Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to work with Photoshop’s advanced shape tool functions and create a complex custom shape arrangement.
• Learn how to create your own custom patterns and textures and integrate them smoothly into your work.
• Learn how to work with small details in your piece to produce a more complex, realistic outcome.
• Learn a professional, non-destructive workflow, working with smart objects, vectors and other non-destructive techniques.
• & Much More!

Learn how to work with Photoshop’s advanced shape tool functions and create a complex custom shape arrangement.

Learn how to create your own custom patterns and textures and integrate them smoothly into your work.

Learn how to work with small details in your piece to produce a more complex, realistic outcome.

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to work with textures/patterns, even creating your own custom halftone pattern.
• Learn digital painting techniques, and learn to understand correct lighting and shadowing.
• Learn how to master the minor details of your piece to create an outcome with more depth and substance.
• Learn how to build up multiple layers of coloring to correctly tint and blend your image.
• & Much More!

Learn how to work with textures/patterns, even creating your own custom halftone pattern.

Learn digital painting techniques, and learn to understand correct lighting and shadowing.

Learn how to master the minor details of your piece to create an outcome with more depth and substance.

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Apply filters and light effects in a non-destructive way by mastering Photoshop smart objects.
• Learn how to correctly work with layer styles and blending options, creating a multi-layered vector composition.
• Learn how to create custom patterns and textures within Photoshop in order to structure a more realistic outcome.
• Learn how to utilize a totally non-desctructive workflow, so that you can go back and edit details of your image at any time.
• & Much More!

apply filters and light effects in a non-destructive way by mastering Photoshop smart objects.

Learn how to correctly work with layer styles and blending options, creating a multi-layered vector composition.

learn how to create custom patterns and textures within Photoshop in order to structure a more realistic outcome.

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Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to work with Photoshop’s shape tools, building up a structural base for your design. You will also learn how to properly work within a grid for greater precision.
• Learn how to master Photoshop’s advanced vector and drawing capabilities.
• Learn how to build up minute details to add realism and professionalism to your end composition.
• Learn how to build up complex layers of blending options to style your objects in a non-destructive way.
• & Much More!

Learn how to work with Photoshop’s shape tools, building up a structural base for your design. You will also learn how to properly work within a grid for greater precision.

Learn how to master Photoshop’s advanced vector and drawing capabilities.

Learn how to build up minute details to add realism and professionalism to your end composition.

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to work with advanced shape tool techniques and vector workflows.
• Learn how to work with the smallest details of your composition to produce a realistic outcome.
• Follow along with a clear, step by step professional workflow to build up your piece.
• Learn how to work with lighting, blending options and texturing.
• & Much More!

Learn how to work with advanced shape tool techniques and vector workflows.

Learn how to work with the smallest details of your composition to produce a realistic outcome.

Follow along with a clear, step by step professional workflow to build up your piece.

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to create your own unique textures from scratch.
• Learn how to master Photoshop’s various shape tools, learnings advanced techniques often overlooked by even experienced users.
• Work with non-destructive workflows, learning about smart objects and vector capabilities within Photoshop where applicable.
• Learn how to implement subtle lighting and details into your design for a realistic end result.
• & Much More!

Learn how to create your own unique textures from scratch.

Learn how to master Photoshop’s various shape tools, learnings advanced techniques often overlooked by even experienced users.

Work with non-destructive workflows, learning about smart objects and vector capabilities within Photoshop where applicable.

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to work with drawing and shape options in photoshop, building up a base for your image.
• Learn how to build up details and textures to make your composition more realistic.
• Follow super detailed steps to walk you through every step of building up your illustration.
• Learn how to work with the pen/path tool and manipulate your images.
• & Much More!

Learn how to build up details and textures to make your composition more realistic.

Follow super detailed steps to walk you through every step of building up your illustration.

Learn how to work with the pen/path tool and manipulate your images.

In this tutorial we will be creating a beautiful, very detailed heart illustration. We will use some stock images and develop our drawing skills in Photoshop. Don’t worry I’ll show you step by step how to do it.

Final Image

As always, this is the final image that we’ll be creating:

Step 1: Your Initial Sketch

First of all we have to draw our illustration simply with pencil on a paper. It’s okay if you are not really good at drawing; just make a sketch. Then scan it and open it in Photoshop.

Step 2: Creating Your Document

Open Photoshop and make a new document (File>New). It’s important that you have to make a huge document, so it will be easy to work with it. I suggest 4500×3000 and 300 DPI.

Step 3: Start Creating!

Now simply open your drawing and drop it on the document. This way you can copy all of your shapes later.

Step 4: Create a Color Palette

Pick some ‘happy’ colours, come colours that make you feel good. For example yellow, orange, pink and purple.

Step 5: The Pen Tool is Your Best Friend

Pen Tool is my all time favourite tool in Photoshop. We will be using it to create all of our shapes.

Add a New Layer and start using Pen Tool and put anchor points around a shape. Now Right Click>Fill Path. This way you can make simple, one-colored shapes very easily.

Step 6: Using Gradients

However often we need shapes with nice Gradients. Choose Gradients from the Toolbar and choose 2 colors (yellow and orange). Now select the Pen Tool, after creating your path around the next shape Right Click>Make Selection. Now we have a nice selection and all we need to do is to choose Gradients and make a gradient inside of the selection.

Step 7: Build Up Shapes Using Multiple Layers

Repeat the previous steps for the rest of the shapes you drew. Make sure that you make a New Layer for each shape. It’s very important.

Step 8: Stroke Those Paths!

Shapes are great, but we have some lines as well on our drawing.

First choose a simple brush, sized around 3px. Now select the Pen Tool, and draw a path line following the contours of your sketch. Then Right Click>Stroke Path. Now we have a very nice line! Notice how I’ve checked the ‘simulate pressure’ box, to create a more natural effect:

Step 9: Using The Elliptical Marquee Tool

Select Elliptical Marquee Tool from the Toolbar, then hit Shift and make a selection. You will see that when you hit Shift the selection will be a perfect circle. Now select Brush and choose a soft brush, set the size to 569 px and start painting inside the circle.

Step 10: Keep Creating

Repeat the previous steps lots of times until you finish each shape and each shape you draw on your original drawing.

Step 11: Get some pictures of flowers

For our illustration we need some flowers. Download the flower images from the resources section for this tutorial:

Step 12: Extracting the Flowers

Now we need to extract these flower images from their backgrounds. Open up the flower image and then select around it using your pen tool. Then right click>make selection. Select the rectangular marquee tool from the toolbar, and then put your cursor inside the selected area. Right click>layer via copy. That’s it – you have a beautifully selected flower on it’s own separate layer.

Step 13: Positioning Our Flowers

Drop your flower on our main document. You probably have to resize it and maybe rotate it as well; in order to do this go to Edit>Free Transform.

Step 14: Building Up Your Flowers

Now we have to duplicate our flowers several times. Just simply Right Click on the layer and choose Duplicate and place your flowers anywhere you want them.

Step 15: Select More Flowers

One flower is really boring, so choose some more, around 4-5, and repeat the previous steps.

Step 16: Rinse and Repeat

Now that we have all the flowers needed all we have to do is to duplicate them and place them on the right places.

Step 17: Getting There

Okay, so one half of our heart is perfectly finished. Use Shift to select all of the layers, now hit Alt and click on your shapes and start moving them. Hopefully you have just duplicated all the layers. However it will be hard to handle them and place them correctly. While all of the duplicated layers are selected, Right Click on one of them and choose Merge Down.

Step 18: Add Some Glamour

Add a New Layer above all of the layers, choose a small soft brush, set the color to white and start clicking on the heart. After you finished it, Right Click on the layer and choose Blending Options, select Outer Glow and set the Size 38 px and the Opacity 75%.

Step 19: Work on the Background

Merge down all of the layers of the big heart (don’t save it, it’s very important), so everything expect the lights will be on one layer. Make a new document with the same dimensions and drop the merged layer to the new document. Duplicate this layer, put it under the original one and go to Filters>Blur>Motion Blur and set the Distance to 656 px.

Step 20: Building up Lighting

Cut out the crystal from ‘crystal.jpg’ (see the download folder for this tutorial) and drop it above the ‘Motion-Blur-Heart’ layer. Now set the layer style to ‘Overlay’, go to Edit>Free Transform and rotate the crystal a little bit. Duplicate it a few times.

Step 21: Finish the Background

Let’s make the background a little bit more exciting, but keeping the simple atmosphere. Duplicate the main heart, place the new layer under the original one. Go to Filters>Blur>Gaussian Blur and make it really blury. Set the Radius 38.6 px.

Step 22: Color Adjustments

After you finished everything Right Click on one of the layers and select Flatten Image. Now go to Image>Adjustments> Curves and play with it and make the original illustration a little bit darker, brighter and more vibrant. I recommend you setting the Output to 87 and the Input to 128.

Step 23: Final Touches

Add a New Layer above the heart layer, set the Layer Style to Overlay. Overlay will make it really shiny. Select some middle-sized soft brush, set the color to white and click on some parts of the heart you would like to highlight for example some flowers or triangles. You will see that it looks really nice.

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

You can view a larger version of the outcome by clicking on the image below:

Download Source File for this Tutorial

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to correctly implement blending options in order to build up a base structure for your object.
• Learn how to pay close attention to the details of your composition, and how to create an accurate, realistic outcome.
• Learn how to remove the need for pre-made textures, and instead create your own custom textures and brushes from scratch.
• Learn how to build up a variety of lighting effects, using multiple techniques, for a multi-layered, richer outcome.
• & Much More!

Learn how to correctly implement blending options in order to build up a base structure for your object.

Learn how to pay close attention to the details of your composition, and how to create an accurate, realistic outcome.

Learn how to remove the need for pre-made textures, and instead create your own custom textures and brushes from scratch.

Warning: This tutorial is NOT FOR BEGINNERS, it’s for people who know their way around Photoshop and are looking to further their design knowledge/skills. If you aren’t comfortable with radial gradients, overlay layers and clipping mask layers and have a good foundation level of artistic skill this tutorial probably isn’t for you. Oh, and you should definitely have a graphics tablet; it would be undiluted madness to try this with a mouse!

Still reading? Excellent stuff. This tutorial is going to focus on design choices and a little bit of theory. There are literally thousands of tutorials online that cover keyboard shortcuts and clever ways to tweak your custom brushes but less cover the reasons why we’ve chosen to do what we do when we’re creating a piece of art, which is often more important than the process of how you got there (but don’t worry, there will be some of that too!). And we’ve even included a few custom brushes that you can download here.

Final Image:

Here’s the final image that we will be creating:

What’s my motivation? (or ‘No, he wasn’t always a tree!’)

The goal of this image was to take an existing concept and push it further. For those of you that haven’t played The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask I’ll give you a very brief explanation of the story behind this image. The Zelda franchise has always flirted with a dark narrative, but Majora’s Mask was the first game where they really looked into the dark side. The hero “Link” gets a spell put on him that mutates him into a Deku scrub (a strange tree like creature), and the moon crashes into the planet killing everyone! The transformations in the game always looked quite painful and upsetting; Link would scream in pain every time. I always felt that the game could have gone even further with the transformation, so I thought why not do it myself?

Fun Fact: When Link was in his normal human form, dogs would simply ignore him, when he was in his Deku Scrub form they would get angry and bite him! As if being a tree wasn’t bad enough! At least they didn’t confuse him with a hydrant…

Step1: A good foundation (or ‘How to obtain a hot beverage with minimal effort!’)

First things first, open up an A4 PSD at 300 dpi. Start off drawing a rough layout using my custom “dc colouring opacity” brush (in the brushes download pack) with a light blue colour. Always try to get the main character’s pose sorted out and think about the general composition as a whole. Don’t worry about details until you’re happy with the bare bones first; you’ll only end up having to fix things later. It always helps to stand up and “act out” the pose so you get a better understanding of it. If you can, have someone else act it and take a photo that you can use for reference. Not only that, it’ll make great blackmail material when you next want a cup of tea!

Fun Fact: Despite being ‘ethically sketchy’, blackmail can indeed get you a nice cup of tea…

Step 2: Lines

Once you’re happy with your rough lines, draw the character’s final lines on a new layer called ‘lines’ (imaginative, huh?) using the ‘ink’ brush (also in the brushes download pack!).

Step 3: Add some Colour

Next up, use the paint bucket tool to fill the background with an appropriate blue/teal colour. This serves 2 functions; firstly it helps set the mood of the piece, secondly it gets rid of the white space. Not only can white space be a bit intimidating, but colouring against white will throw your perceptions of colours.

Still using the ‘ink’ brush; lay in the flat colours of your image on relevant layers underneath the ‘Lines’ layer. Make sure to keep adjacent colours on separate layers to make shading easier, so colour all the skin on one layer, then clothes on a layer above, his strange branch hair on another, etc.

Step 4: Background

Open up your references to help inspire you. As you can see, everything from the game is a bit dark, twisted and creepy so let’s make our background evoke similar feelings. Using my “inking opacity” custom brush, lay in a basic background, with simple bushes and trees. Try to make sure everything in your background leads towards your focal point (e.g. all of the branches lead your eye towards Link). Remember the closer we are to things the more saturated the colour is, so use less saturated colours on trees that are further away to make them recede into the painting.

Step 5: Let there be light

Now we’re going to add our light sources; Link’s little Fairy companion (called “Tatl”) and the moon. We’ll keep it simple at first, as we are just adding them for reference so we can work out where the shading should go on Link. On the ‘skin’ layer, use an airbrush and choose a nice bright yellowy-orange, and draw a simple round glow in front of Link. Do the same with a white colour to establish the location of the moon.

Fun fact: Tatl has a brother called “Tael” which is a bad pun on the phrase “tattle-tale” which proves Nintendo loves bad puns even more than I do!

Step 6: More background elements

Add in some mountains in the background and draw the owl from the reference on a branch that is again pointed towards Link. Just render the owl as a silhouette for now; we’ll focus on him properly at a later stage. Use a texture brush to make the floor look a little varied. You don’t need to use a specific brush for this; it’s just something to make the ground look more varied at this stage. It helps to have things vaguely established so that you start to get a feel for the general environment you’re creating.

Step 7: The magic of clipping masks

Now for each of your flat colour layers, create two clipping masks each (create a new layer and tick the “use previous layer as clipping mask” box, then click ok). Set each of the top clipping mask layers to overlay in the blending modes, and the leave the bottom ones at normal. Using clipping masks will allow you to add basic shading to each layer without worrying about going over the edges; simple but brilliant!

Step 8: Shady business practices

We can now start adding some basic shading on the skin using the ‘inking opacity’ brush on the Skin’s normal clipping mask layer. Try to picture Link as a 3D object, and how the light sources would affect the light and shadows falling on him.

Step 9: Lather, rinse, repeat…

To avoid being repetitive, I’ll simply say that you need to repeat this step for the clothes, boots and hair on each of the relevant normal clipping mask layers. Add the strange fiery glow to Link’s eyes using a soft airbrush, and then a hard edge round brush to add the more defined parts (again this is just another element of his design that we’re pushing a bit further.)

Step 10: The Lockdown (or ‘you’re so transparent’)

Another tip which will help those of you that like to keep line work in your final image is to lock the transparency of the ‘lines’ layer by clicking the small chessboard icon in the layers palette. This means you will only affect existing pixels and not create any new ones on that layer, so you can now colour your lines easily on the ‘lines’ layer. Use colours darker than your darkest shading for each area (e.g. a really dark green for Link’s clothes outlines).

Step 11: Moonlighting

You can also render rim-lighting on the locked Lines layer (e.g. The moonlight on his hat and the light on Link’s hands cast by the fairy ‘Tatl’) by choosing a white colour or bright yellow and painting over the lines.

Add the moonlight to Link using a light blue colour (don’t use white as it looks far too strong) with the inking opacity brush. Try to fight the urge to render too much moonlight as we wouldn’t see much of it on Link from this view; he’s mostly blocking it from our viewpoint.

Step 12: Gradients

Lock the transparency of the skin layer (click the chessboard icon) and use the radial gradient fill tool on the skin layer to more accurately show the light emitting from Tatl casting a glow over Link’s hands, using a soft yellow colour at 25% opacity. Make the yellow more saturated the closer you get to the light source. If you repeat this on the ‘skin overlay’ layer it will add more variation and richness to the lighting. Add some more detailed shading and highlights to Link with the inking opacity brush, and don’t forget to colour the lines a bright yellow on his hands to simulate rim lighting.

Step 13: The overlay layer

Create a new layer called ‘Blends’, move it directly underneath ‘lines’ in the layers palette. Set the layer properties to ‘overlay’ and select the radial gradient too. We want to create the effect that light gives as it naturally scatters from a surface it has hit. Choose a light blue for the areas where the moonlight is hitting Link and light yellow for areas where Tatl’s glow is hitting him. Click on the point where light has hit the surface and drag the gradient tool outwards to create a subtle burst of reflected light. Remember that some surfaces are more reflective than others so vary the amount accordingly. Now add more glow to his eyes on this layer using a yellow radial gradient. Keep adding to the shading as you go; as you add more light to the image it will be clearer where shadows should fall, such as along the grooves of his hair.

Step 14: The overlay layer strikes again

You can also use the ‘blends’ overlay layer to enhance the colour variation on Link, eg. use a low saturation red to make his cheeks look more flushed and a soft orange on his boots, and a green on his hat to add more colour. The beauty of overlay and soft light layers is that they add richness without obscuring any existing details you’ve already rendered. It makes them very useful for editing colours on the fly.
Now spend some time perfecting the shading and lighting; add smaller details such as light and shadows in the grooves in Link’s body to make his skin appear more tree-like.

Step 15: Get dirty! (also, get your minds out of the gutter!)

People always bemoan that working digitally produces very clean, artificial looking work, so use some grimy texture brushes on the overlay layers (the clipping masks we applied and set to overlay earlier) to mess things up a bit. Link is currently half tree, so there’s plenty of scope to go crazy with texturing here. Likewise because he’s in a forest, feel free to add dirt to his clothes and scuffmarks to his boots. Everything should look well-worn. Doing all of this on the overlay layers helps because again, you don’t lose any existing details you’ve already drawn in, it just adds to them.

Step 16: Tatl’s tale…

Going on with my theme of pushing the design into a more ‘realistic’ fantasy, I’ve decided to give Tatl a more humanoid appearance; I still keep her colour and 4 wings, but using an almost white yellow with the inking opacity brush give her a more obvious female form; the more elements the viewer can relate to because they have a basis in reality, the further you can push the fantastical elements and still have them believable. Despite being a fairy, a humanoid version will illicit a more empathic response than a simple glowing light; having a form makes it feel more authentic to the viewer.

Create Tatl’s ‘pixie dust’ motion trail with a low opacity yellow airbrush and then use a speckled brush with opacity set to 60% to add in some faerie dust particles, with a mixture of very light yellow and white shades to make it seem like it has more depth.

Step 17: Clouding over

The night sky should be rendered with a mixture of blues; no blacks should be used because the moon is out in full. Use the radial and linear gradient fill tools on the background layer to get a nice variation of colours, making the sky darker at the top. Create a new layer above that to render the clouds, using an airbrush for the majority of the work and adding to them with some of the cloud brushes that we have provided alongside this tutorial. Start from a dark base and add the lighter colours to the clouds as you go.

Step 18: Star get!

On a new layer, below the cloud layer, add some random stars to the sky using a star brush (there’ll be one in the tutorial download file). Change both the size of the brush and the opacity to create stars that appear to be different distances, as well as a mixture of yellow and blue-ish whites. Then apply a slight Gaussian blur to the layer to soften them, and also add a Gaussian blur to the clouds.

Step 19: A lesson in landscaping

Create a new layer above the background, stars and clouds and call it ‘mountains’. Using a low saturation blue, render in the mountains. As you’ll notice, my first attempt at mountains was both (a) too detailed and (b) quite dull, so I changed them later on in the process. Later on, I brushed out a lot of the detail in the mountains as they’re too far away to see that level of detail, then I made them more dramatic and jagged for a sinister appearance. Also notice I made the largest peak a subtle pointer to one of the minor focal points; the moon.
Using the airbrush (because it has soft edges, as do things in the distance), add in clock town on a layer above the mountains, in a slightly darker and more saturated blue. I’ve gone for a stylised representation of Clock Town as everything is more curved and crooked than it would be in realistic architecture.

Add another layer in between the mountains and the town, and use a light grey airbrush to create the mist that collects at the bottom of mountains.

Step 20: “You look more like a flooring inspector” (+10 points if you get the quote!)

On a new layer, use a light blue brush suggest a very subtle path starting from Clock Town and leading down the hill to Link. Make it wind a bit because curves always look more interesting than straight lines. Create a new layer above the floor/path/etc. and set the blending mode to overlay. Add a yellow glow (cast by Tatl, of course) on the floor with the radial gradient tool. Erase this glow from the area near Link’s feet to imply the shadows they would cast.

Now that Tatl is even brighter, add some more yellow light to Link, and enhance the shadows even more. Use the inking opacity brush to add some light reflecting off of his boots and face, for example. Also enhance some of the smaller details at this point, such as using a light colour to trace the outline of the pattern on his clothes, and a small dark brush to add more detailed grooves and variation to his skin.

Step 21: The Menacing Moon! (or ‘I’m sure it wasn’t that close yesterday…’)

The moon in the game was given a lot of character as it would ultimately crash into the land of Termina and destroy the world; ending the game! (And your hands if you had the rumble feature enabled in your controller!) I’ve decided to reign this in a bit as the main story in this image is Link’s mutation; I want the moon to be there as an ominous threat of things to come that Link is unaware of at this time. We’re still going to keep the face, but make it much more subtle, and reminiscent of the faces people can see if they look at the moon. Use an airbrush to softly render an angry face, using reference of the in-game moon as a guide. To add authenticity, paste in a photo of the moon (there are a lot of photos around the web for you to use, it’s a pretty common image!), on a layer above your drawn moon, resize it (press CTRL+T to free transform) and set the layer’s blending mode to overlay.

Fun Fact: For the more curious among you, this is the point where I corrected the mountains.

Step 22: Sticks and stones (they’re more trees than sticks really…)

We have our far off background sorted, but it’d be helpful to have some mid-ground items to help push the illusion of depth, so on a new layer add some creepy trees on the left hand side. Use a fairly dark blue to show that they’re closer, but still far away enough that we’re still not seeing any real colour detail. Draw in the gossip stone (in the right hand side of the image) with the inking opacity brush, a search online will provide you with plenty of reference for it’s appearance. Once you’re happy with it, use the lasso tool to select it and open up a stone texture (once again, a quick check online should come up with something; there are plenty of free textures around), copy it and then back in the Broken Link image press Shift + Ctrl + V (or edit>Paste into) to paste the texture into the gossip stone selection. Make sure the texture is directly above your gossip stone in the layers palette, and set the layer properties to Hard Light.

Fun Fact: If you bombed the gossip stones in “The Ocarina of Time” and “Majora’s Mask” they would fly up into the sky like a rocket and explode. I don’t know why they did, but they did.

Step 23: The sky at night (or ‘I’ve drawn too many clouds, haven’t I?’)

You’ll notice I decided that the sky was looking far too busy with all of the clouds I had drawn in so erased a lot of them and went with just a few. Every picture needs some space for the eyes to rest; too much detail will start to harm your image because everything is fighting for attention. Copy and paste a cloudy sky photo texture above your sky layer and set it to overlay, to add a little authenticity and variation.

Step 24: “Eyes in the dark…” (or ‘Couldn’t they have just called him “the owl?” ’)

Time to take a look at Kaepora Gaebora; Link’s owl advisor. I’ve decided not to stray too far from his design as it works fairly well. A quick google image search for owl reference later, and we’ve found a fairly appropriate example to use in this pic. I like the way the real owl’s plumage is feathered (as in textured, not as in…um, feathers!) so I use this element in his design and exaggerate it a little further to continue the eerie nature of image. I also prefer the orange eyes that the real owl has to his blue eyed counterpart. I’ve kept in his trademarked eyebrows to make sure the audience will recognise him as a character and not just a creepy owl in the background. Just using a tiny bit of light to highlight some of his form keeps him mysterious.

Step 25: To the forefront (or ‘It’s rude to point!’)

On a new layer above everything else, draw in some dark silhouetted scenery in the foreground. Remember they are here to create depth and aid in composition so ensure they are all pointing towards a focal point (here the branches and grass all point to Link and an additional bit of foliage is leading our eyes towards Tatl). Draw in a very small amount of highlights just to suggest the 3d nature of the objects and apply a slight gaussian blur to these new foreground elements to make everything slightly out of focus. All that’s left to do now is make all of your small final touches, such as drawing some of the leaves that Tatl’s glow would hit to suggest more depth in the greenery and drawing a small clump of the ground in front of Link’s boots to suggest his weight on the ground.

Step 26: Final Touches

You can also add another layer set to Overlay at the very top and use gradients to add more “oomph” to your image. Feel free to experiment a bit, adding dark colour variation to the sky, mountains and clouds, or adding even more glow to Tatl and Link. Tidy up your image, before we finish with the final step…

Step 27: All good things

This last step is actually a really good method for improving photographs, but it works just as well on illustrations. Press Shift + Ctrl + Alt + ~ If you’ve managed to do this without breaking your hands, it will select the luminosity of the image (or all the light parts for those of you that have misplaced your thesaurus). Go to the very top layer and press Shift + Ctrl + C to copy from every visible layer and then Ctrl + V to paste it into a new layer. Set the new layer’s blending mode to Soft Light with an opacity of 45%, and you’ll notice that all of the colours are slightly richer. It’s a subtle effect but will often give that extra “pop” that arty people are always so concerned about having.

Not-so-fun Fact: This shortcut only works on the PC, as far as I’m aware, there currently is no mac equivalent shortcut. If anyone knows otherwise, please feel free to put me straight; I’d love to know if there is a mac shortcut for this trick!

I hope this guide has been helpful to you and that you can apply many of these principles to your future work. You can keep up to date with our artwork at our art blog and our website www.CoolSurface.com You can also come follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/DavidCousens

Have fun,
David.