The Professional Photoshop Book - Volume 7 2015

CREATE YOUR OWN CREATURE IN BLENDER AND

INSERT IT INTO A PHOTO FOR A REALISTIC LOOK

COMBINE 3D

AND PHOTOS

C

reating an image using one technique is

easy once you have spent time and

mastered it, whether it’s a photo, 3D

creation, or matte painting. However, it can

be a real challenge when it comes to combining a

few techniques together. When a piece of art is

created using multiple and completely different

techniques it can often look quite disjointed. It is

very difficult to get a seamless and realistic look to

the image.

This tutorial will teach you the basics of 3D

modelling and texturing in Blender, and how to

then insert your renders into a photo environment.

MODELLING THE CREATURE

CREATE AND RENDER THE MODEL

Combining 3D art and photos is a tricky task – it

takes a lot of time to make photorealistic renders, so

the render doesn’t ‘drop out’ from the photo. Here

you will learn a few tips to make it easier and faster.

You can use any version of Photoshop for this

tutorial along with Blender. Blender is absolutely

free, and much easier to learn, than other types of

3D software and the skills you get from this tutorial

would be enough to make your own character. You

can download the latest version of Blender for your

system at http://www.blender.org.

After you have installed it, you are ready to start

this tutorial and create your very own 3D!

01

SET UP THE SCENE

First, launch Blender, and then adjust the

render parameters: change the render type to Cycles

at the top of the screen – it gives a much more

beautiful result, then change the render resolution on

the right to 1200x1500 pixels, and don’t forget to set

100% in the window below. To reduce the noise, go

to Sampling, and make at least 500 samples.

02

CREATE THE BASE MESH

You can use the cube in the centre of the

scene. Select it with the right mouse button, change

the shading to Soft on the left of the screen. Now the

shading will be smoother than before. To make it

even smoother, you will need to apply a modifier. Go

to Modifiers inset in the right-hand toolbar, select

Subdivision Surface and change the Subdivisions

Parameter to 2 and 2. Now the cube is a sphere.

03

MODIFY THE BASE MESH AND

MAKE TENTACLES

The buttons you will need are: G for Grab, S for Scale,

R for Rotate, and E for Extrude. Switch to the Edit

mode below. Change selection type to Face Select,

select the top polygon of the cube, press E and grab

the new border a bit higher. You will see how the

form of the cube changes. Extruding the bottom

polygons and making them smaller will help you to

make curvy tentacles.

FROM BASIC FORM TO

YOUR OWN CREATURE

WORK IN

PROGRESS

Progress 1: Create the basic form

Progress 2: Render the creature

Progress 3: Insert the render

ALEKSEI PUSHILIN

http://www.be.net/plannit

@plann_it

OUR EXPERT

Aleksei Pushilin is a 26-year-old

freelance game artist from

Chelyabinsk, Russia. He loves every

side of game developing – 3D and 2D

assets, characters, environments

and user interfaces. He also enjoys

making maps and navigational

systems in his spare time.

SOURCE FILES

You can find an image of the water

pump on FileSilo, you will also need

photos of autumn leaves to

complete this tutorial – make them

yourself, or grab the ready-to-use

images from FileSilo.

Combine 3D and photos

The Professional Photoshop Book 81

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