Industry NewsA tutorial on how to create an OS X wallpaper effect using Photoshop
by drphotoshop
Before we begin, this tutorial will show you my attempt at recreating the os x wallpaper eye candy. I have no clue to the actual process of creating the wallpaper, but I believe this closely recreates (and I hope you do too) the effect with relative ease.
1. Create a new document, about twice the size of its intended purpose. I used 5000 px x 5000 px. Fill the background with color #0A5FAF.
2. Create a new layer.
3. Expand the window so there is a large margin outside the document canvas. (You’ll see why in step 4)
4. Take the pen tool, and make a curve that starts and ends outside the document. Close the pen path outside the canvas.
5. Right Click (or ctrl click for the mac) on the pen path and ‘fill path…’. Fill it with white.
6. Apply a stroke effect of about 1 to 5 px depending on the size of the document.
7. Bring the fill down to about 10 - 30 %
8. Repeat steps 2-7 a bunch of times to fill up the document with this.
9. Personally I like to separate each layer into a folder so I can easily create a change in the next steps with having to recreate each layer from scratch.
10. Duplicate each layer in side each folder. Hide the original. Create a new blank layer and merge this new layer with the duplicate so that the effect ‘f’ will no longer be applyed for that layer. Basically your rasterizing the layer.
11. Apply a mask to the newly rasterized layer (you can find the button in the bottom of the layer palette). Take the gradient tool and set it to black to white and blending mode darken. On the layer mask, apply gradients by clicking and dragging. By setting the blending mode to darken, you can apply the gradient multiple times and it will not undo the region masked region created on the gradient you dragged out just before. This would not be true if it were normal. You want to leave the center and the middle of the stroke mostly intact and hide the ends and sections not close the the line.
12. Take the blur tool and start to heavily blur the ends of the stroke line and partially blur the middle of the stroke line.
13. For extra taste and eye candy, create a new layer above all. Create a gradient that is either linear or radial with the colors being black and white. Set this layer to overlay and bring down the opacity to around 40%.
Filed under: Fun Stuff, Tutorials, Tips, Tools | Tagged: design, effects, graphics, how to, osx, photoshop, tutorial | No Comments »
A tool for automatic online backups
by JellyHead
Lets face it, backing up files is boring, but it is a good idea. Loosing digital photos, client files and important documents can bring a tear to your eye and set you back months or even years. Protecting these files usually means time consuming backups using tapes, burnt disks, or another hard drive, none of which are very reliable. The solution? Backup online!…. so natually I googled it and the best one in my opinion is Mozy.com
Mozy provides 2 gig of backup space for free. All you need to do is sign up then download and install a very small application, select which folders to backup and choose how often and at what time. If your computer is idle at the times you set then Mozy will automatically backup. Just set, forget and rest assured that your files are safe.
Filed under: Business Blogging, Tutorials, Tips, Tools | Tagged: backup online | No Comments »
I recently came across this site, FreeRice.com - an innovative approach to feeding the hungry. It’s a simple game that improves your smarts and helps to end world hunger. The idea is very creative. This is how it works: you go to FreeRice.com and play their vocabulary game, for each question answered correctly 10 grains of rice will be donated by the sponsors to help people living in poverty. Everyone wins - you get to play the game and grow your brain, FreeRice get the traffics, advertisers get their exposure, and people get the free rice. If you like the idea, please help to spread out the word.
PLAY NOW and feed a hungry person!
Filed under: Fun Stuff | 1 Comment »
Filed under: Fun Stuff, Tutorials, Tips, Tools | Tagged: fonts, free | No Comments »
Purchase the new Semi-Permanent book via Paypal. As usual, it’s full of great art work submitted by people from all over the planet. Brought to you by designiskinky.net
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: books, design, news | No Comments »
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