My Easy sig making Tutorial!

[Shawk]

Hey, I made this for a friend a few days ago, thought id post it here too. If you used it post what you made with it !)

(Note. The Layer properties I use might not work with different colors, you need to play around with them to see which one works best with your colors. Also, this is using Photoshop.)

First, start out with a basic 400x100 image with a background, (Color doesnt matter..)



Next, add an image, I'm using a Mortal Online Concept art downsized to about 500x361.



Next, clean up the left to be the same color as the rest of the added image.



Then, go anywhere online and steal a rock formation, search, "Rock formation," and copy that image, paste it into your image.

Like this one for example..

http://full-loot.com/tutorial/5.jpg

Paste it into your image..



Now, how I did this, was I pasted the rock formation into the image, then changed that images layer to Darken. This is where this could completely not work with your image, the character could be completely covered by the rocks or be to light or dark etc..

What you have to do is play around with the different layer properties so that it automaticly does the croping for you so that the rock formation goes right behind the 1st image.



Once you are done that, grab another rock formation.. like this one.

http://bry07.deviantart.com/art/Muss...ation-79134115

Paste it into your image, and change that layers properties to work with your current image, chances are you will get something like this..



Just use your eraser and erase the layer off the Rhino, this doesnt need to be perfect..

Here is what you get..



Next, make a new layer..



Then go to Image>Apply image.. Make sure you have that new layer selected.



With that new layer still seleted, go to Filter>Sharpen.



And the result..



Now, for a border, Make a brand new layer, like you did above then take your Rectangle Margue tool or press (M) and go over your image, like soo..



Right click the image while your image is boxed and go down to stroke, make that stroke about size 3 and black, or whatever your heart desires.. its your border.



Then after creating your basic border, you can leave it like that.. or make sure you have your border layer selected and go down to overlay (also depends on your image colors, so play around as much as you want with different layers till you get something you are satisfied with.



The result of all this work..



This is pretty basic stuff, but with changing the layers properties you can pretty much make anything look pretty sick with very little effort.. Enjoy.

If you finished this and liked it, try other things, like instead of rock formations.. use Trees or Fire, you can make anything look sick by just changing the Layer's properties.

(Please don't flame, this is for newb photoshopers only that have been asking me how to make there own sigs, if you don't like it or think i'm a newb and my sigs blow ass keep it to yourself..)

[ViolentWhisper]

Made sticky. +1 rep from me.

Post questions here and Shawk will answer them.

[Geo]

Originally Posted by ViolentWhisper

Post questions here and Shawk will answer them.

a/s/l?

[Captain Crackers]

pretty neat tutorial...
but you'll never beat my super awesome smugde skills!
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c8...m89/smugde.jpg
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c8...Untitled-5.jpg
The mods should add a thingy...

[Killermandude]

Originally Posted by Captain Crackers

pretty neat tutorial...
but you'll never beat my super awesome smugde skills!
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c8...m89/smugde.jpg
http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c8...Untitled-5.jpg
The mods should add a thingy...

Those...are...so..badass...
It almost hurts to look at them they own so hard.
+1.

[Captain Crackers]

I know i'm just super awesome. I pwn PS CS3!

[Killermandude]

Shawk - I'm pretty horrible with CS (I have CS2 at my disposal)
How would I go about resizing images?
I have a few that would work, but they change pixel and scale every time I move them to a new pallete. Any tips?

[Lotharr]

Originally Posted by Killermandude

Shawk - I'm pretty horrible with CS (I have CS2 at my disposal)
How would I go about resizing images?
I have a few that would work, but they change pixel and scale every time I move them to a new pallete. Any tips?

Ctrl+T?

When "transforming" an image, remember to hold Shift if you want to keep the original scaling to the image.

[Shawk]

Originally Posted by Killermandude

Shawk - I'm pretty horrible with CS (I have CS2 at my disposal)
How would I go about resizing images?
I have a few that would work, but they change pixel and scale every time I move them to a new pallete. Any tips?

Ctrl+T works for a Layer, But if you want to Resize the whole image to copy then paste over to a new image, you need to make sure both images are in PSD format.

As long as both are psd you shouldnt have a problem, the sizes will all be the same.

Normally what I do if I am taking the image from the internet is instead of saving the image, I just right click the image and press Copy, then go into photoshop, go to new, then paste. Automaticly sizes it for you in psd + you don't have to have the image saved on your computer.

[Tradgedy12]

Yeah, I do that a lot too, Shawk. I usually do that kinda thing with an aspect of my pictures, like the flames in my sig... but for things that I want to play around with a lot, it's not really much of a hassle to create a folder for it and save all the components into it. That way, if I crop part of my sig and then later decide I want the full picture that I had already cropped, I can just go into the folder and get the original, and put it back in. But then things can get messy, if you're using too many layers.... guess that's where Adobe Bridge can come in handy


I know my sig here is pretty crappy, I didn't really put any effor into it. If we can get larger sigs, I'll probably make something like my Hellgate forums sig, this guy.

[Mulambo]

why don't you use the gimp?

[Nehemia]

Originally Posted by Mulambo

why don't you use the gimp?

Some of us can afford using PS CS3, and at least in my opinion, its more efficent program, but if you don't got either one, gimp wins, by price.


P.S Shawk, wouldn't multiply be better choice than darken? Otherwise, great tutorial.

[Killermandude]

Sig's not turning out too bad XD
How is the text done to make it with opacity?
(I've never even used CS before so I'm essentially just winged it to where I'm at now)

[Nehemia]

Originally Posted by Killermandude

Sig's not turning out too bad XD
How is the text done to make it with opacity?
(I've never even used CS before so I'm essentially just winged it to where I'm at now)

Easiest way is to apply opacity through the "Layer" window, theres automatical selection of opacity from 0-100%. Default is 100%.

[Shawk]

Originally Posted by Killermandude

Sig's not turning out too bad XD
How is the text done to make it with opacity?
(I've never even used CS before so I'm essentially just winged it to where I'm at now)

Right click the text layer, go to blending options, and choose options through there, also, just like the other layers you can change them to multiply or overlap etc..

[OMGPIE]

Hooray Shawk!

[Alix]

Making sig's are easy, the question is how to get around the 9,8kb restriction without totally raping the quality?

[Jusik]

I have a good smudge technique that I will post later

[Shawk]

Originally Posted by Alix

Making sig's are easy, the question is how to get around the 9,8kb restriction without totally raping the quality?

Keep the sigs around my sigs size and bring the quality to as close to 9.8kb as you can.. and make sure its in .jpg not .gif.. making sigs is alot harder then that.

[Alix]

Hey, to each one his own. I prefer using things that go with the theme rather then most who slap a picture on an abstract and call it art. I see you are into pretty much the same thing as me, but according to me i find it easy to work with ps and making sigs.

my trouble is however in Photoshop i have to set the jpeg to like 3-4, which makes it a bit grainy, for it to fit the size

[Killermandude]

I can't help but agree - I have the sig made, in like 4 different god damned versions, the lowest size I can get it to is like 15....

As a JPG at 75% of original size of a 400x100 pixel palette, it's 15...


WHY THE HELL...
If I shrink the image down, the file size grows....
I just took it down to 325 pixels by 100, from 400x100...and it went up to 30.75

[Viluin]

The sig you made for this tutorial can't be used on this forum, it's too large.

gg.

[Shawk]

Originally Posted by Viluin

The sig you made for this tutorial can't be used on this forum, it's too large.

gg.

The tutorial was not meant for only these forums, like i said, i made it for a buddy before i made it for these forums.

If you want your sig to run on these forums, when you save the image, save it as a .jpg and bring the quality down to about 40%. The size is just a generic example.

[MasterMind]

Nice tutorial + rep

[Leumax]

Dude Thanks alot, look at what i did with it! I DID A MASTER PIECE!, Well its my first signature and i love it!

[lokius]

+rep from me too, makes me want a MO themed sig. =D