Tutorial 01 - The Little Mermaid - Sebastien
Learn how to colour you icons like so:
This is a very simple icon tutorial which involves using different blend modes and gradients to achieve this effect.
You will need basic knowledge of Photoshop. I used Photoshop 7
Begin by cropping and resizing your screencap until you are happy with your base.
I personally find that placing points of interest at the edge or in corners works better than simply centering
faces, or whichever elements are most eyecatching. Experiment until you are happy with your crop.
This was mine
Obviously, this cap is very dark. Not only that but the colours are very blue, apart from Sebastien
himself, who is very bright red. Also the image is slightly soft from resizing, so now we'll prepare our base.
Firstly, we're going to brighten the image. Duplicate your base and set the copy to screen. While this
helps, the contrast is slightly overpowering, so I reduced the opacity of this layer to 65%. Each image
is different, so play around with opacities until you are happy. Some images are so dark, you'll need
an extra screen layer included, to brighten it up a bit.
Here's where I'm up to
Now Sebastien is clearer, and the red is less overpowering. Flatten your image (Ctrl + E). Ok. Now I still think the
image is too dull in some areas, and too bright in others, so we're going to alter the image's levels.
Image > Adjustment > Brightness/Contrast.
I wanted to make the image lighter and brighter, and get rid of some of the glare. Play about using
the preview and the sliders to see what you like, but for my levels for this icon, I set brightness to +38 and contrast to -20.
Like so
Much better! Now as the image is still slightly soft, sharpen it once. (Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen). If you
do sharpen photographic bases, I find a tiny amount of smudging to help pixelated areas, but because
this base uses solid colour fills, I didn't bother.
Ok now the fun part --- PIN LIGHTS! I LOVE pin lights myself, and use them like there's no tomorrow.
I took this gradient and dragged it from bottom left to top right.
(Brown = #866329 Orange = #DD9C40).
Make sure the gradient is above all other layers, and set the blend mode to 'Pin Light.' Leave it at 100% opacity.
You should have something like this
Sometimes I finish icons at this stage, but for this batch I felt a simple border would help, so create a
new layer. Then use the pencil tool to draw a white (#FFFFFF) 1 pixel-wide border around the outer edge.
Hold shift to prevent slipping all over the place as I always do. :-)
Barely noticeable diffrence, but yeh
Finished!
Other icons I have made using this technique
If you'd like to view my original icon batch, it's right here.
Tutorial originally requested by jesusphreaq
Each image will need prepping differently, and the pin light mode always creates
different effects. Go forth, experiment, and please post your own versions below!
If you have any questions or if I have missed anything, feel free to comment and i'll reply a.s.a.p.!