Creating an Underwater City



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This assignment brings together several existing images into a unique scene.

1. Go to and find a skyline picture of a city of your choice. The picture needs to be in the daytime. Try to get a larger picture so that you have plenty to work with. It should not be an aerial photo, but instead should be taken from ground level. You will have to select the buildings so you can remove the sky, so be sure the buildings in the image are not overly complex or numerous.

Here’s some examples of a city skyline picture:

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2. Open Photoshop.

3. Open your picture.

4. You most likely have only one layer named Background that is locked – double-click on the layer icon…

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to open the New Layer box and name the layer City

5. Click OK, the Background layer should now be named City

6. Click the Pen Tool

7. Make sure Paths is selected in the Pen Tool’s property bar

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8. Zoom in so you can clearly see the tops of your buildings

9. Begin on the left side of your image and click across the tops of your buildings to drop selection points and create paths

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10. Scroll to the right and continue clicking until you reach the right side of your image

11. When you reach the right side of the image, click up the right side then across the top and down the left side then click back on your original selection point to select the entire sky

12. Right-click and choose Make Selection

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13. Set the Feather Radius to 1 and make sure Anti-aliased is checked and New Selection is turned on

Click OK – your path should now be a selection

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14. Take the time now to go around your image and correct any problems with your selection such as including building parts that were not included, or removing sky parts that are included

a. To add to your selection, choose the Lasso Tool and press and hold the Shift key while dragging around the parts you wish to add

b. To delete from your selection, choose the Lasso Tool and press and hold the Alt key while dragging around the parts you with to remove

15. Press the Delete key to remove the sky. Then Deselect the sky.

16. Press and hold the Ctrl key and click the Create a New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers palette

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this should insert a new layer below the City layer (pressing Ctrl ensures that the new layer is at the bottom of the layer stack instead of at the top)

17. Rename the new layer Water

18. Click the Gradient Tool

19. In the Gradient Tool properties bar, click on the actual gradient

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the Gradient Editor window will open

20. Double-click the left Color Stop icon under the gradient

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the Select Stop color: window will open

21. Choose a dark color that will serve as your deepest water color . Click OK

22. Double-click the right Color Stop icon under the gradient

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23. Choose a light color that will serve as your shallow water color Click OK, then click OK again to exit the Gradient Editor

24. Make sure the Water layer is selected

25. Click in the center at the bottom of the Water layer and drag to the top

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when you release the mouse button, the gradient will be applied (if you do not like how your gradient looks, simply undo the gradient by using Ctrl+Z and reapplying it, repeat the process as many times as you need to until you have a gradient you like)

26. The water is too smooth, so let’s add some particulate matter (little animals and sand and plants and stuff floating in the water) to it by clicking Filter then pointing at Noise and clicking Add Noise

27. Set the percentage to around 3 (feel free to set it to what you want, but remember that too much will look unnatural) and set the remaining options to whatever looks best

28. Click the City layer

29. Time to make the buildings look like they are under water – press and hold the Alt key and click the Create new fill or adjustment layer icon at the bottom of the layers palette

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then click Hue/Saturation

30. In the New Layer window, click the Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask box

Click OK to open the Hue/Saturation window

31. Click the Colorize buttonbMove the Hue/Saturation/Lightness sliders left and right until you find a setting you like (you do not have to use the same numbers I used above, but you can use them as a good starting place to fine-tune your buildings)

32. Click the City layer

33. To give the buildings the same particulate matter look as the water, click Filter then point at Blur and click Lens Blur to open the Lens Blur window…

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notice that there are a great many options you can play with (feel free to mess around with things to see what they do and how they change your buildings), but we are mostly interested in the following settings: Radius, Noise Amount, Distribution, and Monochromatic; pay close attention to these settings as they will have the greatest impact on your image (again, you do not have to use the settings shown in the image on the right, but use them a starting point for making your own adjustments)

34. Buildings under water will have moss and other type growth on them, so let’s add that in now by selecting the Brush Tool

35. In the Brush Preset picker, choose the Dry Brush

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36. Make the Brush properties match the settings below (make sure the airbrush is turned on)…

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37. Select the top layer in the layer stack (it should be the Hue/Saturation layer) the press and hold the Alt key and click the new layer icon

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38. Click the Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask box

39. Rename the new layer Growth

40. Your layer palette should now look like this…

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41. Change your foreground color to a dark green such as 002200 and the background color to black

42. Change the blending mode of the Growth layer to Overlay

43. Adjust the size of your brush to match the size of your buildings – the [ key will decrease the width of your brush and the ] key will increase the width of your brush in increments

44. Add growth to your buildings – remember that with the airbrush selected you can click and hold the mouse button to slowly add color just as if you were using a spray can of paint – don’t go crazy with the color as we will change to a different foreground color in just a moment and add in even more color

45. You should now have an image similar to this…

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46. Click the Switch Foreground and Background Colors button to make black the foreground color

47. Add in more growth – it is a good idea to fill in the darker areas of your image using black, or to soften overly bright areas of your city with black

48. You should now have an image similar to this…

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you can if you wish at this point change to a different foreground color and add even more varied and unique growth your image, it is up to you

49. Let’s simulate some plants growing from the top of our buildings by selecting the Smudge Tool

50. In the Brush Preset picker, use the Hard Round 5 pixel brush with a Master Diameter set to something small such as 2 px ; also, set the Strength on the Smudge property bar to 80%

51. Click the City layer

52. Zoom in to a rooftop and click and drag up to make it appear plants are growing on them

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change the Master Diameter and the Strength to add more variety to your image

53. Work around your image adding plants wherever you like until you have an image you like

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54. Let’s add in some fish by creating several fish shaped brushes. Go to Google and find atleast five fish pictures to use. Here’s some ideas of fish that would work great.

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55. Click Edit then Define Brush Preset

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to open the Brush Name window

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leave the brush named the default and click OK

56. Close the fish image and click the Brush Tool in your underwater scene

57. Scroll to the bottom of the brush list and select your fish brush

Choose black as your foreground and change the Opacity and Flow to 50% each

58. Insert a new blank layer and name it Fish – make sure it is at the top of the layer stack

59. Change the Master Diameter to an appropriate fish size – generally something around 30 pixels – and begin drawing in fish; create several larger fish of varying darkness then decrease the brush size and add in smaller and smaller fish to complete your school – feel free to make the fish seem to swim among the buildings

60. You should now have an image similar to this…

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61. Repeat the above brush creation and fish addition process to scatter other schools of fish around your image – feel free to select some of your fish and rotate or stretch them slightly so that all of your fish do not look exactly alike

62. You should now have an image similar to this…

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63. When you are happy with your fish, give them a slight blur by clicking Filter and pointing at Blur and clicking Gaussian Blur – use a slight blur, such as between and 1 and 2 pixels (make sure you are using the Fish layer!)

64. Insert a blank layer and name it Ripples and make sure it is at the top of the layers palette

65. Click the Brush Tool and choose the Hard Round 19 pixels brush

66. Change the Master Diameter to between 20 and 50 pixels – exactly what you will use depends on the size of your image

67. Set the Opacity to 35% and the Flow to 100% and change the foreground color to white

68. Draw in some random lines, as in the image below…

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69. Click Filter then point at Blur and click Gaussian Blur

70. Use a Radius of between 20 and 40 pixels depending on the size of your image (the larger your image the larger your radius)

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71. You should now have an image similar to this…

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notice the white variations in the water that add depth – remember that you if you do not like what you have at this point that you can adjust the impact the Water layer has on your overall scene by decreasing the layer’s Opacity until you get something you like

72. Let’s add some seaweeds in front of our buildings by inserting a new blank layer on top of our layer stack and naming it Grass

73. Select the Brush Tool and choose the Grass brush in the Brush Preset picker and make sure the Opacity and Flow are set to 100%

74. Set the background color to black and use the same the same dark green foreground color you used to create the moss on the buildings earlier

75. Choose a brush size that matches the size of your buildings – start with a larger size then vary the size as you add in more grass to give it a nice textured feel; also, try using a slightly lighter green to increase the variety of the grass (but don’t make it too light as it will look unnatural)

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76. Click Filter then point at Blur and click Gaussian Blur and set the Radius to less than .5 (yes, that means under ½)

77. Click Filter then point at Noise and click Add Noise and set the Amount to around 3% (make sure Uniform and Monochromatic are both selected)

78. Now let’s add in some custom created seaweed – insert a new blank layer at the top of your layer stack and name it Seaweed

79. Use the same dark green foreground color and black background color you used before

80. Use a hard, round brush to draw a green line across the middle of your image – the size of the brush depends on the size of your buildings, but something between 10 and 30 pixels tends to work best

81. Click the Brush Tool and select Dune Grass in the Brush Preset picker

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82. Add some grass across the top of your line

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83. Click Edit then point at Transform and click Flip Vertical

84. Add some grass across the top once again

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85. Press Ctrl+T to activate the Free Transform Tool then right click and choose Warp

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notice that your image now has 9 rectangles on it and 8 dark circles…

86. Click and drag the dark circles until the seaweed has a nice, tapered look to it

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adjust your seaweed to something you like – it does not have to look like mine

87. Click Edit then point at Transform and click Rotate then rotate your seaweed so that it is vertical

88. Click Edit then point at Transform and click Scale and resize your seaweed so that the entire stalk fits in your scene

89. Move your seaweed so that it is in the center of your scene

90. Duplicate the Seaweed layer and name the new layer Seaweed2 then hide the original Seaweed layer and make sure Seaweed2 is selected

91. Click Filter then point at Distort and click Shear

92. In the Shear window, click the black vertical line and drag it left or right in several spots to make the seaweed wavy

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93. Hide the Seaweed2 layer and duplicate the Seaweed layer several more times – how many you do is up to you, but keep in mind that too many will look foolish (a good number is 5 or 6) – each time naming the new layer Seaweed3, Seaweed4, etc.

94. For each new seaweed layer, apply the Shear filter but use different settings so that you have several unique stalks

95. Place some stalks in front of your buildings and apply a Gaussian blur of around .5 pixels then resize them to fit your scene

96. Place some stalks behind your buildings and reduce the layer’s Opacity to between and 20% and 30% depending on how far away you want the stalk to seem, then apply a Gaussian blur or around 1 pixel then resize them to fit your scene

97. Move the Grass layer to the top of the layer stack

98. You should now have an image similar to this…

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99. Now let’s add some bubbles, begin by inserting a new layer; name the layer Bubbles and place it at the top of the layer stack

100. Click the Elliptical Marquee Tool

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101. We will insert two different types of bubbles – larger ones that we can scatter throughout our image, and a very small one that we can use to make long bubble trails, as in the image below…

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the image above is zoomed in very tight to help make it clear that even your large bubbles should be rather tiny and your small bubbles should be little more than a white smudge when zoomed out – be careful not to make your bubbles too large as they will look like something out of SpongeBob

102. Zoom in very tight to where you want your large bubble to be and press and hold the Shift key as you draw a circle

103. Fill the circle selection with black

104. Change the Bubbles layer’s blending mode to Linear Dodge (Add)

105. Activate the Inner Glow style

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adjust the other settings until you get a nice looking bubble – keep in mind that your bubble will likely be a much different size than mine and thus your settings will likely be vastly different (it is most important that you change the glow color from yellow to white), so just play with your settings until you get a nice looking bubble

106. Duplicate your Bubbles layer twice – name one Bubbles2 and the other Bubblesmall

107. Return to the Bubbles layer and with your bubble still selected, click the Move Tool then press and hold the Alt key as you click inside the bubble (you must click inside the bubble for this to work) and drag your bubble to another location – when you release the mouse button you should now have two bubbles on your Bubbles layer (if Photoshop inserts a copy of your Bubbles layer you did it wrong…do it again)

108. Repeat the above step until you have a nice set of larger bubbles

109. On the Bubbles2 layer, press Ctrl and click the layer thumbnail to select the bubble

110. Click Edit then Free Transform and make the bubble slightly smaller

111. Change the layer’s Opacity so that the bubble is not so bright (decreasing the size will cause it to be brighter)

112. Repeat the Alt – Move Tool process to scatter these smaller bubbles in with the larger ones

113. Select the Brush Tool with white foreground color and zoom in on the larger bubbles and use a small brush (Soft Round 5 pixels) to add a slight reflection on the top-left portion of each bubble

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the difference is subtle, but obvious when you zoom out (you may need to experiment with the Opacity and Flow until you get a reflection you like)

114. For both the Bubbles and Bubbles2 layers, add a Gaussian Blur of approximately 1 and add Noise of approximately 3%

115. You should now have an image similar to this…

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116. Make the Bubblesmall layer the active layer and decrease the scale of the bubble until it is very tiny then decrease the layer’s Opacity so that the bubble is not overly bright

117. Choose an area of your image that you want a bubble trail coming out of – preferable a rooftop – and move your small bubble there then use the Alt – Move Tool method to create approximately 5 additional small bubbles (remember that bubble trails are almost completely vertical)

118. Press and hold the Ctrl key and click the Bubblesmall layers thumbnail to select all of the bubbles you have created so far, and repeat the Alt – Move Tool method to create more bubbles – continue in this fashion until you have a nice bubble trail – feel free to rotate the bubbles so that you have some good variety in them

119. Create any additional bubble trails you wish to have

120. Add a Gaussian Blur of approximately 1 and add Noise of approximately 3%

121. You should now have an image similar to this…

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122. A final addition to our scene is the shark that claimed the city as his own . Go to Google and find a picture of a shark. And add the shark onto your underwater city.

123. Use the Magic Wand Tool

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click the white area around your shark

124. Click Select then Invert to select just your shark

125. Press Ctrl+C to copy your shark

126. Return to your underwater scene and press Ctrl+V to paste your shark – notice that Photoshop has put it on its own layer, rename this new layer Shark

127. Move the Shark layer so that it is behind the seaweed and the Ripples layers but in front of the buildings and the Fish layers

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128. Use the Free Transform Tool to resize your shark so that it fits your scene then move to a spot you like

129. Save your work to this point in your folder as yourname_underwater_city

130. Depending on which shark you chose, the color of the shark may be considerably different from the surrounding scene, if it is (if it is not, just go on to the next step), you can easily match your shark’s color to the color of the water by clicking Image then pointing at Adjustments and clicking Match Color to bring up the Match Color window

131. Under Image Statistics, change the Source to underwater_city and the Layer to Water

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notice that your shark now has a definite blue tint to it

132. Adjust the Luminance, Color Intensity, and Fade sliders until you have a good color to work with (no, it will not look perfect, we will adjust the shark further in the next step)

133. Press Ctrl+U to open the Hue/Saturation window

134. Adjust the settings until you have something that you like

135. Use the Burn Tool

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to darken the top of your shark (sharks are almost always dark on the top and light on the bottom as it makes them hard to see from above because they blend into the ocean floor as well as hard to see from below as they blend into the bright sky) – don’t go crazy, just give it a gentle darkening with the Exposure on the Burn Tool property bar set to 50%

136. Your underwater city is now complete:

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137. Save your image to your folder

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