|
Photoshop Tips
Using Photoshop to Create a 3D Look
By Vinny Chirayil
Dateline: March 7, 2005
Version: Photoshop 5.5
More Photoshop tips
Discuss this in the Photoshop forum
The following tutorial can be completed by anyone who is familiar with Photoshop. You don't have to be an artist and only Photoshop's basic tools have been used. No tablet or digital pen is required.
The image you'll create was inspired by a Softimage XSI render by Baruch Zevolun, so the design credit goes to him. The aim of this tutorial is to show you a different use for Photoshop, other than image editing, so this is a tribute to the original artist's work. In addition, I wanted to break a tradition. Most of the 3D work of animators takes inspiration from 2D work, such as sketches, paintings or photos. However, this 2D work was inspired from a 3D render. So, hats off to Baruch Zevolun!
Creating the Ball
Let me say at the beginning that I'll be using new layers as necessary throughout this tutorial. I started by drawing a circle and filling it with white. A simple linear gradient was then applied to transform the flat 2D ball into a 3D ball. Only the shadows are missing.
I then drew an ellipse and filled it with black, then rotated and blurred it slightly.
To simulate the effect of area lights (shadow fades with distance) I used the Distort tool on the Edit > Transform menu.
Put the shadow back in place and it looks just like a Softimage Mental Ray FG/Global Illumination render.
Now for the reflection. Imagine the ball is on a table. The ball would show the opposite edge of the table in its reflection. To do this, I made a black ellipse on top of the ball layer and retained only the part inside the ball area.
I blurred it slightly to soften the edge. But the ball still isn't looking
glossy and reflective. This is because it is reflecting only the table and pitch black area over it. If we had a white board (reflector) nearby, its reflection would be seen on the ball.
I drew a shape on top of the ball layer with the Path tool, converted it into a selection and filled it with white, followed by a slight dash of color on it.
If the table was also reflective, then the white board's reflection would be seen on it. And this in turn would be visible on the ball. So I flipped the shape which I made earlier and reduced the scale and opacity of the layer.
I then added the ball's reflection on the floor, added a little glow on the highlight and a shiny chrome ball was complete. I saved this as its own file.
| 
