Screen-Printing Grain Effect in Adobe Photoshop

1. Introduction & Overview: Hey guys, I'm Evgeniya from Attitude Creative, and in this class, I will share with you my special proof technique for creating a graphic effect, which imitates the grain and texture of traditional screen printing by using smart filters in Adobe Photoshop. [ MUSIC ]. This technique offers a lot of creative possibilities for stylizing found images, pencil drawings, or digital art with shading, as well as photographs. In a striking graphic way. Which can be really handy when designing prints, posters, or giving the same flavor to the collection of images. [ MUSIC ]. In this class, I will step-by-step show you how to build this effect. How to adjust it to create a desired look for your images and how to color your stylized images using bold solid colors or gradients to create an awesome screen-printed look. Everything in this class uses non-destructive smart-filters and adjustments. Once you have built the effect, you can easily apply it to any other images. With just a little bit of tweaking. [ MUSIC ]. I cannot wait to see how you use this technique in your own work. Join me in this class and let's make something awesome. [ MUSIC ] 2. Image Considerations: This technique works best with images which have a good gradation of tone or some shading because it works by producing a continuous tone and shading by creating grains of varying size and density based on your image. You can use photographs, digital art, pencil drawings or shading, and paintings or illustration with tonal gradation. But if you have a line drawing or any other design or art work which is made out of solid color lines or shapes, this effect won't make a lot of difference to the way it looks because there are no gradients in these type of images. This technique is similar to halftone, but instead of using dots it uses varying shapes or grains formed into irregular patterns. Also even though the overall aesthetics with this effect can be generally described as a grainy or of screen printing. This technique can give you an effect resembling stippling or of a photocopier, old newspaper print, or a really old and harsh photographic print. Depending on the image you are using, the effect will need to be adjusted to work well with its tonal range. To start with and to build the initial effect, I recommend that you download the same image as I will be using for demonstration so you can easily follow along and see how this technique works. After you have created the initial effect, you will be able to easily solve the image out and experiment with your own images, enter the settings of the effect where necessary. You can find the link to the image I will be using in the notes of this video and in the project description here. Download this image in the highest resolution available and let's get started. 3. Document Setup: Let's begin by setting up a new document in Photoshop. Press command M or Control M in the windows to open the new document options window. The loop or the effect which we'll be recreating depends on the size of the image it is applied to. Due to the minimum settings of the effects will be using. The bigger the image the smaller the green, you will be able to create. For now, let's set up the document to be a three portrait format, which is 29.7 by 42 centimeters. Set the resolution to 300 dpi. If you want to modify it in future, and for example, want to create a small image for web instead, it is still better to work in a size of at least 2,000 pixels on either axis and resize a flattened image afterwards. Rotate it towards the end of the class. Set column mode to RGB here, and set the background color to transparent, which will save you a few steps, for later on. When everything is setup correctly, let's create a new document. As soon as your new document opens up, press command shift S or control shift S in the windows to open the save as dialog. Here give your document a name and I will call it screen printing grain effect master. I will be referring to it as the master file through out the class. Then choose where you want to save it so that you can easily find it later. Then set the format to PSG and make sure that layers archived here. Hit save. Now let's go to the layers panel. If it is not open, go to the window menu and select layers. Here, select the transparent layer. Double-click on its name and rename it to image. Then right-click on it and select convert to smart object. This is a smart object inside of which we will be applying our effect. Now let's double-click on this layers thumbnail, and this will open the quantum of the smart object as a separate document. If you have a cab view of all of your documents, you will be able to see them here and check the name of the document you're working in to avoid mix-ups. At the moment, we will be dealing with the quantum for a smart object in what with the master file. To be able to have smaller details, now final image, in a free format we need to increase the resolution of this marked object document. To do this, press command OI or control OI in the windows to open the image size dialogue. Here go to the resolution filled and increase it from 300 dpi, to 600 dpi. If your units are set to pixels, you will see these values increase. But if you set them to centimeters, the size should still correspond to a free format, which is 29.7 by 42 centimeters. Essentially, we are only increasing the number of pixels the image will be made off but not the oral format of our final image. You can experiment with the resolution more later when you're working on other images. But stick with 600 dpi for now to be able to achieve the same results as I will be showing you. Set it up the same way and press okay. The initial document setup is done and next we can add our image. 4. Adding an Image: To add the image into this document, firstly, press Command O or Control O in the windows, locate the downloaded octopus image and press O, then press Command A or Control A in the windows to select it, and copy the selection. Now, you can close this document as we won't be needing it, then go back to the Smart Object document, and paste the copied image in to it. This image is quite a bit smaller than our document, let's press Command T or Control T in the Windows, then resize it to a desired size in relation to the overall format. Normally, increasing the size this way is not good practice as it results in loss of quality and pixelation. But in this case, since it'll be headed and we define this image using filters, it won't cause any issues, something like this will do. Let's press "Enter" to apply changes, and exit the free transform mode. To avoid confusion in future, rename this layer to source so that you know that it contains the image, which you can swap out later. Now, we can filter prepare this image, or apply in our effect. 5. Image Adjustments: To be able to easily adjust the effect which will be created and apply it to other images. In future, we will need to use non-destructive adjustments and smart shelters. In order to do so, we need to convert this image layer into a smart object. Right click on this layer in the layers panel then select Convert to Smart Object. First of all, let's edit this image to have a plain white background so that the grain will be employed only to the Octopus illustration. If you are using a Creative Cloud version of Photoshop, which supports smart adjustments, select the smart object in the layers panel, and press Command L, or Control L, either of those. You should see their levels adjustment dialog pop up. If it doesn't, which will be the case if you're using Photoshop CS6 please refer to the mode for this video in which I share a work around chloroquine and destructive adjustments. In any case, what you do with the actual adjustments will be the same in any version of Photoshop. In the levels though, select the wave hydro button, and click on the areas of the image which you want to be white to set the white point. I don't mind leaving some of the width in the background because it can create a nice texture. But if you want, you can get rid of everything in the background. For this, you might need to zoom in to see what you have selected, then click around to get rid of all defects. You can also hold on the Alt key to see whether you've missed anything. Carry on clicking around all artifacts in the background until it is completely empty. When you're done with the background, you play changes by pressing Okay. This adjustment is specific only to images where you will to even out or remove background. If you're working with a cut-out, a photograph or an image within an even background, you don't need to worry about this at all. Since this technique is based on creating solid color monotone grain, it is useful to desaturate this image and adjust it as a black and white to better control its contrast. Also, at this stage, you won't be able to see whether your chosen image works in monotone or not. To make your image black and white, select it in the layers panel, and then press Command Shift, or Control Shift, or B. Even with those to open the black and white adjustment dialogue. For now, leave these settings as they are, or to leave them to slightly increase the contrast but don't boast it too much as you can always revisit it later on if you need more contrast. Remember the shades of gray are really important and the rich the gradation you have, the more detailed the image will look afterwards. In Photoshop CC, apply adjustments this way or convert them into smart filters which you will be able to see in the layers panel under the smart object they're applied to. You can adjust them at anytime by double-clicking on their names. The other filters which we are about to apply shouldn't be applied to this image after these adjustments. In this case, it will work fine because smart filters are applied to the image from the bottom up. After these adjustments are applied, now we can start building the graphic effect. 6. Building the Graphic Effect: Before you proceed with building the effect, it is a good idea to save the smart object document and then save the master file. This stage can be a bit power intensive. If you have a lot of apps running at the same time as photoshop, it might be a good idea to close them for now, and if necessary, go to your photoshop preferences and dedicate more RAM to Photoshop. In any case, it may take some time, to render the previews, apply changes, and to save the smart object file. Be patient, because the result is a worth it. When everything is saved, let's start building the graphic effect. Make sure that you are in the second level document, which is the contents of the smart object from your master file and not in the master file itself. Now, press "D" to reset the foreground and background colors on the Tools panel to Latin white respectively. This is important. Otherwise, the effect won't look as they should. Then select your smart object layer. In the layers panel, then go to the filter menu and choose filter gallery. Here, we need to have two effects. If you only have one effect on the list, click on this button here to add another one. Then select the bottom one, go to the texture section here and set it to gray. Then select the one on the top and set it to turn edges from this cage section. When you first pick these effect, the image might not look good at all. You need to carefully adjust the settings until you get the look you like. Let's start with the green settings. First of all, set the gray type here to regular. This will give you more delicate gray overall. You can also check out household gray looks as it can also work well for this effect. Then play around with the intensity and contrast settings. The intensity of gray controls the amount of gray and by that whole smooth the transitions are, and how much contrast there is between different tonal areas in the original image. The higher the value, the smoother the transitions. The contrast here, since the total depth of the overall imaging. The higher the value, the lighter the overall image is. For this image using sovereignty for both intensity and the contrast settings is about right. Now, let's have a look at the tone edges effect. Image balance controls the threshold, will force will be considered black and what we will be white. The higher the value, the more details will be kept in the right areas, 38 looks quite good here. Smoothness controls the appearance of the particles. With higher values, the shapes become more defined. You can set it to 14 or even 15 and not touch it again. Contrast in the tone edges effect controls the balance between dark and light areas. The higher the value, the lighter your image will get. For this image, 22 looks fine to me. When you are happy with what you are seeing,click "Okay" to apply these effects. You can see that these effects were added on top of the smart filters stack in the layers panel. Now, if needed, you can go and adjust the contrast of the original image to change the order of the exact. This is the initial effect. Let's save this document and switch back to the master file. You can see that the contents of the smart object has been updated here. Here, you can only see the smart object and no effects or adjustments. The reason for applying the effects in the contents of the smart object and not within the master file, is that, this way you can easily play around with the level of detail in your image by changing the resolution of the smart object document, which as you remember, we said to 600 DPI earlier, to have smaller gray. At the same time, the overall size of the master file is kept unchanged and it's resolution is still set to 300 DPI. Now if you go and change the resolution of the Smart Object document it will only affect the size of the grain. This is pretty handy for fine tuning the overall look. I hope now, all this multilevel document structure, makes a little bit more service. Now let's quickly prepare the smart object for coloring. 7. Eliminating White from the Image: To effectively color this image, to have more flexibility, and to better imitate this clean printed look, it is useful to get rid of the white background in this smart object so that we are only left with the grain, which forms the image. To do this, let's go back inside the smart object document where we have just added the filter gallery effect. Select the smart objects layer in the layers panel. Right click on it, and in this menu which will pop up, select blended options. In the main blended options section, go to the blend If settings. Make sure it is set to gray, on the top slider, move the right toggle to the left. Even moving it one step to the value of 254 should do the trick because it will eliminate the white color from this layer. You can also split this toggle by dragging one of its parts sideways while holding down the Alt key to have a smoother transition from the opaque book color to transparency. I will set it to something like this. Now, let's press "Okay" to apply changes. If you need to edit the blend if settings in the future, just double click on this icon of two overlapping squares next to the layers name here and it'll open the layer style window where you can make any desired changes. When everything looks good here, save this document. Now we're going to finalize this image by coloring it. 8. Colouring Your Image: For now we're done with the content of this smart object. So let's go back to the master file, where we'll be coloring other stylized image. Here, this image should appear with transparency around it. Which means that we can color it using color or gradient field players. But firstly, let's add a background. Go to the bottom of the layers panel, click on the add new fill or adjustment layer button and select solid color. In the color picker window, select any color you want to use and click okay. Now let's quickly put this layer under the layer with the image. If you need to change the background color later to better work with your image, simply double click on the layer thumbnail in the layers panel and edit it anytime. If you want, you can also use a gradient with summarize paper texture as a background, but I will leave it with you to decide. Now, let's color this image. There are a few different ways you can do it and in this class, I will share a technique for coloring these type of stylized images using fill layers. Go to create new fill or adjustment layer button and select solid color. Select any color you want to use for your image and click "Okay". Make sure that these new solid color layer is above the smart object layer and then hold in on the old key collectively in the solid color layer and the smart object layer when this arrow appears. This will cleave the color of your layer to the visible contents or the smart object below and you will fill it with your selected color. Everything should work just fine. But if it doesn't, for example, if you missed the step with the blend in settings, you can also set the blend in mold for the solid color fill layer to screen here. In a similar way, you can color your smart object with a gradient. For now, let's hide this color filler. Then select the smart object layer in the layers panel, and then holding down the old key, go and pick a gradient fill layer from the same menu. Holding down old it allows you to cleave the new radius fill layer to your image layer straightaway. You will be able to see how the gradient fills visible elements in your image. In the gradient cell window which open, when you create a new gradient filler area, you can set up your gradient. Click on the gradient thumbnail, to open the gradient editor window and then either pick a gradient from the presets or set your own colors by clicking on the color stops and selecting colors using the color picker. Two colors look nice. But you can get an even more fun screen printed group by adding more colors stops to your gradient by clicking just under the gradient slider like this. Then set this new color stops to any color you want to use and move it to the desired location. When you are done with the gradient editor, click "Okay" to apply your selected gradient.. Whilst in the gradient fill widow is still open, you can further explore other gradients settings. For example, by trying out different gradients style here, will change in your gradients scale or rotation angle. You can also move your gradient around the canvas, holding down your mouse button to mainly position it in relation to the image. You can also reverse the gradient you don't want to click. If necessary, reset the enlightenment, to its default setting. When you're done, press "Okay" to apply your gradient. If you need to edit it that again, just double-click on its thumbnail in the layers down. These are a couple of easy ways of coloring these kinds of images. Another way is by using gradient maps. If you want to create a duotones or any kind of know everything about duotones in my class, mastering duotones in Photoshop. Now, this effect is for the setup. Next, let's have a look at how you can apply the same effect on other images. 9. Applying the Effect to Other Images: With your effect ready and working, you can now easily apply it to any other image. It is a good idea to save and keep the effects Master file as it is, neatly organized with just one image inside of it, so you can easily reuse it later. To apply the same effect for other images, press "Command Shift S" or "Control Shift S" in the Windows and see if it will be pulled as file under a different name for every new image you stylize. Now in your duplicate document, double-click on the "Smart Object Layer" thumbnail to open it's contents and then double-click on the "Smart Object" containing the source image here. Now we're in the third level document which should only contain an Image Layer. Now go to another Image file, copy the image and then paste in your image into this Smart Object Document, and then remove the original Image Layer. Scale and position your new image within your format as you want. Save this document and close it. Now back in your second level document. Turn the visibility of Black and White and Filter Gallery filters off. Double-click on the "Levels" filter to edit it's settings to work with your new image. If your image is very different from the one we used, you can reset the settings by holding down the "Alt" key and clicking on the "Reset" button, which will appear in the place of the Cancel button. Adjust your new image from scratch using the eye droppers to set White and Black points or by moving these toggles from the Input Levels slider. After levels are adjusted, turn "Black and White adjustments" back on and edit their settings if required. When the image looks good, turn the "Filter Gallery" filters back on and adjust them if necessary. Start by playing around with the Intensity and the Contrast settings over the Grain Effect, and see how they alter the look of your image. Then switch to the "Torn Edges" effect and adjust the image balance and the Contrast settings, but keep the Smoothness set to 14 or 15. Change one thing at a time with little steps to fine tune the look of your image. Go between "Torn Edges" and "Grain" settings to adjust both settings further if necessary. Good effect come from trial and error, so experiment and adjust the settings until you get the look you're after and then apply changes. I can give you examples for every kind of image and situation, but I have attached an effect reference PDF containing a few examples with different settings which you can download from the Projects and Resources tab here. After you have finished adjusting the effects, save the "Smart Object Document" and then go into the "Main Document" and change the colors to achieve the desired effect. Since you will be working with Fill Layers to color the image, you can easily try out different options and keep a number of color versions within one document by creating different Fill Layers, and keeping only one of them visible a time. Just make sure that all of them are clipped to the Smart Object Layer to be able to use them properly. Play around with applying this effect to different images. Try different color versions and have fun. Next, let's have a look at how we can create more complex multi-colored grain images or designs. 10. Creating Multicolour Compositions: If you want to use a few different colors in your image or design and imitate a look of printing there is more than one ink. You can do this by using a few smart objects and coloring them separately. It is best to start working from this third level "Source" document. So start by going into it. Then get the composition you want to use and drag all of its elements into this document. I'm using this image here, which is already cut into two separate layers. I won't get into how to cut and arrange things in this class because it is a separate story. So if you want to learn about cutting and coloring techniques in Photoshop please checkout my Digital Collage class. After you have placed all of the elements into this document, save it and go back into your second level smart object document. Here, make all the necessary adjustments to make this image look the way you want it to look overall, following the same process as I've shown in the previous meeting. When everything looks good, save this document, close it, and then go back to your master file. In your master file, now you will need to create as many separate, smart project layers as the number of different colors you want to use. In my case it is just two. To create a copy of the smart object. Right-click on "Layer" in the layers panel and in the menu which will appear choose "New Smart Object via Copy". It is crucial that you create in your smart object via copy and not simply duplicate this label. Because if you duplicate it, the contents of these two smart objects will lead to the same smart object within, which is not what you need. So this step is a very important. Repeat the process to create the required number of separate smart objects for each color you want to use and I will still with my two. After you have created the required number of smart objects, now you can start editing their contents. To avoid confusion, make sure that you don't have a document open at the same time. Then double-click on the first smart object layer. Then double-click again on the smart object inside this smart object to get back to the source. In the third level document, decide which element you want to keep in this object and height would deliver layers for the elements which you want to color differently. Then save this document and close it. After that save the second level smart object document and close as well. Now back in the master file, double-click on the second smart object, and when it opens, double-click on the smart object inside of it. Remember which elements are kept in the other smart object and hide or delete it from this one. Since I'm only working with two elements. I am done. If you have more than two, then hide anything else, you don't want to be colored together with the selected element. When ready save the document and close it. Since we have separated the image, if necessary, you can further tweak the adjustments and the fields or settings for a particular element in your second level document. For example, like this. This is super useful especially when you are working with compositions which have both very dark and redder light elements. Because it allows you to compensate for the difference and to keep as many details as you want in every element. When ready, save this document, close it, and go back into the master file. If you have more than two smart objects, which you want to color differently, making the process with the remaining smart objects and isolate the elements for separate coloring. When ready, create separate fill layers for each smart object. Place each fill layer above its respective smart object layer, which you want to color and clip it to it. Then go and change the colors until you've created [inaudible]. that's how you create a multi-color design was this effect. Next, lets have a look at [inaudible] and saving your images, for your desired output. 11. Scaling & Saving Your Work: As I mentioned in the beginning of this class, the size of the grain and hands [inaudible] or detail is determined by the pixel dimensions of the document containing the image the effects are applied to. If we have changed the resolution of the Smart Object Document to 600 DPI to begin with. If you want to have larger green, you can reduce it back to 300 DPI or to any other value in-between. If you want to have an even more delicate grain, use even higher resolution. But bear in mind that the larger the file, the longer it will take to render the effects. If you will too high, your Photoshop will freeze or crash. If you're working in a document which is larger than what you ultimately need, for example, if you need an A4 document and not an A3 but you are generally happy with how everything looks, instead of changing the size of your developmental document, it is better to scale down the flattened image instead. To do this, go to the menu in the top right corner of the layers panel and select Flatten image. Then either crop your image to the desired size and resolution using the crop tool and crop settings in the Options bar, or open the image size dialog, change its size here, set resampling method to Bicubic Sharper, and apply changes. If you're planning to print your image, convert your flattened document to CMYK price even if your printers require files in CMYK. Or if you are working in back and white, convert it to grayscale to ensure you just a proper black and white print without any tinting. Then press Command Shift S or Control Shift S in the Windows, and save your work in JPEG or PNG format if you're planning to put it online or save it as TIFF or PDF if you want to print it. If you have flattened your image prior saving, be careful not to overwrite your developmental PSD file containing your smart object and the field layers. If you want to share your work as a Skillshare projects, we're sure we will allow you to scale the flattened image down to about 1200 to 1600 pixels wide, which will be also useful for posting on social media. Then save your image in a JPEG format, and use the quality slider here to make sure it does honor the two megabyte file size limit. You're good to go. 12. Final Thoughts & Conclusion: [MUSIC] That's it for this class. I hope you have enjoyed it and you'll find some interesting creative pieces for this effect in your work. This technique rule also as a further visual development for the projects in our other classes. For example, scanner glitch to give this counts a more finished look like I have done here. All sorts of mixed serious projects could also benefit from applying this effect because it allows to reward their original sourced images into something new with potentially and better quality and resolution. If you like sterilizing in distressing images and enjoy learning how to create different graphic effects in Photoshop, don't hesitate to check out our other Photoshop effects classes which you can find on our profile. If you are particularly into the grainy look, be sure to check out our class so we can zero ckeck for the copy effects in Photoshop. To learn our special versatile technique for distressing graphics, type Allegro photographs and for creating unique grade textures. If you like this course, please give review so more people could discover it. If you have any sort of questions, leave a comment on the community board for this class and I will have an answer and provide feedback. Be sure to follow us here on Skillshare, to be the first to know about our new classes. I cannot wait to see what you create using this technique and hear about your experience. Make sure to post your work in the project section for this class. If you're going to share your work on Instagram, please tag us at attitude creator and use the attitude skills hashtag, so we can easily find your posts. Also, don't hesitate to follow our page on Facebook to see what we're up to. Get all the latest updates send us private messages if you need to get in touch about something and look to this if you have a feature in our students spotlight gallery. Thank you for watching this class. I hope to see you in our other classes.