The image is copyrighted and all, you can see it one the image itself, but I was interested in one other thing: The background of this image. The sea and the sky and how it can be done in Photoshop CS quite easily. So here it is people quick and dirty.
Fire up the CS (It is only possible to be done in CS and CS2, because it uses Fibers filter), create a new document, I used 800x600 in 72 dpi.
Make a new layer name it ‘Sky’ and add a gradient like this:
It doesn’t really matter how do you achieve this effect, but I prefer to use Create new fill or adjustment layer (half white half black circle icon in the layers palette) and choose Gradient. This way I can control my gradient fill with more precision. You can use my settings here:
Or make your own!
Next you make a new layer and name it “Sea” and add a new gradient, just like we did the first one:
Here is the result:
Now we have to crop some of the Sea layer, to see the sky. Switch off the Sea layer by clicking the Eye icon beside the layer and grab a Polygonal lasso tool (you can find it under Lasso tool submenu), create a selection where the sky and sea intersect:
Activate the Sea layer again and go Select>Feather> 3 px and than press Delete on your keyboard.
Create a new layer and name it “Waves” and fill it with some color. Choose ‘142337’ for foreground and ‘C7E2FF’ for background color.
Now go Image>Rotate canvas>90CCW and go Filter>Render>Fibers and use these settings:
Next you go Filter>Distort>Glass and set your parameters like this:
Distortion: 2
Smoothness: 9
Texture: Frosted
Scaling: 200%
Rotate the canvas back to normal and here it is now:
And that’s it, you have a good starting point for beautification, I used eraser on a low opacity to erase some of the distance sea and further I used burn/dodge tool to create more realistic waves and this is what became of it:
Add some flying penguins, ice and clouds and you have a genuine scene!
Hope you like this one, until the next time we meet, so long...
maliDM
