Photoshop Tutorial: Create a Colorful Rainbow Fantasy Scene

In this tutorial, you will learn how to make a cool fantasy scene with balloons and rainbows!

Estimated execution time: around 2 hours.
Difficulty: beginner
Recommended photoshop version: I used CS4 but it should do fine in all the other versions too.

End result:

Author:

Views: 38561

Score: 9.08 / 10

Author earned: $40

Practice tutorial

Tags:ballooncolorfulfantasyrainbow

Step 1

Create a new file with a Width of 1000px and a Height of 1500px at 72 dpi (Dots Per Inch)

Step 2

We are going to use the following picture: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1165462
Just copy it to your Photoshop file and name the layer Balloon.

Credits go to jlacy304 for this awesome picture.

Step 3

Now we are going to erase the sky behind the balloon. There are a lot of different ways to cut or delete things in Photoshop. But for this one we are going to use Color Range. Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) and right click on the image. A drop down list should pop up now, select Color Range. Uncheck Localized Color Cluster and put the Fuzziness to 100. Then click in the left bottom corner of the picture and hit OK. You will notice that the sky is now selected, just hit Delete and head on to the next step.

Step 4

In this step we are going to cut the basket of the balloon. For this step I used the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L), see picture for reference.

Step 5

We don’t need the whole balloon, so we’re going to cut the top off. This time I used the Pen Tool (P), because it has the possibility to make nice curves. If you have problems with this step, try to use the Convert Point Tool (P), which can be found in the same place as the pen tool. When you put your mouse on a pin-point and hold Alt and then drag you will notice that your curve will change. Just play around with it till you get something like the following picture.

Step 6

Link the two pinpoints together until the top part of the balloon is in the path. Right click with your mouse and Make Selection. Use 0px as Feather and hit OK, after that you can just delete that section of the balloon.

Step 7

Now the balloon is just a hard and straight line, but we’re going to change that. Open up the Liquefy (Shift + Ctrl + X) window and use the following settings:
Brush Size: 136
Brush Density: 86
Brush Pressure: 87
Then you just pull up the highlighted areas.

Step 8

We are now going to put some grass on it. First off we start to make a new layer, calling it Grass and set it under the Balloon layer. Second of all we make a background color for the grass. Pick a Soft Brush with a Size of 50pxHardness of 0% and use #618407 as color. With that set you paint a little bit above our balloon. Look at the picture for references.

Step 9

Now we are going to paint the grass on using a standard brush in Photoshop called: Dune Grass. If you can’t find it try to open Preset Manager under the tab Edit.
Click the little arrow on the right and select Reset Brushes then hit OK and there should your brush appear. Now set as your First Color #618407 and your Second #80ac0a. And brush away, I used for the Size 20px close to the sides and a Size of 30px in the middle. Try to make something that looks like the image.

Step 10

To make the grass look a little bit more realistic we are going to use the Dodge (O) and Burn (O) tool. Set the Range to Highlights and the Exposure around the 70%. Dodge some parts on the top and burn the parts close to the balloon, you can also play a little bit with the setting and the places where you use the dodge and where burn.

Step 11

For the next step in this tutorial we are going to use a tree. After some searching I found this picture: http://www.sxc.hu/browse.phtml?f=view&id=854281
Download and open this file in Photoshop.

Credits go to TouTouke for this amazing picture.

Step 12

Just like the balloon we are going to cut the tree out of the picture. First we go to Window and then Channels then select the Blue Channel. If you did this correct your image is now black and white. Grab the Quick Selection Tool (W) and drag a straight line on the right and the left side of the tree. Then go back to the RGB Channel and hit Delete. See the image for reference.

Step 13

You will notice that there is still some blue around and in the tree, we are going to delete that using Color Range. So grab your Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) right click on the image and select Color Range. Use the same settings as we used in Step 3, find a nice blue spot and click on it. When you hit OK you will see that the blue areas of the tree are selected. If you can’t get the selection right because Color Range selects too much try to click on the spot at the left bottom of the tree.

Step 14

Now that we have the sky deleted it is time to get rid of the landscape. Grab the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) and select the landscape, it doesn’t have to be very precise. Look at the image for reference.

Step 15

Select the tree and copy it to our main file. Name the layer Tree and put it behind the Balloon and Grass layer. Rotate and scale it a bit using Transform (Ctrl + T).

Step 16

We are going to scale it all down it a bit. Go to Window and then Layers (F7). Select the first layer, Hold Shift and select the last layer. Go to Edit > Free Transform (Ctrl + T) and scale it down, I also moved it a little bit down to the left bottom corner

Step 17

Now we are going to work on the background. Get your Paint Bucket Tool (G) and fill the Background layer with #6d98bd.

Step 18

I looked at the balloon and I thought that it could use some more color. So we got to Image > Adjustments > Brightness/Contrast and use the following settings:
Brightness: -5
Contrast: +35

Step 19

In this step we will create our own brush. Open a New Window with a Width of 50px and a Height of 50px.

Step 20

Grab the Custom Shape Tool (U) right click on the image and select the Circle Thin Frame.

Step 21

Make a nice circle with it, but make sure you hold Shift when doing this. Stay a little bit away from the edges just like the following image.

Step 22

Now we go to File > Define Brush Preset. Just give it a nice name. If you can’t click on Define Brush Preset go to your Layers panel and deselect your layer, that should do the trick.

Step 23

Now that we have the brush we go back to our main file. Select the Brush Tool (B) right click on the image and select the brush we just made. Leave the Master Diameter on 45px and set White as Color.

Step 24

Make a New Layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) name it Air and brush away! Create a few rings under the balloon, use different diameters, I used the diameters from 2px to 45px. Make it look like the image below

Step 25

You will notice that there is a ring that is actually on the balloon. We are going to make it look like as if the rings come out of the balloon. First grab your Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) and delete that part that is on the top part of the balloon.

Step 26

Now we use our Burn Tool (O) use the following settings and burn the top of the half-circle.
Exposure: 100%
Range: Highlights

Step 27

We now got the following layers: Air, Balloon, Grass and Tree. Select them all and make a Group (Ctrl + G) of it. Name that group Part 1.

Step 28

Right click on the Part 1 group and select Duplicate Group. Select the group and Transform (Ctrl + T) it, scale it a bit down and move it to the right top corner.

Step 29

Now the second part is just a copy of the first one, but we don’t want to look it that way so we are going to do some adjustments. First we go to Edit > Transform > Flip Horizontal.

Step 30

Select the Part 1 Copy group and hit Ctrl + E. When you do this Photoshop will merge all the layers that are inside that group. Now we can use adjustments on it.

Step 31

Go to Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation (Ctrl + U), we want this part a little bit more gray so we reduce the Saturation with 15.

Step 32

Now there are two balloons in the image, but we want to connect them with each other. To do that we are going to use a rainbow. First get the Gradient Tool (G) go to the top left of the screen you see a little colored bar. Click on it, now the Gradient Editor should pop up. Select the Rainbow and leave the settings as they are.

Step 33

Draw a straight line above the empty part of the balloon. Name the layer Rainbow. See the picture for reference.

Step 34

Transform (Ctrl + T) the rainbow. Scale the height down a bit, the right click on the rainbow and select Distort. Hold Shift and Alt while dragging the top right corner to the middle, create something like the picture below.

Step 35

This could be a little bit a difficult step. If you don’t get the result that you want just try again and again and again till you found the right way to do it. Again go to Transform (Ctrl + T) this time we right click and select Warp and try to make it look like that the rainbow is jumping from the one to the other balloon. When you have the result that you wanted place the Rainbow layer behind the Part 1 group.

Step 36

Duplicate (Ctrl + J) the Rainbow layer and apply a Gaussian Blur (Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur…) of 35px.

Step 37

Grab a Brush (B) with a Size of 300px and a Hardness of 0%. Set your color to White and click twice on the beginning of the rainbow. Name the layer White Glow.

Step 38

Pick the Line Tool (U) set the Weight (in the top bar) to 1px, use a White color as front color. Now drag two diagonal line’s trough the glow.

Step 39

Repeat Step 36 and Step 37 for the smaller balloon.

Step 40

We are going to adjust the background a bit. So go to your Layers panel and create a layer called Overlap Background, set your colors to the basics ones: Black and White (D). Go to Filter > Render > Clouds. Set the layer to Luminosity.

Step 41

The clouds look terrible now, so we are going to put a Gaussian Blur over it. Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur… use a Radius of 125px.

Step 42

Now we are going to make some clouds as a finishing touch. Create a New Layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) above the Balloon Layer and name it Clouds. Open up your Brush Panel (F5 or Window > Brushes) and use the following settings for the brush.

Step 43

Brush a cloud in the bottom left corner and one above the first balloon. If you don’t get the result you wanted just delete it and try again.

Step 44

Create a New Layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) beneath our Clouds layer. Name this one Clouds 2. Brush a big cloud in front of our first balloon. Try to click with your brush instead of dragging the cloud. This way you achieve your goal sooner.

Step 45

Copy (Ctrl + J) the Clouds 2 layer and place it beneath the Clouds 2 layer. We want to have a nice shadow from the cloud on our balloon so we are going to make the Clouds 2 Copy black. Go to Image > Adjustments > Invert (Ctrl + I). Drag the layer a little bit down to make it look more realistic.

Step 46

Our Clouds 2 Copy isn’t a real shadow yet. We have to make sure that the layer is only visible on the balloon layer. So we are going to create a Clipping Mask go to Layer > Create Clipping Mask (Ctrl + Alt + G). Now you notice that the shadow is only visible on the balloon. Now Reduce the Opacity of the layer by 20%.

Step 47

Create a New Layer beneath the Part 1 Copy, call it Cloud Tree. As you probably have guessed we are going to make a cloud behind the tree. So grab your brush and brush away.

Step 48

Last but not least, we Create a New Layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) above the Part 1 Copy and paint a little cloud in front of the balloon.

Step 49

And here is our finale image! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and have a nice result :D

If you got stuck, just ask.

35 Comments:

Alan2641 says:

Well done -- great detail and clearly written --- just what a tutorial should be

(2 years and 119 days ago)

Mario says:

It's a good tut but a if you low the opacity of the rainbow around 75% it will be a grate one

(2 years and 117 days ago)

Guest says:

Very Good i like

(2 years and 117 days ago)

Guest says:

A really great tut you must be professional.

(2 years and 117 days ago)

Guest says:

this is kinda wack mines better

(2 years and 117 days ago)

Guest says:

thanks alot great one

(2 years and 117 days ago)

nancy says:

gud one i like the clarity of tut thanx

(2 years and 116 days ago)

Clinge says:

Very good, learned a lot from it

(2 years and 116 days ago)

Guest says:

great

(2 years and 115 days ago)

Guest says:

Great tutorial, but those custom brush settings are really hard to read...
You should save the screen whit those on better quality.

(2 years and 114 days ago)

Guest says:

This is the best

(2 years and 113 days ago)

Guest says:

Loved this one! I just couldnt figure out the clouds lol.. But it was really helpfull!

(2 years and 113 days ago)

gewoontjeerd says:

Hey all, thx for the comments I'd really appreciate it!

For the people that have problems with the brush settings for the cloud. I am going to upload a better image in half an hour, so I hope that you're able to finish you picture then.

(2 years and 113 days ago)

Guest says:

hiiii

(2 years and 113 days ago)

gewoontjeerd says:

Hey all, I tried to put a new image for the brush picture. But I can't edit it anymore :S So I uploaded the image here:
http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/1203/screen42n.png
hope that it helps

(2 years and 111 days ago)

Guest says:

this shit sucks.. i dont understand it at all. its to stupid... ahaha jk i loved it... good work

(2 years and 110 days ago)

Guest says:

im highly enjoying this(: except for step 42. :/

(2 years and 110 days ago)

Guest says:

good foo

(2 years and 110 days ago)

Guest says:

im done ;]

(2 years and 109 days ago)

Guest says:

suck it

(2 years and 105 days ago)

Guest says:

Great

(2 years and 104 days ago)

Guest says:

greaT !!!!

(2 years and 98 days ago)

Guest says:

good and wonderful but i think if you make a tree Light-colored
it will became Do a lot beautiful and fancy

(2 years and 90 days ago)

Guest says:

Very good I liked it

(2 years and 87 days ago)

Guest says:

You Are a good teacher..
it's very wonderful.!!!
always be cherrful..

(2 years and 85 days ago)

Guest says:

Very clear and good fun to do. A real learning curve. Thanks.

(2 years and 80 days ago)

Guest says:

Its very nice tutorial for me !!!

I am done this !!!!

(2 years and 77 days ago)

Lamantine says:

wondeful tutorial !

(2 years and 63 days ago)

Guest says:

好极了

(2 years and 62 days ago)

erathion says:

Very nice work...

(2 years and 56 days ago)

Guest says:

fantastic tuts... like it very much

(2 years and 28 days ago)

Guest says:

very nice tutorial http://www.clippingimages.com

(2 years and 3 days ago)

hereisanoop says:

nice tut

(1 year and 354 days ago)

Guest says:

great tut !!

(1 year and 293 days ago)

Guest says:

evan I good do this! ãccept @tt the clouds there goes something wrong :S Thx

(1 year and 287 days ago)

Leave a Comment

Name:

Comment:

submit