www.3dartistonline. com/fi les
Questions and answers ●●
01Prepare the working
layers
Open the PSD fi le named ‘Working Layers’. There are four layers, colour-coded to act as guides to aid in this tutorial: Blue: Middle Guide, Green: Top Guide, Yellow: Side Guide and Grey: Paving. The paving layer is the actual photo source we’ll be creating our seamless texture from. Whenever you make a selection using the colour guide layers, always ensure the Paving layer is the active layer. In the Layers palette, Ctrl/Cmd-click the blue Middle Guide thumbnail. This creates an automatic selection around the blue guide. With the Selection Marque tool and Paving layer active, Ctrl/right-click somewhere in the marching ants on the image and choose Layer via Cut from the drop-down menu. You should now have a square area cut from the paving source on its own layer – name this ‘Middle’. Repeat this process with each of the selection guides and name the layers ‘Top’ and ‘Side’.
02Align the layers
You can hide or delete the Guides and Paving layers now, as they have served their purpose. I’ll continue to use the colour guides for illustration purposes in this next step. In the Layers palette, move the Middle layer so that it sits below the Top and Side layers. Currently, the Side and Top layers are positioned outside of the Middle layer, so we need to position them to sit inside and on top of it. They also need to be moved to the opposite sides. Remaining within the Photoshop Guide boundaries, use the Move tool to drag the Top selection to the inside-bottom edge and the Side selection to the left-inside edge.
03Create a side seam
We can already see how swapping the positions of the Top and Side selections works towards the creation of the new tiling seams. The Side layer is almost perfect – we just need to do a little editing in the top-left corner where there is a visible edge. We also need it to blend in with the paving layer beneath it. Turn off the Top layer so we can see and edit the Side layer. Select the Eraser tool with a soft round brush set to
approximately 80 pixels. Reduce the Opacity to 50% and start to delete the visible edges from the Side layer. You can see the parts I deleted from the Side layer in Image 1. Image 2 displays how both layers look when they are visible. As you can see, the two sections blend very well.
04Build the top seam
Turn the Side layer off and the Top layer on. You may notice that the cracks in the paving from the Top layer do not align perfectly with those from the Middle layer. For now, repeat the process of deleting the obvious layer edge. It might help to reduce the Top layer opacity in the Layers palette so you can see the layer beneath as you work. In Image 3 you can see the areas I have deleted from the Top layer. Image 4 shows how the Top and Middle layers look when active. Now it’s time to turn these layers into an actual texture so we can check the seams and, if required, work with photomanipulation tools.
05Merge layers and save the texture
In the Layers palette, click in the area next to the Top, Middle and Side layer thumbnails. This will select and highlight all three layers. Ctrl/right-click in the highlighted area and select Merge Layers from the drop-down menu. All of the three layers have now merged into one. Click in the new layer thumbnail to make an automatic selection. Ctrl/Cmd-click+C to copy the selection into the clipboard. Create a new image sized 2,048 x 2,048 pixels. Ctrl/Cmd-click+V to paste the selection into the new image. Back in Layers, click the area next to the thumbnail and select Flatten Image, then Save As to your hard drive and name it ‘Texture’.
06Post edits
Go to Filter>Other>Off set and play around with the Horizontal and Vertical sliders to examine the texture for any obvious tiling or seam issues. I tend to use the Healing Brush tool set to Replace and select some grey stone material from the other fl ags to paint over the paler areas. By selecting a fl ag corner or crack from another area in the paving image, I can also paint over and replace areas that need it, such as a paving crack that’s fl awed as a result of earlier editing. Every time you edit your texture at this stage, run the Off set fi lter a few times to check for editing scars.
Join the community at www.3dartistonline.com
The paving image included in this tutorial had undergone some preparation before I included it in the PSD working layers. This was done to save time and text for this tutorial, but should not be overlooked when creating a tiling map from a photo source. Fixing obvious perspective distortion is essential to the success of seamless editing. If the original image is slanted or uneven, then the fi nished texture will be too. With regards to the
technique in this tutorial, there are no rules when it comes to choosing the three sections from a photo source. It just so happened that with the Paving Image, the selections highlighted within this tutorial worked best. You may fi nd in other photo sources that the bottom edge of your main selection tiles better than the top edge, and the same applies to the left or right. The only way to know which is best is to work with all of them.
Image preparation is paramount
• DID YOU KNOW? • All tutorial fi les can also be downloaded from:www.3dartistonline.com/fi les
03 04 05 06 01 02 3DArtist ● 85