Who said that you have to use a feature the way it was supposed to be used?
Well, today I'm going to share with you one slider that you can use to create a soft,
beautiful painterly effect.
And guess what?
That slider was not created to do anything like this at all.
But it works.
And that's all we need to know.
So, without any further ado, let's get started.
Back at it again in the wonderful world of Photoshop, and if you want to go ahead and
download this photo and follow along, you already know what to do.
Check the links in the description.
Now, select the Background layer, and then press Ctrl or Command + J to make a copy of
it.
Now, we can apply a filter to this.
But before we do anything, let's go to Filter and then Convert for Smart Filters and hit
OK so that we can change the values of that filter later.
Now, the filter is this and this is the trick.
Go to Filter, and then Camera Raw Filter.
So, let's go to the Detail tab.
On top, we have Sharpening.
If you add sharpening, it's going to add some noise.
At the bottom, we have Noise Reduction for that.
You can use this slider to reduce noise.
But also at the same time, what is noise?
Noise is a kind of texture.
Right?
So, if you reduce the texture, what's it going to give?
The painterly effect.
So, if we go extreme on this one, have a look at what it does.
Instantly.
Amazing painterly effect.
Here's the before and this one is the after.
Just look at it.
Now you can control the Amount.
So, I'm going to go 100% on this one just to show you the difference between that.
And Luminance Detail, if you increase it all the way up, it will bring back all the details.
So, if you decrease it slowly and gradually, it will start to take away the details.
So, look closely only at the skin for this moment.
So for this example, for the skin, I guess this value looks fine.
And hit OK.
For the other areas, we will have other values.
Now once that is done, we can get the details back in the eyes and maybe the mouth, if you
want to.
So, let's create a Mask.
By the way, we can name this Painterly Level 1 or just Painterly 1, that's fine.
Now, click on the Mask button right there.
Now, take the Brush, black as the foreground colour and paint on the areas where you want
the details back.
So, in this case, I'm going to paint on in here.
Increase the Flow and Opacity to 100.
And let's get the details back.
That's kind of too much, though.
So, I'll just press X to make the foreground colour white again and then delete the details
from some of these areas like that.
Now, we don't want the Mask to be so active.
So, here's what we do.
We click on the Mask, we then click on the Properties and you can decrease the density
of the Mask.
If you cannot see the Properties, you can always go to Window and then make sure Properties
is checked.
Now for this one, I'm going to keep it at about.. something like 35 works for us.
Now, we also have the details on the eyes and the mouth and we also have the painterly
effect and guess what, we can add some more values to other areas as well.
So with Painterly 1 selected, you can make a copy of it.
Press Ctrl or Command + J. Now, in this copy, you can double click on the Camera Raw and
change the values.
And that was the whole point in converting it to a smart object by going to Filter and
Convert for Smart Filters.
Now, let's increase the values even more, if you go back to the Details tab right in
there, and we can actually just zoom in and increase the values even more or in other
words, lose the details.
So, decrease the Luminance Detail.
So, I'm going to keep it at about that and hit OK.
Now, I want to take it away from the face.
I don't want the face to have so less details.
So, select the Mask again, take the Brush and black as the foreground colour.
And this creates a wonderful effect.
Now, in this case as well, you can of course increase the Density.
There we have it.
Now, if you want, let's make one more copy of it just for the Background.
So with this Painterly 1 selected, you can name this Painterly 2.
This is level 2.
Make a copy.
Ctrl or Command + J and in this one, double click on the Camera Raw filter again and we're
going to reduce the details even more.
Let's go to the Details tab and inside of that, Luminance Detail.
Let's go crazy on this one to all time low, and hit OK.
This is looking fantastic.
But there are some areas where we are losing details.
Have a look at the top of the subjects head.
We don't want that to happen.
So, select the Mask, the same thing, take the Brush, black as the foreground colour
and paint it away from the subject.
We want the subject to have some details, some sort.
There we have it.
This is wonderful.
Now, what you can do is you can name this Painterly 3, and we will add some filters
to it as well.
Now, let's make a group of all of these softening layers.
So, with the first one selected, hold the Shift key and then select the last one, the
Painterly 1.
All of them in the middle are being selected at this moment.
Then press Ctrl or Command + G to make a group of all of them and we can name this Softening
or Painterly Softening.
Whatever you want.
Now, one of the things which are trending these days are sun flares.
Everybody's adding them.
So, why shouldn't we do that?
Let's do it.
So, let's add a gradient.
So click on the Adjustment layer icon and then, let's choose Gradient.
Now, inside of that, let's choose the colour from white to yellow or yellow to red, whatever
type of sun flare you want to add.
So, single click on this one.
On the left hand side, I'm going to choose, let's choose bright yellow.
So, let's select yellow and let's choose something bright like that.
Okay.
And on the right hand side, single click on this one, single click on the colour and we're
going to choose something orangish.
Well, that is looking fantastic.
Hit OK.
And hit OK.
Again, change the Style from Linear to Radial so that it's radial.
Radial means something that has radius, which means circle.
So, now we can move it any way we want.
We're going to move it at the top.
And guess what.
You can also control the size of it by using the Scale right here.
So, if you increase the Scale, the size increases.
If you decrease the Scale the size decreases.
For this one, we can go for 140.
Let's go for 160.
Why not?
Hit OK.
Now, we want to make sure that the flare always brightens stuff.
Now, what was the Blend Mode which brightens stuff?
Screen.
Right?
Screen - brightens, Multiply - darkens and Overlay ad`ds contrast, Soft Light adds a
little bit of contrast.
Just a recap.
So now let's change the Blend Mode from Normal to Screen.
Now, you can always go back and change the colours if you want to.
You can double click on this one, single click on this one.
I'm going to click here and change the colour.
Let's make it a little more colourful.
Increase the saturation a little bit.
This is fine.
Maybe let's make it a little more reddish.
There we go.
An orange as well.
Let's make it a little more reddish in here.
That's looking fantastic.
Hit OK.
That's fine.
But we want a little more dimension on the sun flare.
What do we do?
Make a copy of it.
With this one selected, which is Gradient Fill 1, press Ctrl or Command + J to make
a copy.
Let's decrease the size of this because we want the intensity to be higher in the middle.
So, single click on this one and set the Scale to maybe 120 or something and you can move
it even top, something like this.
Or maybe 110 or 100.
So, I'm going to move it right there.
There we have the sun flare done.
Now, when you're dealing with a lot of layers, do not forget the organisation because later
if you want to adjust it, you're going to get confused.
So, let's select both of these layers.
So, select the first one, hold the Ctrl or Command key and then select the second one,
and then press Ctrl or Command + G and let's name it Sunflare.
Great.
Now, you can of course, decrease or increase the Opacity.
So, I'm going to keep the Opacity 85-84.
That's great.
Now, it's time for us to add my favourite Adjustment Layer and that is Curves because
if you master Curves, you can do anything in Photoshop.
You can match the composites, you can do colour grading.
Curves has a lot of applications.
Dodging and Burning.
It's like an all rounder.
So click on the Adjustment Layer icon and then choose Curves.
Now, first of all, let's start with darkening the shadows because I think there's too much
brightness in the shadows.
So, I'm going to take this slider to the right like that.
Wow.
It's already looking fantastic.
Now, we have darkened the shadows.
But we still want to create a faded effect.
What do we do?
Now, once you've taken this to the right, you can always take it up from same position
to create a faded effect, something like this.
It's also faded, but it's also darkening the shadows at the same time.
Now, let's decrease the highlights a touch, just a touch, it's kind of too much at this
moment, and maybe create something like this.
Wow.
Just a simple move.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Creates a wonderful effect.
If you want to increase colour, what would you do?
The first thing that comes to our mind is increasing the Saturation.
But, Saturation treats every pixel equally.
So even if a pixel has very less amount of colour, it will boost its colour and it won't
look right.
So, click on the Adjustment Layer icon and let's choose Vibrance.
And then inside of that, let's increase the Vibrance to about.. let's go higher, bout
44-45 is fine.
Have a look.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Now we're talking.
Now, let's do some color grading and for color grading as well, my favourite tool is Curves.
So, add one more Curves on top of it.
Now, you can top it off with as many Curves as you want.
Now, let's click on the Adjustment Layer icon and let's choose Curves.
In the shadows, let's have some blues.
So let's go to the Blue channel and increase the blues in the shadows like that.
Or maybe, let's just go from here, just a touch.
And then the highlights.
I want some yellows.
Now, yellow is the opposite of blue, right?
So if I decrease the blue, I will get yellows.
So, let's decrease the blues in the highlights just to touch.
Not so much.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Just a touch of blue here.
Right.
Now, I feel we should add some magenta in the shadows as well.
So, let's go to the Green channel.
There's no magenta, but there is green.
And the opposite of green is magenta.
RGB is the opposite of CMY.
Keep in mind, red opposite of cyan, green opposite of magenta, blue opposite of yellow.
So, let's move to green.
And keep the green constant in the highlights.
And in the shadows, let's decrease it.
Add some magenta.
Just a touch of magenta.
Right.
Now, let's move to the Red channel.
Now, as you can see, there's too much red in the shadows, but we don't want to remove
the reds from the skin tones as well.
So, what do we do?
With the help of the Hand tool right there, select the Hand.
That's not exactly the Hand tool, but that's the Hand inside the Curves.
We're going to make a point right there, just click on in there.
So make sure that that area is constant.
And now for the shadows, just decrease the reds like that.
And just by doing it, you see the effect in there.
It's creating a massive and wonderful effect.
Have a look at it.
Isn't that wonderful?
So, here's the before, here is the after.
I absolutely love it.
Now, let's create a faded effect here as well.
So, let's go to the RGB channel and take up the shadows like that and add some dimension
to it by adding a point on the left and take it down, like curve, like that.
Before - after.
Now to add some more dimension, let's do a tiny bit of dodging.
We don't need burning in this case, but let's do some dodging now.
Keep in mind, dodging is brightening, burning is darkening.
And you can do this with Curves again.
So, click on the Adjustment Layer icon and then choose Curves.
Now, you need to take it up just like that.
Let's take it up a little bit.
Now, select the Mask, press Ctrl or Command + I.
Now, zoom in.
Now, take the Brush with the foreground colour white, and you can decrease the Flow to somewhere
about, let's go for 2% or 3%, something like that.
Now, let's paint on the bright areas or where the light is falling.
So, the light is falling from the top.
So, let's brighten up the highlight areas to add some mood and dimension to it.
Now, you can take your time to do this.
I'm going to decrease the Flow to 1%.
Let's go for 2% Flow.
See, have a look.
Here's the before, here's the after.
It's adding some dimension.
Guys, I'm doing it really, really fast.
You can take all the time in the world to do this.
Let's brighten her hand as well.
Forever, the light is falling from the top.
Maybe this area a little bit.
Maybe her shoulders.
Something like this.
Now, let's have a look.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Just a teeny tiny bit of light, I thought, might be helpful.
Now, the light is bringing up a little bit of blues in the shadows as well.
That might be the reason of colour grading here.
So, we can try putting this layer under the previous Curves Adjustment layer, and it solves
the issue.
And that is why it's important to name the layers.
Let's name this Dodging.
And let's name this one Color Grading or just Grade..
Grade 1.
Now, it's time for the fun and easy stuff.
And that is Colour Lookup tables.
You can add as many Colour Lookup tables as you want.
So, let's click on the Adjustment Layer icon and choose Colour Lookup.
And for this example, Crisp_Warm would fit the best.
So, from the first drop down menu, let's go ahead and choose Crisp_Warm.
You can choose whatever you like.
I like Crisp_Warm on this one so it adds a little warmth to it.
So, here's the before, here's the after.
But it's also making the shadows very dark and we don't want it at the bottom of the
image.
So what do we do?
We select the Mask and then we choose the Gradient tool from white to black.
Let's create a gradient from top to bottom so that it only affects the top part of the
image.
Let's try making a better gradient.
I like this one.
This is fantastic.
Now, I also don't want it to affect the shadows.
So, what do we do?
We double click on the right hand side of the Adjustment layer.
This brings up the Layer Styles dialog box.
If you want anything to be taken away from the shadows, you take the slider of the underlying
left from left to right.
But that is very harsh, right?
So, hold the Alt or Option, click on the slider to break it apart and take it all the way
to the right and left hand side.
Now, hit OK.
Now it's only affecting the bright areas.
It's looking wonderful.
But, it's also adding some highlights on the skin which we don't want.
This is not looking very good.
So we select the Mask, take the Brush, black as the foreground colour and then we take
it away from the skin.
You can increase the Flow to about 40% or let's go for 30% and let's take it away from
the face to get back the skin tones.
Right.
There we go.
This is looking great.
Maybe I'm going to go back and take it.. paint it here as well.
Let's decrease the Flow to 20%.
Just a touch.
All right, there we go.
Now, let's go crazy on this one.
Let's add one more Colour Lookup table.
Click on the Adjustment Layer icon again and then choose Colour Lookup.
And this time, let's add a sunset kind of effect.
So, click on the drop down menu and let's choose LateSunset.
But that's kind of too much.
No worries.
Let's decrease the Opacity.
Let's choose somewhere around, let's go for 34%.
Have a look at it.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Creating an amazing effect.
But at the face, it's creating some discrepancies which we don't want.
So, select the Mask and Brush, select it, black as the foreground colour, Flow at 20%.
That's fine.
And then just start painting on the face and take it away from the areas where you don't
want it.
That's it.
It was that simple.
So, without the Mask.
With the mask.
You see, it's brightening the face and taking our attention to the subject.
Now, what you can also do is you can paint on the complete face and then you can lighten
the mask as well.
There's a feature to do that in Photoshop.
And the way you do that is you select the Mask, and then you open up the Properties.
Alright.
If you cannot see the Properties, again go to Window and then make sure Properties is
checked.
And then you can decrease the Density of the Mask.
Slowly and gradually increase it.
So, I'm going to keep it at about 67 or something like that.
Now, to add more warmth, I know this is insane, but let's go ahead and add one more Colour
Lookup Adjustment layer.
And this time let's choose EdgyAmber.
It adds a wonderful warmth to it.
It's kind of too much.
Let's decrease the Opacity.
Let's keep it at about 9%.
That's wonderful.
Here's the before, here's the after.
Just a touch of it.
Maybe let's go for 6% and we are good to go.
Now, this last step is optional.
If you want to add some texture to it, you can do that as well.
So, let me go to my File Explorer or Finder, and I'm going to drag it and drop it into
Photoshop on top of her.. top of the canvas, something like this.
And let's change the Opacity, sorry, Blend Mode to Overlay, and Opacity to about 70%,
something like that.
Not too high.
Let's go for 60 or something like that.
But there are a couple of cracks, which we don't want.
So, what do we do?
So, let's remove the cracks.
We are not liking it anyway.
So, let's change it to Normal so that we can see the cracks properly, increase the Opacity,
and then we'll apply it again after we remove the cracks.
Now, this is a smart object, so we need to right click on it and choose Rasterize Layer.
And now let's go ahead and remove all these cracks.
So, let's select the Healing Brush tool, the Regular Healing Brush tool, hold the Alt or
Option, take a sample and then just paint on the cracks to remove them.
You don't have to be super accurate about it because it's any way going to be applied
as a texture.
No big deal in here.
Super simple to do.
Alright, that looks wonderful.
At the side, maybe we want to remove all these.
This is great.
Let's remove all these lines as well.
Okay, now once you're ready, once you think it's all right, then you can go ahead and
change the Blend Mode back to Overlay.
From Normal to Overlay and change this Opacity to whatever number you like.
For this example, I'm going to choose maybe 56 or something like that.
And let's remove this from the subjects face by clicking on the Mask button, take the Brush,
black as the foreground colour, Flow 20% is fine.
Let's keep painting on her face.
Maybe let's go for 5% Flow.
You want a little bit anyway.
So, let's paint it properly.
Paint it here and there as well.
And there you have a nice texture.
You can, of course, control the Opacity if you want to increase the texture amount.
Let's go for 65% and we are ready to go.
Of course the texture is optional.
Without texture, it also looks wonderful.
With texture, it looks like a different style.
I like that as well.
So whatever you choose, you can go for it.
So here's the before, let me show you.
Here's the before and here is the after.
A wonderful, painterly effect.
So that's how you create a painterly effect.
And the basis of that was just one slider.
What was that slider?
Luminance.
And also there was one more but in the same section, so one section we can say.
Luminance Detail.
And that was it.
It was supposed to remove noise, but we can definitely use it for other purposes as well.
So, just keep in mind, you need to break free in Photoshop.
If there's certain tools or features meant to do a certain particular things, you can
try it for anything else you want.
Just press all the buttons, play with all the menus, try everything and if you get lost,
you can always reset Photoshop, and there's a tutorial on that in this channel as well.
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free for everybody forever.
Thanks for all the support.
Thank you for watching.
I'll see you guys in my next one.
Till then, stay tuned and make sure that you keep creating.