LOST IN THE CITY

PROJECT PLOT

This new project I'm starting called,"Lost in The City" is about a man who lives downtown of a city. The project begins with him (I'm going to call this man Luke) leaving his apartment to find something to do because he is bored. As he is walking down the street, Luke sees all of these people happily living their lives on the street with others like a biker, some cars, jump roping kids, a tired business man, and a mother and daughter walking together.

When he sees the tired businessman, Luke starts to relate to his sadness for having to do the same boring tasks over and over and not enjoying it. This motivates him to find some activity that will satisfy his need to relax. As he gets to the end of the street, Luke finds someone spray painting a concrete wall. Luke then stops wondering why this man would do graffiti in a public place like this. The artist then responds by saying that he is making a mark in this city because he wants to be self employed, not employed to someone, and that people should spend their time fulfilling their own dreams, not the dreams of others. The artist says that he shows this philosophy through graffiti so others can see his own creations that don't contribute to one single person, but for everyone.

Luke is then inspired to help the artist to create a graffiti mural for all to see. They add abstract images of their imagination. Eventually, some of the neighbors join in the fun and make their own ideas come to life. Now the whole street is full of joy and brightness, and begins to glow from its environment.

Storyboard Sketches Page 1

Storyboard Sketches Page 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

MAKING OF THE PROJECT

City Street Sketch

This project will be made with Photoshop and After Effects. The city street will be made into a long strip for the movement of Luke and the camera. The animations will be made in Photoshop, along with the buildings. Some of the buildings may also be built in Illustrator. The trees, grass, and clouds from my O Bird Animation will be used in this project to save me some major time.

From my city street sketch above, you can see the buildings that were made. The whole buildings won't be shown for the project due to the camera, but the buildings play a vital role in filling the space where Luke will stroll down. Some of the buildings like the apartments to the right will be duplicated, along with windows, trash cans, and light posts in the street. The reason why the blue border is on the image is because I had to scale down my two images when cropping them together to make them aligned.

That is my plan for this project so far. I will eventually write more about this as I work on it, so stay tuned for more updates on Lost in The City!

HOW TO CREATE A CUSTOM BRUSH IN PHOTOSHOP IN A FEW STEPS

Photoshop has a variety of preset brushes to use for projects. But what if the brush you want isn't available? Do you combine brushes together, add objects one at a time, or anything else time consuming?

No need to fear any longer! This quick tutorial will show you how to make a custom brush of your own design in a few steps!

STEP 1

Original Hexagons

Scaled Down Hexagons

The first main step would be to make a new project, then make the shapes for your brush, preferably from the polygon tool. I chose to make hexagons because of it being a simple shape not many people would use. Make sure that there is some variety to your brush by repositioning, rotating, and scaling down your shapes. Once that is done, scale down your shapes to fit the canvas.

STEP 2

The next step would be to select your object(s) for your brush, and go to Edit >Define Brush Settings, or search for it on the Help menu. From there, this pop up will appear. Rename your brush to something relevant- I named mine "Hexagons".

STEP 3

After you have made your brush, it should appear with all of your other brushes. It will then show a number, which represents the brush size made by default. This "default size" comes from how big the pixels were when you first made the brush.

STEP 4

Original Brush Settings

Shape Dynamics Settings

Scattering Settings

Transfer Settings

Select your custom brush and go to the Brush tab on the right tab. From there, you can mess with the different effects like Shape Dynamics and Scattering. Here are some screenshots of each effect I placed. I recommend that your brush has the Opacity Jitter, Flow Jitter, and Size Jitter so your brush's shapes are different and look unique. Feel free to change these settings to your own liking.

STEP 5

Hexagons Shift Position with Cursor Movement

Now that your brush's settings are adjusted, it's time to test them out! I used my brush and found something very interesting. Every time I press my brush down, then move my cursor out, the brush shape will rotate and move at a slanted angle. This is shown above, which I like because it gives the picture perspective.

Hexagons With One Brush Size

Hexagons With Multiple Brush Sizes

Go on and play with your brush settings. Do crazy things like mess with the brush size, opacity, and colors! Above are two example I made with my hexagon brush. The top image contains hexagons made with one single brush size, while the one below contains hexagons with several different brush sizes. I showed it this way so users can compare how different brush sizes affect a project. 

That concludes this tutorial! I will possibly include more tutorials and other posts for upcoming projects of mine.