Convert Photo to Color Drawing with Photoshop

To Create Drawing from your Photo - Part 2.

Mask out and Blend all Layers together

Each filter that we have create in previous processes have it own benefit as well as some of its effect that we do not want. So we already use Layer Blending Mode to matched all layer to produce effect that we want but there’re some part in each layer that we want to hide out. In this step we will mostly use layer mask to hide some area that we don’t want and keep only the part that we want for each layer to blend it all together.

Masking "Hard Stroke" Layer

Start with "Hard Stroke" Layer, which is apply with Poster Edges Filter, produce smooth dark brush stroke especially at the shadow area as well as along the object’s outline. But Poster Edge filter also create color banding at plain area which are the effect that we don’t want. And please note that, this layer is in Normal blend mode with 100% opacity so it completely hide all pixel in all layers below it when it not have layer mask. To masking the "Hard Stroke" layer please follow step.

1. Create Layer Mask to "Hard Stroke" layer by selecting it and click Layer Mask Button at bottom of Layer Palette.
2. Hide all layer above "Hard Stroke" layer by click the Eye icon next to the layer thumbnail. This will help you to clearly define which part of image that effect by current working layer and easily mask out the unwanted parts.

   

3. Select "Hard Stroke" layer’s mask to make it active, indicated by the dark border around layer mask thumbnail.
4. Use Brush Tool , select black as Foreground Color. Start drawing with black color in to layer mask over the area you want to hide. You can also paint in white color to reveal a masked area.

After Apply Mask | Before Apply Mask | Mask Image

Tip: While working with layer mask it is a good idea to reset Foreground and Background color to black (RGB: 0 0 0) and white (RGB:255, 255, 255). So you can easily to toggle between the color using "X" key. When you are painting with black as foreground you can press "X" short cut to quickly switch to white color to paint and unhide the area.

Note: As you may know, photoshop layer mask is a grayscale image, so what you paint in black will be hidden (0% opacity), what you paint in white will show (100% opacity), and what you paint in gray shades will show in various levels of transparency. You can easily measure the opacity in each area using Eyedropper Tool with "B" or "Brightness" (0% = black, 100% = white) value in HSB color modal. You can find more detail about Info Palette and how to switch the color modal at Using Photoshop Info Palette.
You can painting layer mask directly with 50% gray, which produce 50% transparent. But I usually painting in with only Black or White and control the color value in between using Pen Pressure Control Option and also with soft brush shape. This will produce smoother effect and also blending of color .With pen pressure option, which is available with pressure-sensitive drawing tablet, you can control the opacity by your hand pressure. In general, with black set as foreground color, you can painting 50% gray by put 50% pressure on the pen tip. See also All about Photoshop Layer Mask.

If necessary, you can also create layer mask for "Outline" layer that apply with Find Edges filter. The Find Edges filter, which is apply to this layer, may produce fuzzy un-natural stroke or may be too dark in some area (see example below). You can mask it out using same method as masking the "Hard Stroke" layer. You may lighten the stroke by painting light gray to that area. While you masking the layer you can temporary turn opacity to 100% to and hide all layers underneath, except "bg" layer, to clearly see the stroke.

Image with Text | Image Only

Tip: To clearly see the effect for each layer you can quickly toggle layer visibility, by turn On and Off the Eye Button .

Masking the Layer Set

Now create layer mask to Layer Set1 by, select the layer set and click New Layer Mask Button . You can use Layer Set’s mask just like Layer Mask in the layer. Select Brush Tool and use relatively large brush tip, in this tutorial i use 800px brush. With Layer Set’s mask active, paint around the image’s edge with black to fade out the color. With this relatively large brush you can paint with outer rim of brush to painting light gray to fading out the color but not completely hiding it. You can press "F" key to toggle to full screen mode. This will let you move the cursor out side image canvas and paint using brush’s rim.

Full Image | Mask before filter | Mask after filter

After you satisfy with the result apply Palette Knife filter (Filter » Artistic » Palette Knife.. ) with; Stroke Size: 25, Stroke Detail: 3, Softness: 10. Following by small amount of Gaussian Blur around 1px to 3px, it depend on how much stroke detail you needed. You should have similar result with example below.

Create Pencil Sketch Layer

Duplicate Layer Set1 by drag it to New Button , now you should have duplicate of the layer set and all layers in side. With the new duplicate layer set select, choose menu Layer » Merge Layer Set or Ctrl(Command) + E to merge the layer set. Rename the new layer to "Sketch". Apply Chalk & Charcoal filter ( Filter » Sketch » Chalk & Charcoal ) with; Charcoal: 5, Chalk Area: 20, Stroke Pressure: 2. Change layer blending mode to Multiply with 90% opacity.

Click to select "Sketch" layer’s mask to make it active. Press Ctrl(Command) + M to bring up Curve windows and drag black point up, as shown in picture below, to turn the black color in the mask to light-gray. This will make the area around the edge that cover by mask more visible.

Note: The Ctrl + E (Windows) or Command + E (Mac OS) is short cut that use for merging layer, merge layer set or merge clipping mask. The name of command in the menu will be change depend on which object you select in the Layer Palette. (See also Merge Layer, Merge Visible and Flatten Image Command ).

Chalk & Charcoal Result | Result after change blend mode

If your image have a lot of high-light area, like the wall area in the example, you can create additional layer to add brush texture to the high-light.

To create brush texture for high light area:

1. Duplicate the "Sketch" layer and rename it as "Sketch 2".
2. Discard its layer mask by Right + Click (Windows) or Control + Click (Mac OS) at the layer mask and choose Discard Layer Mask from pop-up menu. You can also discard layer mask by drag it to Trash button at bottom of Layer Palette.
3. Reset the layer blending to Normal with 100% opacity. And choose menu Select » Color Range, this will open Color Range windows.
4. Turn Selection Preview to Gray Scale, and click at the high-light area to choose sample colors you want included. Then set Fuzziness slider bar to broaden or tighten the range of color to cover all the high light area. For this tutorial I set fuzziness to 30. You can also select Add Color button and click in the image to add additional color to selection or select Remove Color Button and click the color you want to remove from current selection. After you satisfy with the selection click mask button to add selection as layer mask of active layer. Now select the layer mask and apply 1px Gaussian Blur, to soften there edges, if nessessary.You can find more information about Photoshop Color Range Command and also in detail Step-by-Step tutorial at heathrowe.com - Enhance Color using Color Range Command.

5. Apply Sponge filter ( Filter » Artistic » Sponge ) with; Brush Size 3, Definition 2, Smoothness 3.
6. Click the Link icon between "Sketch 2" layer thumbnail and "Sketch 2" layer mask thumbnail to unlink the layer and its mask. Apply 3px Gaussian Blur.

Sponge Filter Result | View Mask

Tips: If you have no active selection in the image , when you apply any blur filter to color layer with linked layer mask both color layer and its mask will blur together. You can blur the color layer without effected its mask by unlinked it from the layer mask (using link icon that describe above) or making a selection in your image. In most case, if you need to blur entire layer but not its mask, you can use Select » Select All or press Ctrl(Command) + A to select entire layer and apply blur filter.

7. Now you can fine tune the mask. You can use Brush Tool to mask some additional area that might not be cover with Color Range Command, by painted the mask with black. Or painted the mask with white to reveal the area that you want to add brush texture.

   You can also use Curve (Ctrl + M) apply to the mask to grow the black area by darken the mid-tone (drag control point at middle of the curve line down). Or contract the black area in the mask by brighten up mask’s mid-tone (drag control point at middle of the curve line down). If you use CS3 you may expand or contract the selection directly using Refine Edges Command. (See also Photoshop CS3 Refine Edges Command)

8. Change "Sketch 2" layer blending to multiply. If the effect is too dark you can also decrease its layer opacity as needed (I use 80% opacity for this tutorial).

Fine tune your Final Drawing Effect

Now after all this processes, using several filter and blending mode, your image may a little bit darker. You may need to lighten up by using Adjustment Layer. With Photoshop Adjustment Layer you can make color adjustment to all visible layers below it at once without flattening the image. You can also use Photoshop Adjustment Layer to fine tune the final visual of the drawing by increase or decrease saturation as well as its contrast.

To use Curve Lighten up your image

1. Select top most layer ("Sketch 2"), and click at Create Adjustment Layer Button at bottom of layer palette and choose Curve. This will create new Curve Adjustment layer and bring up curve windows.

   

2. Adjust the curve by click the curve line and drag. To brighten up the mid-tone click at middle of the curve line to create control point and drag the control point up until the image looks the way you want. And then click OK to apply and close Curve Windows.

The other advantage of Adjustment Layer is you can modify the setting anytime you want, by Double-Click at it thumbnail. The Photoshop Adjustment Layer also allow you to temporary hide its effect by make it invisible by click its Eye icon or even discard it permanently by dragging the layer to Trash button to delete it.

You can also use Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer to adjust image color saturation. To create Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer click at Create Adjustment Layer Button at bottom of layer palette and choose Hue/Saturation. To increase color saturation for all color equally, drag saturation slider to the right or desaturation by drag the slider to the left. You can also adjust the color saturation for specific color by select Edit drop-down box for the color channel you want to adjust. For more detailed information and Photoshop Adjustment Layer tutorial you can visit PhotoshopTips.net - Adjustment Layer )

Create Drawing Action

This action will help you create all layers needed for this tutorial. You can also review the processes in the action to better understand all the steps I am doing as well as the setting that I use in Layers Preparation section. By the way to achieve final result, after run the action, you need to create layer mask to blended all layers together manually using Brush tool. Please follow the blending section for detailed instruction. The action will create layers, layer set, rename and re-order it as final step in layer preparation section.

Download: Create Drawing Action - Zip file

**If you have problem with loading Photoshop Action please visit Saving and Loading Photoshop Action for detailed instruction.

Note: Before you run this action make sure that your image file have Background layer and it’s a active layer. Because this action will start from the process that convert Background layer to layer name "Original". Anyway this action is run properly with the file that have more than one layer. You can keep other layer such as text or your watermark layer but the action will only start and effect from the Background Layer. You can convert Layer to Background with out flattening it by, choose menu Layer » New » Background from Layer.

Relate Articles:

• Photoshop Filter Gallery: Quick Reference
• Photoshop Blending Mode: Quick Reference
• Using Photoshop Hue/Saturation Command
• Using Photoshop Wave Filter
• Using Photoshop Painting Tool
• Saving and Loading Photoshop Action

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 21st, 2007 at 3:56 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.