Incredible…

Check out these amazing iOS icons made in pure CSS! They are incredible. It’s certainly not the most practical way to draw icons but it sure is pretty neat that someone took the time to do it and how well they turned out! CSS3 is powerful and useful.

Another cool thing about them is that they are scaleable and look pretty decent when you make them really big or really small.

Article: iOS Icons Made in Pure CSS – Article

Icons: iOS Icons Made in Pure CSS

Step 1

Open the photo that you wish to edit and the first thing you want to do after that is duplicate the photos layer. This will make it so much easier if you decide that you want to start over and have accidentally over written your original picture file! Because now you will be working on the duplicated layer rather then the first one.

In this tutorial I’m going to be using a picture of a baby I found on sxc.hu.

Step 2

We need to make a selection of the baby just on his upper body and head. An easy way to do this is to use the Quick Mask Mode to get to it just hit Q. When you hit it nothing noticeable will change, the only thing that does is the quick mask button on the bottom of your tool bar gets selected.

Once your in the quick mask mode select the Brush Tool (B). Hit D (Resets your default colors to black and white) and start brushing over the baby. If you did it right you should be coloring the baby red not black. When you’re done covering the baby hit Q again which should select everything BUT the baby. To fix this just hit Command+Shift+I or Control+Shift+I if you’re on a PC.

Create a new layer and fill it with a color and hide the new layer. This is only so we can get that selection any time we want and we don’t have to repeat this step of selecting the baby with the quick mast tool anymore.

Step 3

With the new selection go back to the pictures layer (not the original the duplicated one!) and hit Command+C (Control+C) to copy it then paste it Command+V (Control+V)

Now you should have just the selection on a new layer. Open Levels (Command+L) and play around with the sliders until you get a darker, but not unrealistically dark, looking subject.

I did: 9, .64, 247

Step 4

Select the Pen Tool (P) and draw a shirt on the baby. Select the layer (by Command+Clicking on the layer) then hide the shirt layer.

Step 5

With the shirt outline still selected go to the first layer and hit Command+C then hit Command+V which should create a new layer. move that layer above all the other layers.

You should start seeing a tan baby with a farmers tan! All we need to do is add a few more touches then were done!

Step 6

Open Levels Command+L and play around with the sliders till you get a lighter subject. I put mine on:

0, 1.15, 241.

Then open Hue/Saturation (Command+U) then make the Lightness about +15

Step 7 – Final Step!

Select the shirt layer, then go to Select->Modify->Contract and enter 3px. Inverse the selection, Command+Shift+I, and apply a Gaussian Blur, Filter->Blur->Gaussian Blur make the radius 1.0 pixels

Conclusion

You’re finished! Now you know how to take any picture and give someone a farmers tan! If you wanted to remove a farmers tan from a picture it would be a lot alike this tutorial! All you would need to do is select the farmers tan then feather the selection and use levels to make the selection match the rest of the skin. You might need to play around with other adjustment tools like Curves or Brightness/Contrast and not just the Levels.

Step 1

Create a new document, I made mine 1100px by 700px. It doesn’t matter what you use so use whatever you want. Fill the background with a color that you want. I chose #f9eddf.

Step 2

In this tutorial I’m going to be making the banner wrap around the container of a website. If you are going to do this aswell, create a new layer above the background layer and make the container using the Marquee Tool. I made mine 600px wide and 100% tall and filled it with white.

Step 3

Select the Marquee Tool (M). Make a selection a little bit wider then the container. I made mine 686px by 60px (Remember my container is 600px wide). Fill it with #f26c4f

Step 4

Duplicate the layer you just made, select the Move Tool (V) and move the newly made layer down about 40 pixels

An easy way to do this is to use the arrow keys while holding down the Shift Key. Each time you move the selection while doing this will move it 10px. So just hit the down arrow four times.

Move layer below the container.

Step 5

Select the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) and cut out the ends of the layer that you just made in the last step by drawing a triangle from each point to somewhere in the middle of the banner.

When you have drawn the selection hit Delete

Step 6

With the Polygonal Lasso Tool still selected draw a triangle at the bottom of the first banner going all the way to the bottom of the second one.

To create a triangle that looks good, create Paths (The easiest way to create a path is to turn on the Rulers and just click and drag from the ruler on to the document and unclick where you want to place the guide) on the outer side of the first banner as well as the bottom side and on the second banner create one on the inner side as well as the bottom of it. If that was confusing look at the picture to see the guides as well as the selection I drew.

Once you have made the selection create a new layer and fill it with #a54a36. Duplicate the first triangle layer and use Free Transform to flip it horizontally and move it to the other side of the banner.

Step 7

All that’s left is just adding finishing touches to the banner.

You can create a shadow, to do this duplicate both layers of the banner and fill them with black. Move them down a few pixels and change the layer opacity to 10%.

Lastly, Add text to the banner and your all done!

Step 1

Set your Foreground Color to #FFFCDB, select the Rectangle Tool (U) and draw a square (hold shift)

Step 2

Go to menu Edit > Transform > Warp. Now you should see an overlay grid on top of the square. Drag the points, handles, or any where in the grid to warp the image.

Step 3

Select Free Trasnform (Command+T) and rotate the note a little to the left. Set your foreground color to #FFF799. Open Layer Styles, select Gradient Overlay Use the foreground to transparent gradient and click and drag the gradient to the top section of your note.

Note: Depending on how much you rotated your note, your Angle will be different then mine!

Step 4

Control click the note layer, (Command+Click the Thumbnail) create a new layer below the layer. Fill it with black. Apply the Gaussian Blur filter with a radius of 8 pixels. Go to menu Edit > Transform > Distort, hold down Alt+Shift and drag either of the top corner anchors in until you cant see the shadow on the sides of the note. Now, drag the center anchor down until you cant see the shadow above the note. Use the arrow keys to nudge the shadow down and to the left a few pixels.

Lower the shadows Layer Opacity to 55%

Final Image

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Start off with a new document and fill the background with your desired color. I’m using 6dcff6. Reset your Foreground and Background Colors (D) and Switch them (X). Select the Ellipse Tool (U) and draw a circle (hold down shift to constrain it) that is relatively big. Set your layer opacity to 10%

Step 2

Now we are going to be using Actions. An Action is a recording of a series of commands that can be played back layer on to speed up repetitive tasks. Open up your Actions window, Window->Actions, and click the Create new action button. Name it whatever you want and hit Record. Okay now your action is being recorded, so all commands that you do will be recorded into the action.

Step 3

The first thing were going to do is duplicate the Ellipse Layer, so hit Command+J, then Command+T now in the Options Toolbar set the horizontal and vertical scale to 80% and then set the layer opacity to 20%

Step 4

Alright! Now that your action is complete just hit the Play button a couple times until you like what you see! I hit mine 4 times. Add some text and you have a cool looking effect! I hope this tutorial helped you learn more about Photoshop Actions and how helpful they can be in some situations!

I’m am going to be releasing tutorials and a totally new design for (dS) right away! I just wrote a few tutorials and right now I am working on the new design, so if the design doesnt seem to look that great please be patient because I’ll hopefully be fixing it!

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Step 1

First, start with a new document, my document size is 820px by 580 and create a new layer. In that new layer take the Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) and draw a rectangle about 260px wide and as high as your document. Fill it with 50% gray (Shift+Delete, and then select Contents “50% Gray”).

Step 2

While on your 50% Gray layer, apply a Fibers filter (Render->Fibers). Set the Variance to 10 and Strength to around 20. If you don’t like what’s in the preview hit Randomize a few times. Hit OK. Hit Command+T to transform the layer and stretch it to the width of your document.

Step 3

Go to Filter->Blur->Motion Blur and set the distance to around 550px. Hit OK and now you should have something that resembles a curtain! Except black and white, So lets fix that. Create a layer below your current layer by holding Command and clicking the new layer icon. Fill the layer with a dark red, I chose #B21418 now go back to the curtain layer and set the Blending Mode to Multiply. Now it should look A LOT more like a curtain!

Step 4

Create a new layer above all the other layers and fill it with 50% Gray, then go to Filter->Render->Lighting Effects and create two light sources one from each corner. Here are my settings.

Step 5

You’re done! If you want to have the curtain look like its opened just select the Polygonal Lasso Tool and play around with that and maybe use the Transform->Warp to add a curve on each side.

Overview

In this tutorial I’m going to be showing you how to draw an old fashioned fan in Photoshop CS3.

Step 1

First we are going to start out with the wire encasing the fan. Create a new document fill the background with white and create a new layer. Hit D on your keyboard, this sets the foreground and background color to the default color. Select the Ellipse Tool (U) hold down shift, click and drag to create a circle. Mine is about 390px wide.

Step 2

Select all the anchors on the circle, hit command+c (control+c on windows), now command+v then command+t, this opens Free Transform. Hold down Alt+Shit and click and drag one of the corners of the Transform box. Make the circle a little bit smaller then the outer circle. After you are done with the transformation hit enter. Make sure you have the Pen Tool selected (P) then click the Subtract From Area which is located in the Options tool bar.

Step 3

Next, create four blades for the fan using the Pen Tool (P), with #464646 for the color. Then create a circle in the middle using the Ellipse Tool (#333333)

Step 4

Using the pen tool draw six wires in front of the fan blades

Step 5

Select the center ellipse in the layers window, command click on it to make a selection around it. Click Select->Modify->Contract enter 1px. Create a new layer above the ellipse (Command+Shift+Alt+N) fill it with white, apply another contraction but this time by 5px. Hit delete. Command+Click the new layer and create a new layer. Select the Gradient Tool (G) and click the Reflected Gradient. Hit D then X. Now click about three fourths of the way down the circle and drag to around the bottom edge of the circle. Set the layer opacity to 22%

Step 6

Next, draw a circle below all the other layers then make four smaller circles inside of that one. Play around with contracting and drawing gradients using the techniques used in Step 5

Step 7

In this step were going to draw the base, Select the pen tool and draw the base, use the the ellipse tool to draw the bottom of the base. To create the reflection on the base select the Elliptical Marquee Tool (M) draw an ellipse, apply a Gaussian Blur (Filters->Blur-Gaussian Blur) and then use the Transform Tool and select Warp to transform it to fit the bend of the base.

Final Step

The final step really isnt a step but instead of going on about putting the final touches on it just play around with what you have so far, i added a few shadows on the middle of the fan blades to give it a slight bevel look, I also added the words in the center of the fan, the font used is “Museo”.
I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and learned some techniques from it. Thanks for reading!