This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
I'm going to show you how to create an extra-terrestrial alien engulfed in a cocoon of light.
I provided a Photoshop document so you can follow along.
Its link is in my video's description or project files.
It contains 3 layers: a black base, a translucent orb and a silhouette figure.
We'll remove the white background behind the figure.
There are many ways to do this, but for this example, first make sure the silhouette figure
is active and open your Magic Wand Tool.
Click anywhere on the white area to make a selection of it.
Press the "Delete" key to delete the white area.
Deselect it by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + D. Notice the white fringe along the edge of the figure.
We'll get rid of it by going to Layer, Matting and Defringe.
Make the Width: 1 pixel and click OK.
We'll convert the silhouette figure into a Smart Object, so we can modify it non-destructively.
To do this, click the icon at the upper, right and click "Convert to Smart Object".
Go to Filter, Blur and Gaussian Blur.
Blur it 6 pixels.
Then, click OK or press Enter or Return.
Go back to Filter, Other and "Maximum".
Make its Radius: 10 pixels and the Preserve: Roundness.
Basically, the Maximum filter has the effect of applying a choke spreading out white areas
and choking in black areas.
Conversely, the Minimum filter has the opposite effect by applying a spread spreading out
black areas and shrinking white areas.
Double-click an empty area of the figure's layer to open its Layer Style window.
I'll drag it over, so we can see the figure.
Click "Outer Glow".
If the color box isn't white, click it and pick white.
The Blend Mode is "Lighten", the Opacity is 100% and the Noise is 0.
The Technique is "Softer", the Spread is 0 and the Size is 250 pixels.
The Contour is Linear and the Range is 100%.
Next, we'll stretch the figure vertically to give it an elongated, alien shape.
Press Ctrl or Cmd + T to open your Transform Tool.
If you see this message, it's just letting us know that the Smart Filters will be temporarily
turned off as we use the Transform Tool.
Go to the top middle anchor point and press and hold Alt or Option + Shift as you drag
it up approximately this much.
We'll compress it a bit horizontally by going to a side anchor point and pressing & holding
the same hotkeys as you drag it in.
Then, press Enter or Return.
If you want to go back to adjust any of the figure's filters, we can do it since they're
Smart Filters.
For example, let's brighten the glow around the figure.
Double-click "Outer Glow" and open the Contour presets.
If you don't see the names of the presets next to their thumbnails, click the gear icon
and click "Small List".
Scroll to "Rolling Slope - Ascending" and click it.
To save space in the Layers panel, collapse the Smart Filters.
Click the Adjustment Layer icon and "Color Balance".
Open the Tone list and click Shadows.
Make the Cyan/Red: 41, keep the Magenta/Green: 0 and the make the Yellow/Blue: minus 65.
Click "Midtones".
Make it 5...10 and minus 100.
Click "Highlights".
Make it 100...minus 100 and minus 100.
Next, we'll make the shape of the orb oblong.
Make the orb layer active, open your Transform tool and go to a side anchor point.
Press and hold Alt or Option + Shift as you drag it in approximately this much.
Then, press Enter or Return.
Drag the orb to the top of the Layers panel and change its Blend Mode to "Screen".
Next, we'll remove the orb's milky midtones, while keeping the orb's highlights . Double-click
the orb to open its Layer Style window.
We'll use the "Blend If" feature to do this.
Basically, "Blend If" blends images together using the luminosity of its pixels.
"This Layer" is the current active layer.
In this case, it's the orb itself.
By dragging the black triangle to the right, removes the orb's darker colors, while dragging
the white triangle to the left, removes its lighter colors.
"The Underlying Layer" represents all the layers below the orb.
By dragging its sliders, it forces the colors from the underlying layers to show through
the orb based on their luminosity.
For the orb, we'll only be using "This Layer".
Drag the black triangle to the right to remove the darker pixels.
We can smooth out its transition by Alt-clicking or Option-clicking the middle of the triangle,
which divides it in two.
Drag the right half of the triangle to the right, which gradually fades out the pixels
between the left half of the black triangle and its right half.
Next, we'll colorize the orb and give it a dark reddish, outer glow.
Click the Adjustment Layer icon and click "Hue/Saturation".
An Adjustment Layers affects all of the layers below it in the Layers panel, so if we want
it to affect just the one layer below it, click the Clipping Mask icon or go to Layer
and "Create Clipping Mask".
You could also press Alt + Ctrl + G on Windows or Option + Cmd + G on a Mac.
Check "Colorize".
For the Hue, type in 30 and for the Saturation, type in 100.
Double-click the orb to open its Layer Style window.
Click "Outer Glow" and the color box.
Pick a bright red.
Change its Blend Mode to Normal and its opacity to 20%.
Make the Spread: 10% and the Size: 125 pixels.
Open the Contour list and click, "Cove Shallow".
The Range is 100%.
Make the figure active and click the New Layer icon to make a new layer above it.
We're going brush a soft, white shape over the middle of the orb, so check your foreground
and background colors.
If they aren't black and white, respectively, press "D" on your keyboard.
Then, press "x" to invert them, so white is your foreground color.
Open your Brush Tool and Brush Picker.
Pick a soft, round brush.
Make its size: 700 pixels, the Hardness: 0%, its Opacity: 60% and its Flow: 100%.
Go to the middle of the orb and click once.
Open your Transform Tool and go to a side anchor point.
Press and hold Alt or Option + Shift as you drag it in approximately this much.
Go to the top, middle anchor point, press the same hot keys and drag it up.
Then, press Enter or Return.
This creates a soft, white oblong shape.
Next, we'll add a soft glow at the feet of our alien.
Copy the soft, white shape layer by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + J. We'll jump the copy down
two layers to just below the figure by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + the left bracket key twice.
We'll place it into a folder by pressing Ctrl or Cmd + G. Reduce its opacity to 18%.
Make the shape in the folder active and open the Transform Tool.
We'll compress the shape horizontally.
Go to the top, middle anchor point and press and hold Alt or Option + Shift as you drag
it down approximately this much.
Press and Hold the Shift key as you drag it down to the feet.
Pressing Shift kept it perfectly vertical as you dragged it.
I think I'd like to adjust its compression, so I'll go back to the top, middle anchor
point, press the hotkeys, drag it up and press Enter or Return.
Make a copy of it.
We'll make the copy smaller in size.
Open back your Transform Tool and go to a corner.
If you're using a version earlier than CC 2019, press and hold Alt or Option + Shift
as you drag it in approximately this much.
If your using CC 2019 or later, just press Alt or Option as you drag it.
Then, press Enter or Return.
Next, we'll add a lens flare.
Before we do, let's save some space in the Layers panel, by collapsing the folder.
Scroll to the top and make the adjustment layer active.
Above it, we'll make a composite snapshot of our visible image, so we won't have to
guess to position the lens flare.
To do this, press Alt + Ctrl + Shift + E on Windows or Option + Cmd + Shift + E on a Mac.
Tick "35mm Prime" and make the Brightness: 100%.
Drag the lens flare over the brightest spot on the orb.
Now that we have the lens flare in its position, fill the composite snapshot with black by
pressing Alt or Option + Delete.
We'll add back the lens flare by pressing Alt + Ctrl + F on Windows or Option + Cmd
+ F on a Mac.
Photoshop applied the last filter we used keeping its settings and position.
The reason we didn't keep the composite snapshot is so we have the ability to go back and change
any of the filter settings if we want to.
We'll blend in the lens flare more using the Blend If feature that we used for the orb.
Double-click the lens flare to open its Layer Style window.
Go to the middle of the black triangle of "This Layer" and Alt-click or Option-click
it to split it in two.
Drag the right half anywhere between 85 and 90 and drag the left half to 40.
Lastly, we'll place our alien image onto the background I provided.
Feel free to use another background if you like.
To place it into our alien image, press Ctrl or Cmd + A to select it and Ctrl or Cmd +
C to copy it.
Open the alien image and scroll to the bottom of the Layers panel.
Make the black background active.
Directly above it, we'll place the new background.
Press Ctrl or Cmd + V to paste in the new background.
We'll adjust the background's brightness and contrast by clicking the Adjustment Layer
icon and clicking "Levels".
If your Levels panel is partially hidden, just drag the other panels down.
Before we adjust the amounts, keep in mind: since every image has its own characteristics
of brightness and contrast, you may want to type in different amounts if you're using
a different background.
For this particular background, in the Output white levels, I'll type in: 47.
For the Input black level, I'll type in: 8 and for the Input midtones, I'll type in 1.24.
This is Marty from Blue Lightning TV.
Thanks for watching!