Christmas Wave Tutorial

This tutorial was written by Amber Howard on December 18, 2014. Any resemblances to other tutorials are completely coincidental. Scripting and translating of this tutorial is forbidden. Do not copy and paste this tutorial anywhere else on the internet. Please link back to the main blog instead.

In this tutorial I used the artwork of Hannah Lynn.

You can purchase Hannah’s artwork and a license through CDO.

Please do not use this or any artwork without purchasing a proper license first.

Supplies needed:
PaintShopPro — I used X7 but any version will work
Tube or close up of choice.
Font of choice — I used Affair.

Plugins needed:
Eye Candy 6 — Perspective Shadow
Lokas Artistic Effects — Metal
Mura’s Meister — Copies
Xero — Mistifier
Xero — Porcelain
Xero — Radiance

Ready? Set? Go!

Open a 600x250 canvas and flood fill with a dark color from your tube.

I used #85111b.

Grab your Rectangle preset shape tool, with the following settings:

Width: 8, Foreground: Color complimentary to your main background, Background: null.

I used #495b45 for my color.

Draw out a rectangle on your canvas about 316x186 pixels.

Objects – Align – Center in Canvas.

Convert your rectangle to raster layer.

Adjust – Add/Remove Noise – Add Noise at 50% with Gaussian and Monochrome checked.

Duplicate the rectangle layer.

On the original layer go to Adjust – Brightness and Contrast – Brightness and Contrast.

Move the Brightness slider all the way down to -255 and apply.

Adjust – Blur – Gaussian Blur – with the Radius setting at 6.00.

Open a tube or close up of choice.

Resize as needed. I resized mine by about 75%.

Copy and paste your tube as a new layer below the rectangle layer.

Arrange the tube where you would like it,

then make the duplicate rectangle layer active.

Take your magic wand tool, with the settings on Mode: Add, Match: RBG, Tolerance: 20%.

Click once inside of the rectangle frame.

Selections – Expand by 4 pixels.

Make the main background layer active.

Selections – Promote Selection to Layer.

Make the tube layer active now.

Selections – Invert.

Hit delete on your keyboard once.

Selections – Select None.

Duplicate the tube layer.

On the original change the settings to Luminance or Luminance Legacy.

Apply a drop shadow of choice.

I used V: 2, H: -2, Opacity: 75%, Blur: 10.67.

On the duplicate apply Xero – Porcelain with default settings only changing the blue channel to 0.

Apply Xero – Radiance with default settings.

Apply Xero – Mistifier with default settings.

Change the settings of this layer to Hard Light and lower the opacity to about 50%.

Hide your main background layer.

This should leave open the rectangle frames, tubes, and promoted layer.

Edit – Copy Special – Copy Merged.

Paste the copied layer as a new layer at the top of the layer palette.

Image – Resize by 80%, all layers unchecked.

Arrange the smaller rectangle at the left side of the canvas.

Image – Mirror Horizontal.

Merge the two smaller rectangle layers together.

Apply Mura’s Meister – Copies with the Wave (Horizontal) setting on default.

Drag this layer in the layer palette to just above the main background layer.

Lower the opacity of this layer to 40%.

Add a new raster layer at the top of the canvas.

Flood fill with the same color that was used for the rectangle layer.

Selections – Select All.

Selections – Modify – Contract by 6 pixels.

Hit delete on your keyboard once.

Adjust – Add/Remove Noise – Add Noise at 50% with Gaussian and Monochrome checked.

Duplicate the border layer.

On the original layer go to Adjust – Brightness and Contrast – Brightness and Contrast.

Move the Brightness slider all the way down to -255 and apply.

Adjust – Blur – Gaussian Blur – with the Radius setting at 6.00.

Open a pixel font of choice and add your credits and tagger’s mark.

Apply an optional gradient glow of choice.

Open another font of choice to add your name.

Once you are happy with the placement,

convert to raster layer.

Next apply Lokas Artistic Effects – Metal with the default settings, making sure to turn the Color Overlay off.

Add a drop shadow of choice. I used Eye Candy 6 – Perspective Shadow with the Height 0 preset and these additional settings:

Repeat the drop shadow.

Save as .jpg and you are done!

Thank you for trying my tutorial, I would love to see your results!

 

In this example, I used the artwork of Mashi, currently available at CDO though she is retiring on December 26^th.