Photoshop lesson - creating soap bubbles

Step 1: Create a 300 dpi canvas and fills the background with Black color because in white background it is difficult
to see a bubble.
Step 2: Create new layer, select Elliptical marquee tool, press shift and create a big circle on the black background.
Step 3: Go into Edit > Stroke, Enter width as approx 10px, color must be “Gray” and Location - “Center”. Press Ok
Step 4: Before move further save the scene and also save the circle selection for future use in the tutorial. Go into
Window > Channels and press “Save selection as channel” button in the bottom of the tab. Now “Alpha” layer will be
automatically created in the Channel tab.
Step 5: Press Ctrl + D and blur the circle stroke. Go into Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur and enter the value between
12 to 15, so all the edges can be blurred out properly but you can still figure out that as a blurred circle.




Step 6: Go into Window > Channels again and press Ctrl and
click on the Alpha layer which you created in the step 4.

Step 7: Create new layer and go into Edit > Stroke, Enter
width as approx 1px, color must be “White” and Location -
“Center”. Press Ok. Reduce the opacity of the layer to around
10%.

Step 8: Go into the previous blurred circle layer and resize it down
little bit so almost 90% blurriness will come under last created
stroke.








Step 9: Create new layer, select brush and change “Hardness to 0%”
and adjust the size of the brush as per your circle size and create 2
highlights as shown in picture.

















Step 10: Go into Window > Channels again and press Ctrl
and click on the Alpha layer for the selection and go into
Effect >Distort > Pinch and select value around -60, so your
highlights can bloat.

Step 11: Select brush and change the hardness to 100% and
create 2 more highlights on the previous highlights as shown
in picture
















Step 12: Select soft edged brush and paint a highlight in the bottom of the bubble.




Step 13: Select all the layers and merged them, create a marquee around a bubble and invert (Ctrl + I) the selection.
If you don’t invert it then you messed the brush, tried out yourself.



Step 14: Save this as a brush by Edit > Define Brush Preset and now you can select from the Brush Tip shape and
start painting on the image. But few settings need to be check before proceed and before painting set the foreground
color as white for transparency.


Tip: Don’t move the Angle Jitter much otherwise your highlights will come in the side or top.




Before conclude I like to mention “As light impinges on the film, some of it is reflected off
the outer surface while some of it enters the film and reemerges after being reflected back
and forth between the two surfaces.” So for color film you can use an Effect > Pixelate >
Color Halftone on the grey background circle with default values, feather delete the border
and reduce the opacity.
For reflection choose the image on which you are creating this bubble and use Effect > Distort
> Polar Coordinates with default values and adjust that image in the bubble by reducing
the opacity and feather out the borders.

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Photoshop - "Disco" effect

       Starting from image from the figure 1 we will create the "disco" effect which was very popular on the posters and the video clips of the 80's.

       For start we will delete the background behind the character. In order to do this we will use the Magnetic Lasso Tool and we will select the contour of the character. Don't worry if the selection is not perfect ! It can be corrected afterwards using the instrument Polygonal Lasso Tool and one of the selection method "Add to selection" or "Substract from selection", depending on what you need. An example of imperfection can be noticed on figure 2. It will be corrected using "Add to selection" because the initial mask did not covered the entire contour of the device from the kid's hand.




After completing the selection run the command Clear from the Edit menu to delete the silhouette.Press the X key to invert the background color and the main color (supposed that this have the black and white values as default). After that, run the command Inverse from the Select Menu to invert the selection, followed by the Clear command from the Edit menu again to delete the background. At this moment we can cancel the selection (De-select command from the Select menu). The result is shown on the figure 3.
Duplicate the Background layer (right click on Background in the Layers Panel, then choose Duplicate Layer from the menu). This new layer will be named "Effect", which will be duplicated again using the same procedure, and the new layer will be named "Silhouette". This will contain the silhouette of the dancer and will always be on top of all the other layers.



       We must add to this layer a mask in order for just the silhouette to be visible. Select layer "Silhouette" from the Layers panel. Click once inside the white silhouette of the dancer with the Magic Wand Tool instrument. From the Layer menu choose the Add Layer Mask command -> Reveal Selection. The background can then be erased, using the following steps. Select the Background Layer from the Layers panel, then choose the command All from the Select menu, then the Clear command from the Edit menu and Deselect command from the Select menu. You will then have to see what is shown in the figure 4.



       The Background and Silhouette layers will remain unmodified. Between them we will add effects layers. Select the Effect layer and apply one by one the next filters: Filter ->Stylize->Find Edges, then Filter->Stylize->Glowing Edges with the parameters Edge width =9, Edge Brightness=13, Smoothness=6. You will get what you see in figure 5.



       This contour can he colored using the Paint Bucket instrument.
In this case use the yellow color. From the Filter menu choose the Blur command->Radial Blur with the parameters Amount =47, Blur Method =Zoom, Quality = Draft, getting what you see in figure 6.



       For the final step, the Effect layer will be duplicated several times and moved/scaled using the command Edit -> Transform -> Scale. You can also change the color of each copy (using the command Image -> Adjustments -> Color balance) to create a rainbow effect. After copying for 5 times the original, the result should look like in figure 7.

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