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Tutorial: The Skull of Corruption

Tags: #Broken Gallery  #Tutorial 
  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    Its been a while since I did a tutorial here...

    You guys already know how I love working with metals, well lets try some BONE!!!

    I've been working through my 'Famed Artifacts of Tamriel' project and tonight it's time to try and tackle the Skull of Corruption. As always I have no idea what the final image is going to look like but I know that I'm going to have lots of fun finding out!!

    This will be a live tutorial that I'll try and update every 5-10mins, in preperation I've already gathered the following textures that I'm pretty sure i'll be working with...

    ...a nice battered looking human skull!!

    ...a rams skull with some nice detailed horns!

    ...and a nicely textured chunk of wood!!!

    For the first step i'm going to take these into photoshop and organise them into my base SOC...

    So starting with these horns, background eraser tool to remove the.....background.....

    .....and that horn on the right is going to have to go! I like my daedric artifacts in mint condition!

    The background is gone and I duplicate the left horn and flip it horizontally to create two 'good' horns, looking at the angle of the human skull texture Ive reduced the size of the new horn slightly to compensate... (free transform).

    The skull was a big file so I've shrunk it down and used the background eraser tool again to create a workable layer. Background eraser has been set to a 7% tolerance so I didn't lose any of the dark details on the skull as I removed its background. Looking very clean so far...

    Same drill with the wood (staff), chopped out the white background and then placed it into a 'believable' position behind the other two layers...

    It does mean I lose alot of the nice textures but that's the way it goes. In this state the 'staff' is obviously clashing with the skull but some shading will hopefully seperate them later.

    Given that Vaermina is associated with nightmares I've picked the following photograph for the background for now, it has alot of potential that I hope to tap into later...

    I've placed the background behind the rest of my layers and we now have our base image! Yeah it's bad at the moment but it's starting to take shape...

    Most of the time I'm all about working on the main foreground image but that background isn't providing a nice atmosophere to work at the moment. We want nightmares, and they historically take place at night so we need to replace that sky with something different...

    I've removed my staff for the moment so I can focus on the background, I've quickly deleted the sky so I can start sampling some different horizons to work into the shot...

    ...and this one looks nice!

    ...yeah it's purple but we can change that...

    So I've positioned the new sky in place. I'm going to change the 'curves' on this new layer (new filter/adjustment layer -> Curves) and then create a nice 'S curve' (whites whiter/blacks blacker)...

    ...this will hopefully provide a nice foundation later when I'll almost definitely be adding a ton of shadow to the image...

    Magentas down -43 on the sky...

    ...and then master hue up to +125 to convert the sky to a hellish red. I've also added a (Filter -> Blur -> Guassian Blur 1px) to the sky to take the sharpness out of the stars...

    Next it's back on to the main 'lava' background and I start with a new 'curves' adjustment layer with almost the same s curve i used previously...

    ...this beefs up the image significantly, the lava now looks very hot to touch and the blacks look far more menacing...

    From here I simply go over the image with my eraser freestyle and tidy up the edges between the two backgrounds, hopefully you guys can see the difference...

    Important step next...

    ...I create a new layer (layer 9) and bind it to my 'lava' layer (alt -> left click between layers), this means when I add shadow (black with paintbrush) it will only effect the lava layer and won't spoil the sky...

    ...I add shadows to the horizon and also use the burn tool on some of the lava on the left side of the image.

    ....the result...

    Still looks a little disjointed? Next I use what is quickly becoming one of my favorite filters...

    (Filter - > Stylise -> Diffuse -> Anisotropic)

    This filter is the mutts nutts! Everything just suddenly seems to mold together, it's the fantasy filter...

    Lol!! We've now got alot of work to do!

    So working of the staff first I've tidied up the edges a little and then on to hue and saturation...

    Curves...

    ...and then a nice brown warming filter. I want the wood to look dense and old...

    I then begin adding shadow to the parts of the staff that are going to be visible...

    Then it's time for the skull and I'll be using the same format...

    Curves -> H/S -> Shading...

    The skull is actually looking a little polished/clean so I think i'll try adding a new texture to it...

    This marble has some nice details that could work...

    I paste the marble in as a new adjustment layer and then set its blending options to 'difference', I'm going to need to squirt some black on to remove the artifacts that I don't want from the new texture and perhaps reposition it slightly...

    ...looks like we've added a couple more thousand years to it now...

    Horns on! And again I've followed the same format for each horn...

    Curves -> H&S -> Shading

    Then bring back the background to see what I get...

    The first thing I'm noticing now is that the sky texture isn't crisp enough so I'm going to have to go back and sharpen it up at some point...

    The horns also have a slight black border which is throwing the image out...I'll need to tidy them with the eraser...

    ....and finally, it doesn't look like a staff!!! It looks more like some kind of totem! I'm going to try using the warp tool on the skull to mold it a little more...

    (Edit -> Free Transform -> Warp) ....I've reshaped all parts of the staff and sharpened up the sky. I'm pretty happy with how the overall image is now looking which means I can start toying with some after effects...

    Here's a nice texture.....let's add some falling meteors...

    Once in photoshop simply set the meteor layer to screen in blending options and then use free transform to find a nice angle/size. You can also use 'duplicate layer' if you want to double up on the impact or create other meteors...

    Here's another nice one! Again this can be applied to the image and set to screen in blending options...

    If any of the effects start to take over the image just take an eraser to them...

    Finally some small lens flares for the eyes....

    Create a new layer and fill it with black, then filter->lighting effects->lens flare. Set this new layer to Screen in blending options and resize and duplicate the flare to fit the skull sockets...

    From here I copy the entire image over to a new file for the final filter(s)/blending...

    Here's the Anisotopic filter in action again...I've also used a final H&S adjustment and flushed out every blue/magenta and green (basically anything that could remotely be considered 'cool') from the image.

    .....all done.

  • Member
    May 5, 2015
    Do you need wood? I have wood.
  • May 5, 2015
    Nice another mason tutorial. *grabs pen and notebook*
  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    New photoshop tutorial by Mason?

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    I was in the Lumberjack Club in high school. Our slogan was "We've got wood and we're coming." Short-lived, but those pancake breakfasts and flannel days will live on in our hearts (literally ... dat cholesterol).

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    Any ideas on backgrounds for this mo-fo?

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    I can't wait to see what you do with the background and how you blend the two together... that's where you shine (and where I struggle mightily). Things like the skull's teeth alternately being completely hidden or standing out too much because of the shadows and the wood grain of the staff throw me into conniptions xD

    BTW--I love the idea of this being a live tutorial!

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    This is really coming along nicely, Mason! Had to duck out for a couple hours, and you've made a ton of awesome progress. Can't wait for more!

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    Thanks mate! All done for now, I'll get back on it tomorrow!

  • Member
    May 5, 2015

    This is awesome!

    After seeing what you've done with your background, I immediately got a plug-in for GIMP that provides the anisotropic filter. I don't know how yours works on photoshop, but mine has a ton of options and sliders to play with (it's a bit intimidating for a greenhorn). It does, however, seem like there is a default setting for it. So my question is: are you using what the filter automatically gives you, or are you fiddling around with all the sliders till you get a result you like?

    Can't wait to see what happens next :D