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July 10, 2017
Create the Wonder Woman Logo in Photoshop – Photoshop Tutorials
Create the Wonder Woman Logo in Photoshop – Photoshop Tutorials
It’s been a long time since the last time I wrote Photoshop tutorials. A lot of things have happened as I probably mentioned in the past. Right now there are tons of sites with Photoshop tutorials and they all share tons of content so I started to feel it wasn’t necessary for me to keep doing. However, I have been trying to get back to a routine of trying new things back in Photoshop moving away a bit from product design, UI and flat design. Essentially, taking a step back to the good old days of having fun with light effects, textures and that 80s look I miss so much.
So for this tutorial I will show you how to create the Wonder Woman logo with that crazy metal effect using Photoshop. There are several ways to do it, a 3D tool might be the best way, but I decided to try it in Photoshop. I hope you have as much fun doing it as I did 🙂
Photoshop Tutorials
Step 1
The first thing to do is get the basic shape of the Wonder Woman symbol. I recreated this one in Illustrator. You can do everything in Photoshop if you want, I just feel more comfortable using Illustrator as it’s faster for me.
Step 2
Now in Photoshop the secret here is to have all shapes in different layers. You can achieve that by copying and pasting or importing, or even selecting and creating layers from the selection. It doesn’t really matter how you do it as long as you have one layer for each part. We will apply some Layer Styles on the following steps.
Step 3
Select the bottom and biggest shape of the logo, the blue in my image. Then go to Layer>Layer Styles>Bevel & Emboss. Use the values below. We will also add a Texture, Inner Shadow and Color Overlay. You can tweak things here as much as you want. For the Texture, use a metal texture. An easy way to do it is to do a Google search for metal texture images, get the one you like. Open it in Photoshop and select it all, then go to Edit>Define Pattern. You will be able to use that in the Layer Styles then.
Step 4
Here you can see the first layer with the bevel look. It’s important for it to have strong highlights and shadows. Repeat the same process for the other parts and use different colors.
Step 5
Now that you have all layers with effect, make sure to tweak them a little. Notice that I have not only different colors but also different strengths for the parts. The 2 parts that go on top of everything else I added a drop shadow as well to create more depth. Experiment with it.
Step 6
Now the tricky part, add the metal texture. I believe there might be a multitude of ways of doing this, I went with my way, or the way I thought it was the easiest one. So select one of the shapes.
Step 7
Add a new layer and fill it with white.
Step 8
Then go to Filter>Pixelate>Mezzotint. Use Coarse Dots. Make sure that you have white and black for the background color.
Step 9
After that still with the marquee selection active go to Filter>Blur>Motion Blur. Use a high value for the Distance. My image is huge so I used 200 pixels.
Step 10
Because the original logo looks like a very rough metal, we need to make the texture a bit stronger. So go to Image>Adjustments>Levels. Move the black level all the way to the right and the white level a bit to the left. The idea is to increase the contrast. Use the image below for reference.
Step 11
Change the Blend Mode to Linear Burn and play with the opacity. I used around 10-30%.
Step 12
Duplicate the layer and move it down a couple of pixels then change the Blend Mode to Color Dodge at around 80-100% depending on the color of your shape.
Step 13
For the shapes that have different angles I just did the same thing but with one difference. I did different angles of motion blur depending on the angle of the shape. The tip here is to use the Polygonal Lasso Tool to select the right angle for the junctions. Below you can see how I did the first 2 parts of the bottom shape.
Step 14
Repeat that pretty much for every other shape. For the head, this is where you will have to do that 3 more times because of the different angles you get there. It’s the same process, it will require a bit more attention though.
Step 15
Group all shapes into a folder then apply a shadow to that folder. You can also merge the folder if you want. I always forget that I can add layer styles to folders now.
Step 16
Add a new layer and mask it with the shape of the symbol. Then with the Brush Tool paint the sides and bottom with a very soft brush and black for the color. I painted with my brush at 50% so I could have more control. The goal is to create a sort of vignette effect.
Step 17
Add another layer and fill with black. Change the Blend Mode to Color Dodge, then with the brush tool, paint some white spots on your design. Because of the Blend Mode the brush strokes will create a really nice light effect. That’s my favorite trick in Photoshop for light effects. It works all the time.
Conclusion
Add another layer and fill with with black, use it as background. Then, select all layers and duplicate them. After that, merge them onto one layer and go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur. I used 20 for the radius but you can try different values depending on the size of your image. Right after, change the Blend Mode to Overlay at 50%. Duplicate this layer and change the Blend Mode to Screen at 40%. Those 2 layers will give the image more depth, contrast and an interesting glow effect. And that’s it. That’s how to create a design with the effect similar to the Wonder Woman logo you see in the posters out there. As usual, try your way, have fun and check out more of our Photoshop tutorials.
Download Photoshop file
abduzeedo
Jul 10, 2017
Source: Abduzeedo Tutorials
July 9, 2017
Specialty Lenses
Every once in a while, you will find that a wide, normal or telephoto lens just won’t do the job. That is when specialty lenses come into play. They …
Source: CW’s Flipboard Feed
July 9, 2017
Whoa Is Me: Keanu Reeves’ Saddest Roles, From ‘My Own Private Idaho’ to ‘John Wick’
We’ve all seen the Sad Keanu memes, and a number of details from the “Point Break” and “Matrix” star’s biography do indeed point toward tragedy. The actor is known for thrilling us rather than saddening us nevertheless, not that there aren’t a few exceptions to prove the rule (even if none of them involve him eating a sandwich on his lonesome).
With “To the Bone” premiering on Netflix this Friday, take a moment to relive some of Keanu’s saddest performances.
“My Own Private Idaho”
Maybe it’s the fact that he’s acting opposite River Phoenix, a friend who died just two years after Gus Van Sant’s early classic was released, but it’s hard not to feel for Keanu in “My Own Private Idaho.” A soon-to-be-wealthy heir, his Scott is always looking after his narcoleptic best friend (Phoenix, whose character is also in love with his bestie); they cover a lot of ground during their journey, but don’t exactly have a happy destination. Scott is last seen attending his father’s funeral, leaving him financially secure and potentially friendless — if only their bond were as strong as the one between Theodore Logan and Bill S. Preston, Esq.
“Bram Stoker’s Dracula”
Not his best performance, but one of his most ambitious. Bad things have a habit of befalling anyone who hangs around a certain Transylvanian count, whose hunger for blood is insatiable. Jonathan Harker doesn’t have an easy go of it, and neither did Keanu after Francis Ford Coppola’s take on that most famous of vampires as released: Much of the “Keanu can’t act” discourse centers around “Dracula,” which few would argue finds him at this best. But it does demonstrate how internalized the oft-underrated actor’s style can be, as though it’s more difficult for him to coax whatever emotions he might be feeling to the surface than it is for other performers. That’s sad in and of itself, and a reminder that Keanu’s talents are better suited to a certain kind of material.
“The Matrix Revolutions”
The final chapter in the “Matrix” trilogy made pretty much everybody sad, though not necessarily for the right seasons. Still, there’s no denying that the film finds Neo at his most forlorn — forced to soldier on after the death of his beloved, he eventually makes the ultimate sacrifice to ensure that no more lives are lost in the Great Robot War (that’s what it’s called, right?). All the fun and action of the original movie (and, to a lesser extent, the first sequel as well) gradually give way to a brooding, at times laborious atmosphere of dread. Talk about bogus.
“A Scanner Darkly”
“I saw death rising from the earth, from the ground itself, in one blue field…a present for my friends at Thanksgiving.” Richard Linklater’s rotoscoped adaptation of the Philip K. Dick novel shifts tones throughout, but the book’s status as a memorial to the author’s friends whom drugs got the best of informs its melancholy arc. Keanu plays a detective who’s in over his head without realizing it, and though the film is mordantly funny it’s also increasingly sad — especially as concerns the animated gumshoe. Substance D: just say no.
“John Wick”
Widely seen as a return to form for the action star, this franchise-starter is also born of grief. Reeves plays the title character, who’s already mourning his wife when bad guys with no idea what they’ve just done kill his precious doggo. The despair this instills in our trigger-happy hero is nothing compared to the grief he visits upon his enemies. As is often the case in his action movies, though, Reeves doesn’t delight in taking lives and exacting vengeance — there’s a certain melancholy to his murder, and neither his wife nor his pup is ever far from his mind.
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Source: IndieWire film
July 9, 2017
‘The Amazing Spider-Man 3’ Would Have Brought Characters Back From the Dead — Watch
“The Amazing Spider-Man 3” will never see the light of day, which many consider a good thing. The first two films starring Andrew Garfield as everyone’s favorite web-slinger inspired a lukewarm reaction, while the just-released “Spider-Man: Homecoming” has earned much more positive notices. A new video looks back at what might have been in the third chapter of Marc Webb’s trilogy, including a resurrection subplot that sounds fairly out-there.
READ MORE: ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ Score: Stream Michael Giacchino’s Latest Soundtrack
“Part of the discussion was that, possibly in ‘3,’ there was this idea at one point that Spider-Man would be able to take this formula and regenerate the people in his life that had died,” says Dennis Leary, who played Captain George Stacy, in the video. “So there was this discussion that Captain Stacy would come back even bigger in episode three.” Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) might have returned from the dead as well.
Doctor Octopus, Green Goblin, Rhino, Vulture, Kraven the Hunter and a to-be-named sixth villain were potentially in the mix as well. Watch the full video below.
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Source: IndieWire film
July 9, 2017
‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’ Score: Stream Michael Giacchino’s Latest Soundtrack
“Spider-Man: Homecoming” appears to be the return to form that fans have been longing for, as the friendly neighborhood superhero movie has opened to favorable reviews and beaucoup bucks at the box office. Amid the praise for star Tom Holland and the diverse ensemble around him, warm words have also been reserved for composer Michael Giacchino. His score is now available on Spotify; stream it here.
READ MORE: ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ Soundtrack: Listen to Michael Giacchino’s Score
Featuring such punny titles as “No Vault of His Own,” “Pop Vulture” and “A Stark Contrast,” the OST consists of 22 tracks. Giacchino, who’s won an Emmy for his work on “Lost” and an Academy Award and Golden Globe for “Up,” has also composed the scores for such films as “Rogue One,” “Let Me In,” “Jurassic World,” “Doctor Strange” and “War for the Planet of the Apes.”
Here’s the tracklist:
- “Theme From Spider Man (Original Television Series)”
- “The World is Changing”
- “Academic Decommitment”
- “High Tech Heist”
- “On a Ned-to-Know Basis”
- “Drag Racing / An Old Van Rundown”
- “Webbed Surveillance”
- “No Vault of His Own”
- “Monumental Meltdown”
- “The Baby Monitor Protocol”
- “A Boatload of Trouble Part 1”
- “A Boatload of Trouble Part 2”
- “Ferry Dust Up”
- “Stark Raving Mad”
- “Pop Vulture”
- “Bussed a Move”
- “Lift Off”
- “Fly-By-Night Operation”
- “Vulture Clash”
- “A Stark Contrast”
- “No Frills Proto COOL!”
- “Spider-Man: Homecoming Suite”
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Source: IndieWire film
July 9, 2017
Kanye West Biopic: Trey Edward Shults Wants to Follow ‘It Comes at Night’ with a Movie About Yeezy
In his first two films, Trey Edward Shults has focused on families in crisis. The drama is interpersonal in “Krisha,” while “It Comes at Night” adds a post-apocalyptic bent to the filial drama. In a new interview with the Independent, the ascendant writer/director says he says something entirely different in mind for a future project: a movie about Kanye West.
READ MORE: ‘It Comes at Night’: Why A24 Took a Gamble on a New Filmmaker’s Ambitious Horror Vision
“I have a dream of doing a Kanye West biopic,” says Shults. “My dream is he will somehow see and like my movies and let me pick his brain apart — to make the ultimate one-of-a-kind biopic we haven’t yet seen [that will] explore this man. I think it’d be amazing. There’s so much to explore. I just want to chill out with Kanye and make something great. I think he’ll like this next movie that I’m writing.”
Sounds like A24 needs to have its people reach out to Kanye’s people and see what they can make happen. As for Shults’ next project, he’s vague on details but does hint that he’s going in a new direction: “It’s not genre and it’s not one location.” Read the full interview here.
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Source: IndieWire film
July 9, 2017
‘A Ghost Story’ and ‘The Big Sick’ Sustain Indie Box Office Surge
“A Ghost Story” (A24) joined the recent surge of strong limited openers. Boasting top reviews, David Lowery’s offbeat Sundance hit nabbed a wider than usual arthouse audience. A24 is terrific with the right project at casting a wider specialized market net, so this should join several recent titles led by “The Big Sick” (Amazon Studios/Lionsgate) and “The Beguiled” (Focus Features) that have found wider interest as they expand.
This weekend, as breakout “The Big Sick” reaches a wider audience, it’s on its way to becoming the biggest specialized release of 2017 so far — and Amazon’s biggest grosser to date. It looks perfectly positioned for its nationwide break this Friday.
Syria documentary, likely Oscar-contender “City of Ghosts” (IFC) opened in New York only, landing high-end reviews for a reality-based theatrical release.
Opening
A Ghost Story (A24) – Metacritic: 87; Festivals include: Sundance, Seattle, BAM 2017
$108,067 in 4 theaters; PTA (per theater average): $27,017
The summer parade of specialized limited opening successes continues with Sundance entry “A Ghost Story.” Another in a series of films to open with top theater initial averages of over $25,000 in New York and Los Angeles (a rarity for most of this year), it is A24’s biggest platform opener of 2017 (their best since “20th Century Women” at Christmas).
Like indie breakout Colin Trevorrow, who followed a studio franchise smash with indie “The Book of Henry,” David Lowery (“Ain’t Them Body Saints”) followed Disney’s “Pete’s Dragon” with low-budget effort “A Ghost Story.” The supernatural tale of a dead husband returning in a sheet to observe his mourning wife rejoins “Saints” stars Casey Affleck (in his first film since his Oscar win) and Rooney Mara. This time, Lowery kept his feet as an emerging director working within his earlier milieu.
What comes next: Similar to other appealing recent successes, this will have a careful but aggressive expansion before reaching a nationwide footprint in a few weeks.
“City of Ghosts”
Photo courtesy of Amazon Studios / A&E IndieFilms / IFC Films.
City of Ghosts (IFC) – Metacritic: 86; Festivals include: Sundance, San Francisco, Tribeca, Seattle 2017
$16,240 in 2 theaters; PTA: $ 8,120
Also backed by Amazon, Matthew Heineman’s follow-up to Oscar-nominated “Cartel Land” shows first-hand recording of life under ISIS. The documentary scored strong reviews and a decent initial response in its two New York theaters. The spate of recent Middle East region war documentaries hasn’t been an easy sell, but this gross shows that with the right push they can be viable.
What comes next: Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington D.C. come aboard next week
“The Little Hours”
Gunpowder & Sky
Week Two
The Little Hours (Gunsmoke & Powder)
$193,750 in 36 theaters (+34); PTA: $5,236; Cumulative: $282,023
The little bawdy nun comedy that could had a decent expansion with sufficient exposure that its further growth to over 100 theaters this Friday looks positioned for similar success.
The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman’s Portrait Photography (Neon)
$12,785 in 8 theaters (+5); PTA: $1,598; Cumulative: $40,318
Lesser results than normal for an Errol Morris documentary. This report on a woman whose art encompassed Polaroid pictures broadened to a handful of new cities to minor results.
“13 Minutes”
13 Minutes (Sony Pictures Classics)
$16,174 in 9 theaters (+6); PTA: $1,797; Cumulative: $36,374
Little traction for this 1939 Hitler assassination attempt recreation as it expanded into a handful of additional theaters.
Ongoing/expanding (Grosses over $50,000 in under 1,000 theaters)
The Big Sick (Lionsgate) Week 3
$3,650,000 in 366 theaters (+255); Cumulative: $6,920,000
With its third weekend, Amazon’s romantic cross-cultural dramedy looks to break out into a major mainstream success. In around 300 fewer theaters than “The Beguiled” last weekend, this grossed about $500,000 more, and placed #8 for the weekend despite its modest theater count. Lionsgate goes wide next weekend with a top five placement likely. This could easily become Amazon’s biggest hit yet.
“The Beguiled”
The Beguiled (Focus) Week 3
$2,086,000 in 941 theaters (+267); Cumulative: $7,436,000
The aggressive expansion of Sofia Coppola’s Civil War Gothic tale is accumulating a good total. The gross for the third weekend is slightly ahead of Focus’ “The Zookeeper’s Wife” a few months ago, which was at slightly more theaters (total: $10 million). This looks to reach somewhere in the low teens. That would make it Coppola’s third biggest film after “Lost in Translation” and “Marie Antoinette” (the latter’s adjusted gross is $21 million).
The Hero (The Orchard) Week 5
$651,330 in 447 theaters (+46); Cumulative: $2,810,000
Sam Elliott’s late career triumph as an aging actor summing up his life continues to attract moderate interest with a chance to get to $5 million.
Beatriz at Dinner (Roadside Attractions) Week 5
$518,765 in 417 theaters (-266); Cumulative: $5,980,000
Miguel Arteta’s zeitgeisty meeting of income disparate folks is winding down after a rapid wider release but still looks to end up somewhat over $7 million. Getting out ahead of several other films was a smart move for Roadside.
Maudie (Sony Pictures Classics) Week 10
$190,462 in 67 theaters (+35); Cumulative: $3,203,000
Now with most of its dates in the U.S. (this Canadian co-production opened earlier in the North, which still represents the majority of the total). This story about a rural painter is retaining word of mouth despite considerable competition as it expands wider.
Paris Can Wait (Sony Pictures Classics) Week 9
$158,766 in 131 theaters (-83); Cumulative: $5,065,000
Eleanor Coppola’s French road trip is declining late in its strong run as an early harbinger of the summer specialized revival.
The Book of Henry (Focus) Week 4
$ 96,550 in 154 theaters (-209); Cumulative: $4,218,000
Going wider initially boosted the total, but Colin Trevorrow’s return to smaller-scale film making is fading fast with few theaters left in only its fourth weekend.
The Exception (A24) Week 6
$69,900 in 48 theaters (no change); Cumulative: $518,962
Christopher Plummer as Kaiser Wilhelm II in exile continues to do modest business as another World War II related film tries to attract older audiences.
The Women’s Balcony (Menemsha) – Week 17
$53,469 in 23 (-4) theaters; Cumulative: $851,375
Slowly inching toward a possible $1 million gross, this Israeli religious drama continues to do decent business.
Also noted:
Lost in Paris (Oscilloscope) – $21,000 in 5 theaters; Cunulative: $38,666
Churchill (Cohen) – $13,402 in 17 theaters; Cumulative: $1,219,00
The Bad Batch (Neon) – $9,336 in 25 theaters; Cumulative: $169,546 (also available on Video on Demand)
My Journey Through French Cinema (Cohen) – $6,420 in 4 theaters; Cumulative: $36,360
Source: IndieWire film
July 8, 2017
Writing 101: A Simple Breakdown of How to Structure Your Screenplay
Navigating the monomyth is a tedious, arduous, and confusing endeavor for any hero on their journey, but it’s even more so for screenwriters.
One seemingly straightforward but surprisingly complicated things about writing a screenplay is story structure. Plenty of screenwriting gurus have offered their two cents on what a well-structured script should look like, but Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey, or monomyth, is perhaps the most widely known and template for crafting stories, and is arguably one of the most accessible for new writers. If you want to get a real handle on story structure, Film Riot has shared an excerpt from Seth Worley’s Writing 101 online screenwriting course that will really help you out.
Even though the excerpt is just an introduction to screenwriting basics, it breaks down the most important and fundamental elements of the craft. Not nailing down your story’s structure is like dropping your audience in the middle of nowhere without a map and expecting them to make it all the way home. It can be done, but 1.) it probably won’t, and 2.) if it is, your audience will be super pissed when they get there.
Source: NoFilmSchool
July 8, 2017
Watch: Learn How to Fly a Drone in 7 Minutes
If you’re ready to take to the skies with your first drone, you’ll want to learn the basics first.
Drone technology is getting better and better every year, making it easier for beginners to take it out of the box and take to the skies. However, even the most basic drone has a bit of a learning curve. So, if you’re ready to shoot some sweet aerial shots but don’t really know how to get off the ground, this video from Darious Britt of D4Darious shows you the basics of drone operation, from rules and regulations you need to follow before you take off to flight exercises you can practice once you’re in the air. Check it out below:
There’s more to flying a drone than being able to pull off sweet moves. Great drone pilots aren’t just those capable of doing advanced aerial maneuvers, they’re those who are capable of doing them safely. Know the rules and regulations in your area. If you’re in the U.S., the FAA may require you to register your drone, but it has actually relaxed its rules to allow hobbyists to fly without having to register.
Source: NoFilmSchool
July 7, 2017
Beyond the Basics: Keyframing in Adobe After Effects
Up your After Effects game with these advanced keyframing tips and tricks.
Keyframing is one of the most important and powerful features of Adobe After Effects. Knowing how to apply and manipulate them will help you to become a more seasoned motion graphics artist. Let’s take a look at a few advanced tips and tricks when it comes to working with keyframes in After Effects. We’ll focus on five methods in particular, including precisely editing values, reversing time, changing interpolation, adding roving keyframes, and working with expressions. We’ll use these advanced methods to bring an airplane graphic to life.
Precisely Edit Values
In After Effects, you use keyframes when you want a value of a layer to change over time. Adding two keyframes to a layer at different times with differing values will bring that property to life.
Source: NoFilmSchool