I Have Done It!

[Neomage]

After finally laying my hands on a copy of Photoshop CS2, I have created my first signature! Ok, it was more of a 30 day trial download but meh, it works!

[Tatsuhara]

Re: I Have Done It!

Woah, that background is awesome. Good job! *claps*

[DakAttack]

Re: I Have Done It!

It's a nice picture, and it's about time somebody found a legitimate use for the lens flare. The text doesn't match the rest of the picture, and the background is a little out of place as well. If the background is your own work, or you have access to the source, I'd mess around with the coloring a little bit.

How long have you been using PS?

[Neomage]

Re: I Have Done It!

It's a nice picture, and it's about time somebody found a legitimate use for the lens flare. The text doesn't match the rest of the picture, and the background is a little out of place as well. If the background is your own work, or you have access to the source, I'd mess around with the coloring a little bit.

How long have you been using PS?

Yeah, the background is my own work. I can also edit the text for most of the picture, but I can't edit the Elemental Wheel because I merged that part after I was done. What do you suggest for the coloring?

Btw, been using PS for about 4 days.

EDIT: Well I can edit the wheel, but not fully. The text size and color has to remain the same, but I can still change shadows and such.

[Feba]

Re: I Have Done It!

advice:

-Too big. Make it shorter
-Border. Always have a 1px border. Stroke all with a 1px black border. ALWAYS.
-Font is odd. Use something more normal... check dafont.com, they have great options
-windurst flag looks weird in transparency

looks good though, just needs some changes.

[DakAttack]

Re: I Have Done It!

Yeah, the background is my own work. I can also edit the text for most of the picture, but I can't edit the Elemental Wheel because I merged that part after I was done. What do you suggest for the coloring?

Btw, been using PS for about 4 days.

Four days is pretty nice. I always wanted to use PS, but I'm scared to open it and mess around. I'm an adept when it comes to Fireworks though.

The three spheres look like they could be accented a little bit. Possibly brighter, or make the other shapes a little darker. A blur can work really well sometimes, but it depends mostly on the theme. I'm not sure if this is possible, but it'd be neat if, within the figures in the background, you could see the reflection of a thunder element.

[Aksannyi]

Re: I Have Done It!

Considering it's your first go in Photoshop, it's not bad. Sure, certain aspects of it can be refined, but you guys would laugh if you saw my first sig effort in PS. In fact, just for fun, i'll post it here. Also, nevermind the use of my full (maiden) name there, I wasn't making it for use on any forum but mostly just for practice.


So you're definitely off to a better start than I was! My best advice for you is to continue to mess around with filters, maybe try to download some different brushes and filters from free websites, and mess with some of those, as well. Also, certain levels of blur and gaussian blur can really be effective on different layers. Check out goodtutorials.com for some (wait for it) good tutorials for photoshop, I've learned a lot from that site.

Just by comparing that first one with my latest, which is in my sig, you can see I've made a big improvement.

[Neomage]

Re: I Have Done It!

Alright, I got back on CS2 and added the 1 Pixel wide border, fixed some of the text so it looks better(still using some symbol font though because it looks all arcane and black magey), made it shorter, and did some little experimenting with the background. I have a new dark version which I think looks a little better but it makes my character and the windurstian flag look a little funky, and the orrigional light colored one.




EDIT: ACK! I forgot to add the border to the light one... oh well, you get the jist of it >.> I can add it later if you guys think I should go with that one.

[Feba]

Re: I Have Done It!

personally I don't feel the background suits the image at all, but it's fine until you start getting better with photoshop. I'm gonna ask a friend of mine to recommend some links.= for you

[Aksannyi]

Re: I Have Done It!

I like the darker one, myself. Just move the Windurstian flag layer up or change the opacity so it shows up more solid, and it will look a lot better. But I really do like the darker background much better.

[DakAttack]

Re: I Have Done It!

The character looks a little lonely.

What if you copied him, blurred him, gave him a 50% transparency, then featured his casting hands beside him and enlarged to the point where it becomes a second focal point? Let them clip a little bit, but keep the whole character on top with the second mostly off the canvas.

Oh, the background creates a nice line. You could lower your character and shift it to where the lens flare is within the diagonal space in the background, then add in the second, larger, and blurrier character farther up the line.

Edit: Examples


Tell me when you're tired of seeing my posts.

[Neomage]

Re: I Have Done It!

I think I'll go with the idea of having a super-translucent Thunder Elemental in the background instead of a larget copy of him. As for the flag, herein lies the problem:

Belive it or not, the flag is set to 100% Opacity. It appears translucent because I am using a Multiply Blend filter on it. I tried using different filters and opacity settings, but the flag itself is such low resolution that I can't make it lighter without making it look all grainy using different filters. I tried bleaching it with a 20% opacity paint fill, but that makes it more translucent, not a lighter shade for whatever reason.

[DakAttack]

Re: I Have Done It!

What if you stuck a single color fill behind it so the transparency wasn't noticable?

[Neomage]

Re: I Have Done It!

Hmm... That might work... in the meantime, what do you think of this new background?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: I Have Done It!

Wasn't floored by the background myself, not a real big fan of any embossing feature, but for what its worth I think it could work with the right theme, I just don't think this fits the theme.

but I came up with a background. If you like it, use it, if not, its fine: