Forgotten Halloween – Dark photo manipulation tutorial
In this tutorial I”ll show you how to create a dark photo manipulation called “Forgotten Halloween”. You’ll learn how to combine different stocks, create a dark and eerie atmosphere and work with lighting effect.
The Final Image
Required Resources:
Step 1
Create a new document in Photoshop with the settings below:
Step 2
Open the forest stock. Drag it into our white canvas using the Move Tool (V) and scale it down it to fit the document:
Step 3
Step 4
Step 5
Cut out the pumpkin and place it in the middle section of the ground:
Step 6
I used a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer with Clipping Mask to reduce the saturation of the pumpkin a little:
Step 7
I used a Photo Filter adjustment layer with the same purpose:
Step 8
Step 9
Create four new layers on the top. Change the brush color to white and use the different cobweb brushes to paint around the pumpkin as shown below:
Step 10
Click the second button at the bottom of the Layers Panel to add a mask to two cobweb layers. Use a soft black brush to erase some unwanted details of the cobwebs to get more natural result:
Step 11
Step 12
Step 13
Isolate the crow and place him above the pumpkin:
Step 14
Make a new layer under the crow one. Use a soft black brush with the opacity about 50% to paint the shadow under the crow claws:
Step 15
Make another layer and use the same brush to paint more shadow of the crow on the pumpkin:
Step 16
I used Hue/Saturation for this crow:
Step 17
I used Curves to darken the crow and on this layer mask use a soft black brush to clear the dark effect on the upper right of the crow:
Step 18
Create a new layer and use a hard brush with the size about 8-9 px and with a red color ( I used #ff0000) to paint an evil eye for the crow:
Step 19
Make three layers on the top. Paint with the bat brushes on each layer with black color. I lowered the opacity of these bats to 40 and 50% to fit the foggy background:
Apply Gassian Blur with 3 px to these bat layers:
Step 20
It’s time for coloring the scene. Make a Gradient Map adjustment layer on the top:
Change this layer mode to Soft Light 100%:
Step 21
I used Color Balance to add some cyan-blue to the scene:
Step 22
Create a Photo Filter adjustment layer on the top:
Step 23
On the top of the layer, use the Lasso Tool (L) to make a selection on the ground and set the feather radius for it to 60:
Go to Layer > Adjustment Layer > Channel Mixer:
We have the result below:
You can use a soft black brush to refine the red area to get the desired look.
Step 24
With the same method I used Curves to make the effect more subtle:
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