Help with banners...

[Tygleris]

All the cool photoshopped banners with avatars and screwy backgrounds. I was just wondering how people achieve some of the effects. One problem being, getting the avatars in the backround without crappy lasso tool cutting and pasting. I know there is something about taking a specific color and giving it a green screen effect.

Another one would be how to make transparent layers...

And finally how to make all the cool multicolored swirly flashy backgrounds that is all over the place.

[Gyotsha]

Re: Help with banners...

This site will show you everything you need to know
good-tutorials.

[Amadaun]

Re: Help with banners...

I don't know what version of Photoshop you're using, (I use 6.0) but the tools I use are pretty much universal. Here's what I do to make a sig or banner.

1. First of all, the magic wand tool is your friend. Open up Modelviewer and get the model you want. We'll use my cute lil' taru in his brand-new lizard armor. Put him in the pose you want, and hit the stop button by the animations list. Use the Print Screen key to take a screenshot of him, and then paste him into a brand new canvas in Photoshop.



2. Use the Rectangular Marquee tool and select around the model. Go to Select > Inverse in the top menu. Hit delete and clear out most of the screen. Then use the magice wand. Set the tolerance to about 30 and select the flat color around the Taru. Delete that, and you're left with nothing but the model.





3. Since the taru is now on his own transparent layer, I usually open up a new canvas, about 2-3 times the size of the final image. Copy and paste the taru into it, resize if need be. Use the first two steps if you want to add any other models to the final product.



4. Go to the tutorial site that Gyotsha recommends and poke around for background ideas. I've thrown something in, as an example. (It's quite ugly, isn't it? But you get the idea.) Add text if you want, resize and save!



Play around with filters and layer effects for something more attractive. My sig, that you see below was the result of playing around. I got the cool gem effect completely on accident! Combine two, three or more tutorials...whatever you like.

Hope this helps a little!

[ruffrydasean]

Re: Help with banners...

tag.. thank you

[Tygleris]

Re: Help with banners...

Well, your post helped out immensely. I've been poking around trying to find stuff for backgrounds but I've had no luck on that so far. If you can narrow my search maybe by a small bit, that would be helpful.

Thanks for the help thus far though.

Double Post Edited:
Ooh nevermind, I didn't realize that by random they meant like a random 5 out of over 1000. I'll continue investigating!

[Tygleris]

Re: Help with banners...

Well this is a start I guess. Just trying out some of the techniques. I wish I would've seen that the pencil sketchy one doesn't look very good until long after I flattened the image and saved it.

[Lunaryn]

Re: Help with banners...

I use the GIMP, and the principle's the same, there are just a couple extra gotchas.

First, if you want to use the file-export screenshot from the model viewer instead of the clipboard, make sure you use bmp; jpg will leave an 'aura' of colors similar but not quite the same as the background color around your model that are hard to remove. If you're bringing in a bmp, you'll need to go into the background layer's context menu and select Add Alpha Channel. If you paste into a new image from clipboard, this won't be necessary.

Delete the background color by using the Select by Color tool and clicking the background, then using Cut. (for some reason we don't have Delete... oh, well)

This works best if your background color is not also present on the model, obviously. A glaring, chromakey-type color is good.

Finally, don't get stressed about the program not letting you put a new layer underneath your background layer. Simply use Duplicate Layer on the background layer to get a new layer, select the background layer, select your image, and Cut. This will leave you a free layer with your model on top of a completely empty background layer. You can go ahead and decorate the background layer, or just load another image as a new layer and put it between the model's layer and the background.

Hopefully this will help those who can't afford Photoshop to try out some image doctoring.

[Kagerou]

Re: Help with banners...

Tyg, use better fonts. Cool fonts could be found here

www.dafont.com

I recommend Visitor (must), Base 02(must), 3 thehardway RMX, 911 Porscha, Baphomet, and Dark11

[Tygleris]

Re: Help with banners...

Okay, need a few more pieces of advice. One... when I select the odd color background and go to delete it, it just fills it with my background color. I want it completeley gone, showing off the grey checkered boxes showing that there is nothing there.

Also, I'm using photoshop, and I wanna know is there a way to be able to change the size of something without having to enter the height/width? Like be able to grab the corner and stretch it manually.

Edit: There, a second attempt is up. Comments/criticism please.

[Kagerou]

Re: Help with banners...

EDIT: New tut on next page

http://www.xaliasx.deviantart.com (thank you Alias for ur awesome brush)

need this brush for the tut shown in the next page.

[Kagerou]

Re: Help with banners...

EDIT: New tut on next page

[Tygleris]

Re: Help with banners...

I have... no clue... how to get that kinda effect with the brush. I kinda started reading, and saw that, and had a panic attack. Then I tried messing around with the brush, realized how much it sucked, then had another panic attack.

[Kagerou]

Re: Help with banners...

Did u use the brush from the link? If u filled it with black, just start clicking on the background with the brush (brush should be set to white). Try using mixtures of different brushes for better effect.

Just post what u got. I'll tell u whats wrong with it.

[Tygleris]

Re: Help with banners...

Well, I can't do any of that. I'm pretty new to photoshop and I can't even find the stupid brush tab to edit all the things he talks about, and I have no clue on how to download and install brushes... if that's possible...

I'm using 6.0 if that helps any...

[Kagerou]

Re: Help with banners...

oh. u have 6.0... then u can't use that brush anyways lol

then just use filter effects for now >.>