Photoshop Tutorial - Photoshop Tutorial to Turn Your Photos Into Watercolor Paintings

I cannot say enough good things about my best friend in the digital world: Photoshop. Suffice to say, I love it! As a Graphic Designer, I use it in 99% of all my projects, and now I enjoy using what I do to make Photoshop Tutorials for others.

You don't need to be a professional or even and "artist" to create works of art. Nowadays, you don't even have to know how to draw! I intend to create a series of tutorials to illustrate several ways to use this program for creating beautiful pictures and illustrations just by using photographs. In this particular tutorial, I will be showing you how to turn photos into watercolor paintings in a few easy steps.

The only materials needed to follow along with this tutorial are:

--Photoshop. I use Photoshop CS3, but you can use whichever version you have.

--A photo. Either a photo of your own or a stock photo. Some really good stock photos can be found for free at Stock Exchange.

That's it! I find a graphic tablet a nice tool for all work I do in Photoshop and they are fairly cheap these days, but it is definitely not necessary.

This tutorial does assume that you have some basic knowledge of Photoshop. Having a basic "beginner knowledge" of the program will help a lot. Also, there is a link in my bio for you to see photos that walk you through everything.

1. Open Photoshop. Then go to File-->Open, select the picture you want to work with and then hit "Open".

2. On the layers palette (on the right side), right click on the "Background Layer" and select duplicate. Do this twice.

3. Click on the first duplicate layer (this should be your middle layer), then go to Image-->Adjustments-->Desaturate . Then click on the second duplicate layer(your top layer) and do the same.

4. On the top layer, go to Image-->Adjustments-->Invert.

5. Still on the top Layer, set the blending mode (located within the layer palette, looks like this: ) to "Color Dodge".

6. Still on the top Layer, got to Filter-->Other-->Minimum and set the radius to 1.

6. Now duplicate the bottom layer(the one that still has color) one more time and drag it to the top of your layers. Go to Filter-->Blur-->Gaussian and set the radius number in the box anywhere between 1 and 5. Usually the more detailed the picture, the lower you will want to set the radius. Then set the layer blending mode to "Multiply".

7. Select the Paint Brush Tool, select the soft round or "fuzzy" brush shape at the top and set the size to fit whatever area you are working on. Set the opacity to 20%.

Go to Layer-->New Layer and name your final layer whatever you wish and hit "OK".

Then select the color you wish to paint with and paint the area to improve or change colors.

Each picture you do will have different results. Have fun playing with different levels and colors! I hope you found this Photoshop tutorial easy to follow. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me.

Of things are better when you have pictures to follow, so I put together a set of free reference pictures to go along with this. They can be found here

Miniature Paintings - A Sublime Art

The art, culture and lifestyle of ancient and medieval India is best reveled through miniature paintings. The penchant for religion, divinity and regal aristocracy is ostentatiously illustrated in these paintings. Though miniature in form, the paintings had an innate beauty and distinctiveness that made them stand out of the crowd.

Crafted by the regional artists the miniature paintings narrate the stories of the bygone dynasties. Purely a brush work, these vibrant handmade paintings were the outcome of some dazzling minerals and vegetable colors. Gold and silver powders, conch shell powders and tiny pieces of semi precious stones were used in a miniature painting to make for the extra glow. It is for this luminous capacity, meticulousness and the universal appeal the miniature paintings are very popular even today.

The themes of the this class of paintings were generally taken from the scenes of Indian epics and religious books like The Ramayana, The Mahabharata, The Bhagvata Purana, Git-gobinda, Surasagar, Rasamanjiri and more. Images from folk legends, classical music codes and royal court scenes were also beautifully illustrated in the paintings. Glass, fabric, marble, paper, silk, velvet, leather and ivory panels generally served as the canvas for the paintings. Miniature paintings gave birth to some noted school of paintings namely The Deccan Schools, The Rajput and the Mughal Schools.

The Rajput School of Miniature Painting imbibed inspiration from the Krishna legends. The emphasis was more on the man and woman relationship and paintings were aesthetic portrayal of their emotion, love and passion. The lovemaking scenes of Lord Krishna and Goddess Radha are some of the finest specimens of the paintings. The Mughal School of Miniature Painting had Persian influence on them. The painters focused mostly on court scenes, royal portraits, natural scenes and landscapes. The Deccan School of Miniature Painting derived a kind of hybrid painting form blending several styles of painting. The paintings manifested exuberant and bold themes influenced from Turkish and Persian paintings.

For comprehensive information on Miniature Paintings and related topics, please visit Ethnic Paintings.

Rajneesh Dubey is Content Coordinator for http://ethnicpaintings.com This website gives you comprehensive informations on painting history, development, trends, popular painting styles, great painters, famous paintings, painting galleries and museums, painting tips, painting classes. In other words, this website is a treat to painting freaks.