editing this image (which was before all the tutorials were up, oops!) She was completely nude. I didn't even take notice of it while I was completing the hair drawing. I decided to do some CC hunting but eventually came to realise that the whole almost-completely-naked thing worked perfectly as she's meant to be stripping off her outershell. Anyway, some edited in undergarments later and I've found that her clothing also works perfectly as I can show of the water effect on her torso and arms)
P.S. I'm still confused whether or not you can view the whole image. I've put it in a public album on my Imugr account so hopefully that should work?
P.P.S. Sorry to ramble, but the wings being cut off was not a mistake. In CAS I couldn't zoom far enough out, and the pose/wings just didn't seem to want to work in game. So if points are deducted for that I won't be surprised.
You learn fast hun.
Can't say much more though as a judge ~
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