Photoshop fun with brushes

It amazes me how many fantastic free resources there are on the web. I can’t remember where I heard about the Photoshop brushes at Obsidian Dawn, but they are simply incredible.

You can use them to create objects, backgrounds, textures and just about anything else you can think of. Download from Obsidian Dawn and move to the Brushes folder of Photoshop. There are full instructions on the OD site. (You don’t need the full-on professional Photoshop, I use Photoshop Elements and the brushes work just fine.)

I took the time to play with these brushes properly for the first time yesterday, and created three rather quirky digital collages.

Two girls and a tricycle

The one above is the simplest and my favourite. I love that late fifties/early sixties film-noir look, and I adored the idea that the smouldering, dangerous brunette would be perched on a tricycle rather than a Harley. The only parts not created with brushes are the two women and the trike, which were three digital images from my collection, and the text.

Earwings

It just goes to show how immature I remain that I keep chuckling at my own idiotic pun in ‘Earwings’, on the left.

This one grew without much planning. I just knew I wanted to try out the wings and grass brush sets. Perhaps the caption is unnecessary, but I liked the visual balance.

Apart from the text, the only pre-prepared image is the girl’s head. I had lots of fun getting the lovely cloudy blue sky just right.

Heartless Crabmaid

This  is the first one I did, and the most complicated, using many, many layers for each additional texture of sea, sand and sky.

Hints and Tips

I experimented with changing the size as well as the type of brush, and varying the colours and opacity slightly helps the look. The exact brush sets I used in each image are mentioned in more detail on my Flickr page – click here or on the images.

And a tip about using Photoshop layers for this sort of thing: name every layer as you go. Then you won’t have to remember which layer to click on when you need to change a bit of ocean or whatever.

So if you have Photoshop, go off and play. The only thing to remember is to give Obsidian Dawn credit for use of the brushes for anything you publish.

Note: Obsidian Dawn are currently updating their website and you may find it down occasionally over the next couple of days. Bookmark it and persevere, it’s worth it.

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