cool absract backgrounds tutorial

Sorry I haven't made one of these in a while, I've been pretty busy lately, but I was able to sneak one in this weekend.

Here's one I came up with while messing around in photoshop coming up with my congratulations piece for Tetris999's sig
Pretty simple, and if you've read my other tuts, you should be familiar with most of the tools etc

-Step 1. Open a new document (duh?) with whatever dimensions works best for your project

-Step 2. Press "D" on your keyboard to reset your default colrs (black and white) or press the icon next to the colors in your tools panel

-Step 3 Select your gradient tool, select the foreground to background gradient (black fading to white). Make sure that you're in difference mode and that you're using the "reflected gradient style", (second from the right.
http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/3697/step1va5.gif

-Step 4 Click and drag the mouse about fourty times across your document, for a decent amount of length, lets say about 1/4 to 1/2 the size of the document each time. Yes I know 40 seems like a ton of times, but it really doesn't take that long. And if you do less than fourty, I won't tell anyone.
http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/1930/step2dz1.gif
^^You should get something like this^^

-Step 5 Now your going to continue with the gradient tool, on the same layer, but now you're going to make your strokes very short, and at different angles. You only want to do about 5 of these short ones. It should look like this.
http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/3660/step3qq5.gif

-Step 6 Time to add color, Press Ctrl+U to bring up the hue box. Now we don't want to go overboard on the saturation, because it will look like we are forcing our colors, and that's not our goal.
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/1897/step4br4.gif

-Step 7 Now create a new layer (press Ctrl+Shift+N) and with the gradient tool again do exactly what we did in step 4, but only do it about 10 times.
http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/3838/step5om7.gif
Change this layers blending mode to "OVERLAY" from the dropdown menu in the layers window.

-Step 8 Press Ctrl+U to bring up the hue window for this layer. The key here is to bring the saturation all the way up, otherwise you won't be able to see this second color, which is kinda the purpose.
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/9327/step6vl2.gif

And you're done!
Finished product
http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/3372/step7nr3.gif


If you want to go one step further, you could throw a wave filter on your base layer
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8428/step8sv0.gif


For continued pandamonium use three layers, ooo ooo and have one be the wavy one!
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/5...native2yb6.gif


Ahh, well until next time The Catalyst, signing off! (I've always wanted to say that) :D

ohhh pretty damn good i gotta remember this for whenever i get photoshop lmao

Quote:

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Originally Posted by the catalyst

I thought, in light of Malkster's awesome abstract grunge sig tutorial, I would post a tut for some of my favorite abstract backgrounds, great for signatures/avatars/whatever.

For this first installment, I have done a cool tech/lighning tut. Saw this somewhere else a while ago, can't remember where, but I modified it a bit and though i would post it.:)



That was great help!
Thanks a lot for sharing that with us!

-First open a new photoshop document, I'm using 250x250 pixels, but if you want to make a sig keep it under 520x120.
-make sure that your colors are the deault black and white by clicking the little icon to the left and below the colors on your toolbar.

1. lets begin, first do filter>render>clouds
http://img47.imageshack.us/img47/2362/cloudsjx1.gif
2. on the same layer do filter> render difference clouds (same as above, but darker)
3. go to image>adjustments>levels and a box should show up. Move the grayish knob at the bottom towards the black nob under the dark area. This shoud give you jagged lines that look like lightning. Actual thickness depends on personal preference
http://img285.imageshack.us/img285/7761/levelsns1.gif
4. Hit Ctrl+I to invert the colors. Here's what it should look like
http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/9...ghtningbq9.gif
5. duplicate the layer and on the duplacated layer go to filter>pixelate>mosaic and set cell size to something fairly large. I used 25.
6. on this same layer go to filter>brush strokes>accented edges and set the settings as follows
-edge width=2
-edge brightness=50
-smoothness=8
-should get something like this
http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/8...ededgeseq8.gif
7. set blending mode to "overlay", by using the drop down menu on your layer panel.
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/2...ingmodebi2.gif
http://img511.imageshack.us/img511/7...sttherebr0.gif
8. Now all that's left is to change the colors. I like to change both layer colors individually for more controll, but you may also just flatten the image by right clicking and selecting flatten image from the menu.
9. To color press Ctrl+B (color balance) and adjust the knobs for shadows, midtones, and highlights. Or if you just want the easy way press Ctrl+U to change the hue, but makes sure to hit the "colorize box in the bottom right hand corner, or it won't get colored.

Ta-Da
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/1448/alldoneec4.gif

Stayed tuned in the future for more background tuts:D

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This was great help! Good advice!
Thanks for sharing this with us!!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by the catalyst

Sorry I haven't made one of these in a while, I've been pretty busy lately, but I was able to sneak one in this weekend.

Here's one I came up with while messing around in photoshop coming up with my congratulations piece for Tetris999's sig
Pretty simple, and if you've read my other tuts, you should be familiar with most of the tools etc

-Step 1. Open a new document (duh?) with whatever dimensions works best for your project

-Step 2. Press "D" on your keyboard to reset your default colrs (black and white) or press the icon next to the colors in your tools panel

-Step 3 Select your gradient tool, select the foreground to background gradient (black fading to white). Make sure that you're in difference mode and that you're using the "reflected gradient style", (second from the right.
http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/3697/step1va5.gif

-Step 4 Click and drag the mouse about fourty times across your document, for a decent amount of length, lets say about 1/4 to 1/2 the size of the document each time. Yes I know 40 seems like a ton of times, but it really doesn't take that long. And if you do less than fourty, I won't tell anyone.
http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/1930/step2dz1.gif
^^You should get something like this^^

-Step 5 Now your going to continue with the gradient tool, on the same layer, but now you're going to make your strokes very short, and at different angles. You only want to do about 5 of these short ones. It should look like this.
http://img218.imageshack.us/img218/3660/step3qq5.gif

-Step 6 Time to add color, Press Ctrl+U to bring up the hue box. Now we don't want to go overboard on the saturation, because it will look like we are forcing our colors, and that's not our goal.
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/1897/step4br4.gif

-Step 7 Now create a new layer (press Ctrl+Shift+N) and with the gradient tool again do exactly what we did in step 4, but only do it about 10 times.
http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/3838/step5om7.gif
Change this layers blending mode to "OVERLAY" from the dropdown menu in the layers window.

-Step 8 Press Ctrl+U to bring up the hue window for this layer. The key here is to bring the saturation all the way up, otherwise you won't be able to see this second color, which is kinda the purpose.
http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/9327/step6vl2.gif

And you're done!
Finished product
http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/3372/step7nr3.gif


If you want to go one step further, you could throw a wave filter on your base layer
http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/8428/step8sv0.gif


For continued pandamonium use three layers, ooo ooo and have one be the wavy one!
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/5...native2yb6.gif


Ahh, well until next time The Catalyst, signing off! (I've always wanted to say that) :D

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This is pretty cool images.. This is what you called art... Thanks for step by step tutorial.... :)