009 - Icon recreation

[spg_spn_girls]

Requested by ex_absolute over icon_talk:
I grabbed a screencap from Jo's Death on Supernatural.
Example
Cropped it to give this:


Sharpen it, and don't change the opacity
Use this (its a random blurred image desaturated, which I use a lot, in this case its the Sheriff from OUAT) Set it to softlight 100% and drag it until the left lower corner gets only a black shadow.
We have this now:


Create a new brightness/contrast layer, and set contrast to 31%
Create a new levels layer with:
RGB: 11 / 0,89 / 236
Create a new curves layer with:
RGB: Out: 135 / In: 110
Now it looks like this:


Create a new levels layer with:
RGB: 17 / 0.96 / 255
Create a new color balance layer with:
Midtones: +25 / -27 / +36
Shadows: +13 / +34 / -20
Highlights: -6 / -33 / +20
Create a new gradient layer with the colors #631495 and #ffffff, try to put only the white on the top like this, and erase a bit of it so it doesn't get to bright. Set it to Softlight 100%
Create a new selective color layer with:
Reds: +93 / +100 / -81 / 0
Yellow: -18 / -5 / +9 / 0
Neutrals: +10 / +3 / + 6 / +15
Add a bit of white at the left top corner, so the top stands out more. Maybe a screened one in 40%.
To get this:


Add another blob at the same place but set it to soft light 100%
Create a new selective color layer with:
Reds: 0 / 0 / 0 / +35
To get the yellow part, create a new color balance layer with:
Midtones: +50 / +40 / -12
Shadows: 0 / 0 / 0
Highlights: +20 / +24 / +2
Make a new layer and click Alt+Ctrl+Shift+E to get a copy of the layers all merged into one image and set it to Softlight 100%


I usually play with Variations a lot (image>variantions) in this Softlight layer just try to make the light parts more bright and the dark ones more dark.
Create a new color balance layer:
Midtones: -31 / - 54 / -65
Shadows: 0 / 0 / 0
Highlights: -29 / 0 / -23
Create a new Vibrance layer and change vibrance to +20. If your photoshop version doesn't have vibrance, just click Alt+Ctrl+Shift+E and erase the saturation a bit.
Result + Original:



The colors are kinda there, needs a bit of adjustments, missing some red over the mouth, green over the hair and some kind of blue over the face. But tecnically its not a bad recreation at all LOL