Hi. This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
I came across this striking, 2013 indie movie poster the other day and thought it would
be a fun, relatively easy project to recreate in Photoshop.
I included the link to a font which is similar to the one used in the poster.
I provided a Photoshop template so you can follow along.
Its link is in my video's description below or in my project files.
When you first see the template, before you download it, you may see just one image, however,
once you open the file into Photoshop, you'll see 4 layers.
The top layer is the original poster.
Under that is a grainy texture that we'll add to our poster.
Under that is a folder containing the top text and bottom text .
Lastly, the bottom layer is a photo we'll use for this project that I found on Shutterstock.
Sorry I had to add watermarks to it because unfortunately, I'm not allowed to distribute the photo to
the public without watermarks.
Feel free to use your own photo if you'd like.
If you'd like to remove the watermarks,
open your Lasso Tool, and click the "Add to Selection" icon.
This allows us to make multiple selections on the same layer.
Draw around each watermark
and go to Edit and "Content-Aware Fill".
Then, click OK.
Deselect it by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + D.
We'll merge the retouched layer with the photo by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + E.
Next, we'll separate our subject from the background.
Open your Quick Selection Tool and click "Select Subject".
Photoshop instantly makes a selection of our subject.
To refine the selection, go to Select.
You can either click "Select and Mask" or Shift-click it to open "Refine Edge".
Frankly, I generally use Refine Edge because I like it better.
It's a personal choice.
I did in-depth tutorials on both of them, so if you'd like to watch them, I provided their links as well.
Check Smart Radius.
This detects smooth and hard edges.
Adjust your brush's size by making sure our Caps Lock key is off
and pressing the right or left bracket key on your keyboard.
Brush over the spiky hair.
Output it as a Layer Mask.
Next, we'll adjust its contrast.
Click the Adjustment Layer icon and click Levels.
For this image, let's make the Input shadows level 43 and the Input Midtones: 2.23.
Keep in mind, since every photo has its own characteristics of brightness and contrast,
feel free to adjust these amounts.
We’ll make our adjusted subject into a Smart Object by Shift-clicking the subject to make
it active as well and clicking "Convert to Smart Object".
Click the Adjustment Layer icon and click "Gradient Map".
Adjustment Layers affect all the layers below them in the layers panel.
If we want them to restrict it to affect just the one layer below them,
we need to make it into a clipping mask.
To do this, click the clipping mask icon or you can go to Layer and "Create Clipping Mask".
Click the Gradient bar to open the Gradient Editor.
If your gradient isn't black to white, click the black to white preset.
Click the lower, left "Stop" and for its location, type in 26.
Click the lower, right "Stop", the color box, and in the hexadecimal field, type in EDE90B.
For its location, type in 38.
We'll make a new layer below our subject by making it active and Ctrl or Cmd-clicking
the New Layer icon.
We'll fill it with the same yellow color we picked for our gradient.
The quickest way to do this is to press "i" on your keyboard to open the Eyedropper Tool
and click the yellow color on your subject.
Our foreground color is now yellow.
To fill our empty layer with it that color, press Alt or Option + Delete.
We'll make a new layer below the yellow layer by again, Ctrl or Cmd-clicking the New Layer icon.
We'll fill this empty layer with a hot pink color.
Click the foreground color and in the hexadecimal field, type in: D607B9.
Then, fill the empty layer with the foreground color.
We won't see the pick color in our poster yet because the yellow layer is above it.
Ctrl or Cmd-click the thumbnail of our subject to select its shape.
Make the yellow layer active and click the layer mask icon to make a layer mask next to it.
The reason we're seeing pink behind our subject is because the black area of the layer mask
is masking out the yellow.
A simple rule to remember about layer masks is white reveals and black conceals the layer
next to them.
We want to see more yellow behind the spiked hair like we see in the original poster.
To do this, Ctrl or Cmd-click the layer mask to select its shape.
Go to Select and Transform Selection.
At the top, make sure the chain-link is active between the Transform’s width and height.
This links them together.
In either field, type in 110%.
Then, press Enter or Return.
Open your Pencil Tool and Pencil Picker.
Pick a soft round or hard round point.
Make its size 100 pixels and the Hardness: 100%.
Its opacity is also 100%.
Draw over just the top of hair filling in the expanded selection and make sure you don't
draw over the forehead, neck and anywhere else on the body.
We're just filling in the hair.
Delete the selection by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + D. Next, we'll a grainy texture to our entire
poster similar to the original.
Make the texture visible and active.
Make a copy of it by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + J. Hide the copy and make the original active.
Change its Blend Mode to Subtract and reduce its opacity to 50%.
Make the texture copy visible and active and change its Blend Mode to Screen.
Reduce its opacity to 30%.
Make the text layer visible.
Next, we'll add the title of the movie.
Make the gradient layer active and make a new layer above it.
Open your Horizontal Type Tool.
The color of the title is the same hot pink in our foreground color.
Open your Type Picker and type in the font I provided, "Caveman".
Make its size 117 points, the aliasing "Smooth, and the alignment: flush left.
Click on your poster and type out your title.
If you're customizing it, type out your own title.
To adjust its shape and other aspects of it, double-click the large "T" of the text layer
to highlight all your text.
Click this icon to open the Character panel or go to Window and Character.
For its vertical scale, type in 160%.
This stretches our text vertically.
We want to position each line to the right of the one above it.
To do this click to the left of the line you want to move and press Alt or Option and the
right arrow key on your keyboard.
To reposition your entire title, open your Move Tool and move it.
This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV. Thanks for watching!