ps制作栩栩如生的云层 Realistic Clouds

Introduction

This Photoshop tutorial will show you how to create clouds. Most clouds tutorials are based on Photoshop’s clouds filter, which is ok if you want a few fuzzy looking clouds without too many details, but I want to show a different approach. The clouds filter will also be used in this tutorial, but only to create a clouds brush and it's this brush that we will use to actually paint the clouds.

Unlike most other Photoshop tutorials I wrote, this is not going to be a tutorial in which you just have to follow each and every step to get exactly the image that I will be showing at the end. The quality of the end result depends on whether we use your own brush, the downloadable brush or the way you draw your clouds. I will try to be as detailed as possible throughout the tutorial. Also understand that this is one of the more difficult tutorials for an author to write (because of some freehand painting involved), but I'm tried to do my best.

The tutorial is divided into 8 steps:

• Create the clouds brush (Includes "Downloading and installing a ready-made clouds brush")
• Prepare the background
• Paint the basic shape of the cloud
• Add more contrast
• Add shadows
• Correct the tone of the cloud
• Create a composition
• Improve the background layer

1. Create the clouds brush

In this step we will create the clouds brush that is needed to paint our clouds.

Note: Jump to step 2 (where you can download a clouds brush) if you're not interested in how the brush was made.

Start by creating a new document: File / New... and select the preset 640 x 480 and click OK:

Press the letter D on your keyboard to set the foreground color to black and the background color to white: 

Go to the menu and select Filter / Render / Clouds

Select the Lasso Tool in the tool bar and make a selection similar to the shape of an egg (or at least close to it).

Make sure that you cover an area that is not just plain medium gray; make sure that you include some light gray and darker gray:

The size of the selection doesn't matter so much. In this example I have a selection with a height that is about 1/3 of the original height of the document. The angle of the shape is not important.

Go to the menu and choose Select / Feather... and select a Feather Radius of 10 and click OK:

This will soften the edge of the area that we're going to copy.

Go to the menu and select Edit / Copy (or Ctrl + C in Windows or Command + C on the Mac) to copy the content of our selection to your clipboard.

Create a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon  in the layers palette.

Return to the menu and select Edit / Paste (or Ctrl + V in Windows or Command + V on the Mac) to paste the current content of our clipboard on this new layer.

Make the Background layer invisible (the bottom layer) by clicking on the eye icon  in front of it.

In the menu select Image / Trim and use the following (default) settings and click OK:

Trim removes all excessive areas that contain no pixels (100% transparent):

At this point you can always select in the menu Image / Adjustments / Brightness/Contrast... to adjust the brightness or contrast of your brush, but quite often this is not necessary when you've selected the proper area.

In the menu select Edit / Define Brush Preset...

Name your new brush Clouds Original and click OK.

Go to the tool bar and select the Brush Tool (important step, because if you don't select the brush tool, then all areas in the following Window, the Brushes Palette, will be grayed out).

Now let's open the Brushes Palette. You can open the brushes palette in 3 ways;

• Pressing F5 on your keyboard
• Using the menu: Window / Brushes
• By clicking on the Brushes Palette tab (A):

Click on the area that reads Brush Tip Shape (B). Select the clouds brush that you just made (C). 

Tip: Hover with your mouse cursor over any brush and Photoshop will show the name of the brush (like in this example with the Wet Sponge brush):

Continue by checking the settings in the area marked with D, because they have to be the identical. Ignore the bottom preview of the brush, yours probably looks slightly different.

Now click on the section that reads Shape Dynamics and make sure all settings are the same (especially the values 100% for Size Jitter and Angle Jitter are important):

Continue by clicking on the section that reads Color Dynamics and make sure all settings are the same (note the value 10% 10% for Brightness Jitter):

Notice that we've only changed the Shape Dynamics and Color Dynamics settings. Make sure that the all the other settings are disabled, like Scattering, Texture, Dual Brush, Smoothing, etc:

Click with the mouse of the area named Brush Presets (A):

At the bottom of that same window, click on the Create new Brush icon .

Name your new brush Clouds and click OK:

Look up the old brush named Clouds Original. Again, hover with your cursor over the brush to check the name to avoid that you delete the wrong brush.

Right click (control + click on the Mac) once you've selected the brush named Clouds Original:

Select Delete Brush and click OK. Of course, if you want to keep the brush, that's fine with me, but be aware that it can cause confusion later on.

We have now created the brush that we are going to use to paint clouds.

We can save this brush for later use by going to the menu and selecting Edit / Preset Manager...

• Select the Preset Type named Brushes (A)
• Click on the thumbnail of the Clouds brush we made earlier (B)
• Click on the Save Set... button (C)
• Give the brush a proper name and click on Save
• After the brush is saved, leave this menu by clicking on Done (D).

Make sure you save the Photoshop file with our original brush, because you might want to make some small adjustments later on.

2. Download and install a ready-made clouds brush

It's up to you if you want to skip this step and jump to step 3 if you just made your own brush. However if you don't have any experience in downloading/installing brushes then might want to read what I have to say in this step 2.

You can download a ready-made brush for our tutorial (the same one that I will be using) here (right click and select Save Target As...)

Look at the following screenshot:

Once we have the Brush Tool  selected, we can click on the button in our options bar marked with A, in the window that opens click on the button with the little black triangle(B) and then select Load Brushes... or Replace Brushes... (C)

• Load Brushes: add the new brushes to the existing brushes in Photoshop
• Replace Brushes: replace the existing brushes in Photoshop

Which option to use is all up to you, but my advice is to select Load Brushes...

Activate the brush by selecting it in the Brush Preset picker window that opens when you click on A in the options bar.

3. Prepare the background

Open a new document in Photoshop with a preset size of 800x600. If you prefer a larger size, no problem, I just prefer smaller images when I'm writing tutorials.

Double click on the foreground color in the tool bar marked with red in this screenshot:

In the Color Picker window that opens you enter the value 304971 (darker blue) in the area marked with A and click OK:

Tip: enter the value by using copy/paste(shortcuts already discussed in Step 1), because it will save you time and you will avoid mistakes.

Double click on the background color in the tool bar marked with red in this screenshot:

In the Color Picker window that opens you enter the value 7E9CB4 (lighter blue) this time. Click OK.

Select the Gradient Tool  in the tool bar (it might be hidden under the Paint Bucket tool ).

Go to the options bar and click on the button marked with A and double click on the gradient that shows both your current fore- and background color (marked with the red arrow):

Select a linear gradient by clicking on the linear gradient icon in the options bar (marked with red in the screenshot):

Make sure that the other settings are identical to the settings shown in this screenshot.

Use the following steps to draw the gradient:

• Hold down the shift key
• Move your mouse cursor to the top of your document
• Hold down your left mouse button
• Move your cursor to the bottom of your document
• Release the left mouse button
• Release the shift key

We hold down the shift key to force the cursor to move over a straight line towards the bottom of our document, which ensures that the gradient will be created under a straight angle.

4. Paint the basic shape of the cloud

Select the brush tool  . Reset the fore- and background color by pressing the letter D on your keyboard: Press X to switch the fore- and background color:  

Select the background color  and enter a value of F4F4F4 (light gray) and click OK.

Add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon  .

Before we start painting, let's check the brush settings:

Make sure that you have selected the Clouds brush (A) and that the size of the brush is 70. You can change the size by clicking on B in our next screenshot and entering a value of 70 px for Master Diameter.

Close the window by clicking on B again:

Make sure the other settings in the options bar are identical to the ones shown in the first screenshot of the options bar.

Now take the brush and paint a basic shape and make sure the edges are the only areas where the background shines through:

Add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon  . 

Change the size of the brush to 50 and paint some smaller clouds on the inside. Move your mouse cursor over the image to see where I painted. You'll notice that I painted close to the top and left side of the cloud, since this is going to be the the brightest area in our final cloud. The lighter red is an area where I painted with a lower opacity (options bar). To make it yourself easy only focus on the maximum opacity of 100%.

Add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon  . 

This time change the size of the brush to 30 and paint some smaller clouds on the outside. Don't cover the complete edge, keep some slightly transparent areas intact. Move your mouse cursor over the image to see where I painted:

If you like the result, then add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon . Double click on its name to rename it to Clouds Merged. This layer will become the layer that will contain a merged copy of the 3 clouds layers.

First make the background invisible by clicking on the eye icon  in front of it. We do this, because we're going to use a technique that will merge all visible layers and since we only want to merge the cloud layers, we have to make the background invisible.

Make sure the empty top layer (Clouds Merged) is active (it will have a icon in front of it) and now press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+E (Command+Shift+Control+E on the Mac) to merge all visible layers on the layer Clouds Merged.

After you're done, turn off Layer 1, Layer 2 and Layer 3 and turn on the Background layer:

Add a new layer in Photoshop by clicking on the Create a new layer icon  .

Go to the menu and select Edit / Fill...

Select 50% Gray (make sure the other settings are the same) and click OK.

Clip this layer with the Clouds Merged layer by pressing Ctrl + G (Command + G on the Mac) or or Ctrl + Alt + G (Command + Option + G on the Mac) if you use Photoshop CS2.

Continue by setting the blending mode of this layer to Overlay:

Select the Burn tool in the tool bar (might be hiding under the Dodge or Sponge  tool) 

Check the option bar. Click on the button marked with A to bring up the Brush Preset picker and select a regular round brush. Select a Master Diameter of 65 px (A) and a Hardness of 0% (C):

Click on A again to close the Brush Preset picker window.

With Layer 4 still selected, paint over the clouds with the burn tool to bring out the contrast.

Move your mouse cursor over the image to see where I used the burn tool:

6. Add shadows

Select the foreground color  and enter a value of 304971 (darker blue)) and click OK.

Click on the Create new fill or adjustment layer icon at the bottom of the layers palette and select Gradient... in the window that opens. A new window will open:

Use the same settings as shown in this screenshot but don't click OK yet, wait until I tell you to do so. 

Make sure that you select the proper gradient. You can select the gradient by clicking on the button marked with A. 

A window will pop up in which you have to double-click on the gradient marked with the red arrow (the one that goes from blue, our current foreground color, to transparent):

Why did I tell you not to click on the OK button yet? Because before we click OK, we should position our gradient in the document window. Move your mouse cursor over to your document window and you'll notice that the cursor has switched to the following cursor , indicating that we're now able to move the gradient.

Move your gradient in the document window by holding down your mouse button until you have something like this:

Don't make the right bottom side of the cloud too dark or too light, just follow the example.

When you're done, return to the Gradient Fill window and click OK.

Clip this layer with the layer underneath (Layer 4) by pressing Ctrl + G (Command + G on the Mac) or or Ctrl + Alt + G (Command + Option + G on the Mac) if you use Photoshop CS2. :

This is how your layers palette should look like right now:

Marked with red is the mask that's part of the adjustment layer. Click on it once to make sure it's active: it will have a double border if it's active and when you have Photoshop CS or earlier a mask icon  will appear in front of the layer.

Press the letter D on your keyboard to set the foreground color to black and the background color to white.

If they're switched, just press X. Just make sure that the bottom of your tool bar looks like this: 

Go to the tool bar and select the Brush Tool . Select a round brush with a Master Diameter of 35 px (A) and a Hardness of 0% (C) (check previous steps for screenshots if needed).

Check the other settings in the options bar and make sure yours are the same, especially the 20% opacity:

Now start painting on the mask with black to mask those areas that need to be brighter, like the left side of the cloud and the top. Try to paint randomly to avoid that the border of the shadow becomes a straight line. Use a lower or higher opacity if you feel the need or a different size brush. Remember, if you make a mistake then just press Ctrl+Z (Command+Z on the Mac) to undo your last brush stroke. You can also correct your mask by painting with white instead by pressing the letter X on your keyboard and pressing X again to continue with black.

Move your mouse cursor over the image to see where I painted my mask with black or gray tones:

If you feel that the transition between shadows and brighter areas isn't smooth, then consider to use the Blur tool , the Gaussian blur filter (Filter / Blur / Gaussian Blur... ) or a brush with a lower opacity to make the transition smoother. Don't make it too smooth or the clouds might look too flat. Make sure that you remove most traces of the gradient on the left side and top of the clouds (those areas have to be almost pure white) by painting mostly pure black in those areas of your mask. Again, move your mouse cursor over the image to understand what I mean. We want to remove most traces of the gradient in those areas, because that's going to be the sunny side of the cloud.

7. Correct the tone of the cloud

Click in Photoshop on the Create new fill or adjustment layer icon at the bottom of the layers palette and select Solid Color... Enter a value of 5C687D (dark gray/blue) in the window that opens and click OK . 

Set the blending mode of this layer to Color.

Clip this layer with the layer underneath (Layer 4) by pressing Ctrl + G (Command + G on the Mac) or or Ctrl + Alt + G (Command + Option + G on the Mac) if you use Photoshop CS2. :

How well your cloud looks depends on a few things;

• how much time you spend on it
• how many different brushes you use
• how many layers you use
• you paintng skills
• patience

I've shown you the most direct approach with still reasonable results, just to make this tutorial easy to understand. Do understand that I would use more brushes, layers and little touch-ups to make the clouds look even better. All I can say at this stage: experiment and look at pictures of real skies to find inspiration.

8. Create a composition

To make an interesting composition it's best to use several different clouds. In this tutorial we will however use only one single cloud.

Only when you're complete done with your clouds, you should add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon . Double click on it's name to rename it to Cloud. This layer will become the layer that will contain a merged copy of all our layers.

First make the background invisible by clicking on the eyeball icon  in front of it. We do this for the same reason as when we merged the 3 clouds layers at the end of step 3.

Make sure the empty top layer named Cloud is active (it will have a icon in front of it).

Press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+E (Command+Shift+Control+E on the Mac) to merge all visible layers on layer Cloud.

Continue by making every layer invisible except for the Background layer and Cloud layer.

Make a duplicate of the Cloud layer, by clicking on its thumbnail in the layers palette and dragging and dropping it on the Create a new layer icon  :

Make a 2nd duplicate by repeating the process.

This is how the layers palette looks right now:

Select the move tool  in the tool bar and move each cloud around until you have a composition you like.

9. Improve background layer

Click on the background layer to make it active. 

Add a new layer by clicking on the Create a new layer icon .

Select the Brush Tool . Select our original cloud brush set to a size of 5 px. 

Change the foreground color to D9E5FA and the background color to A2B6D9: 

Check the settings for the brush in the the options bar. Pay special attention to the fact that the opacity is set too 100%:

Now draw a few random lines between the clouds in the lower half of the image:

Go to the menu and select Filter / Blur / Motion Blur. 

Enter a value of 0 for Angle and a value of 129 for Distance and click OK:

If the result looks artificial, then repeat Motion Blur using the same values or start all over.

We have come to the end of this tutorial. I leave it all up to your imagination what else to add.

In this example I took it a step further:

Note: the plane is from a photograph, contrails were added with the clouds brush. In this example I've moved the upper right cloud to the background, lowered the opacity to 25%, added a mask and removed the bottom of the cloud with a soft brush and added a distant plane in the background.

I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial.