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Intro

This tutorial is thanks to a suggestion from one of our community members. If you want to see your suggestion made into a tutorial then please feel free to suggest an idea here.

Final Image

This if the final image that we’ll be creating:

Step 1

Open up a new document (600X500px) and create a new layer called ‘yellow background’. Fill this layer with D5C05F.

Step 2

Now paste in a paper texture (I used one from our ‘Paper Textures‘ freebie post). Reduce this new layer’s opacity to around 25% and set it’s blend mode to ‘multiply’.

Step 3

Now paste in a photo of a poor African child. I went for a particularly striking photo, as the little girl appears to be looking at the viewer. This should create deeper impact. I cut out my photo using the Lasso Selection Tool.

Step 4

Now use a large, soft eraser brush at 20% opacity to brush away the bottom of the photo, blending it smoothly into the main background.

Step 5

Now duplicate your child layer and set the duplicate’s blend mode to ‘hard light’. Reduce it’s layer opacity to 50%.

This creates a more intense photo, but also makes it look a little too dark. I like the shadows, but want to only have them applied to certain areas. I use a soft eraser brush (20% opacity, 30px size) to erase away the main facial feature areas (the eyes, nose, mouth, and also ears a little) on the ‘hard light’ duplicate layer. This makes these areas stand out a little more, whilst retaining the intense shadowing on the rest of the photo.

You can see the hard light layer before and after this erasing process shown below:

Step 6

Now duplicate your original child photo layer and move the duplicate below the original. Reduce it’s opacity to 50% and then apply the radial blur settings shown below (outcome also shown below):

Step 7

Seeing as the eyes are the focal point of the photo I wanted to emphasize them more. To do this I selected the whites of the eyes using the lasso tool and created a new layer called ‘eye whites’. Then I filled the selections with – you guessed it – white! Finally, to make this effect more realistic I changed the layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduce it’s opacity to 50%.

Step 8

Now paste in a photo of a gun (cut out using the lasso tool). Position it to aim at the child’s head (disturbing I know – but this kind of poster needs to have some ’shock factor’). Then duplicate your gun layer and set the duplicate’s blending mode to ‘hard light’ and it’s opacity to 70%. This should really up the contrast of the gun, giving it greater impact, and more a illustrative feel to fit with the poster.

Step 9

Now create a new layer called ‘explosion’ below your child photo layers (but above the bottom radial blurred one). Use your path tool (set on ‘paths’ not ’shape layer’) to draw out an explosion shape stemming from the child’s head. Then in your paths palette select ‘load path as a selection’. Finally, fill your selection shape with a red-dark red linear gradient using your gradient fill tool.

Step 10

Now to utilize the technique of negative space. Use your eyedropper tool to select the background color of the main yellow background and then begin typing out text in this color over your blood explosion shape. This is the the part that is integral to the meaning behind the poster – it carries the real message that there are so many different ways for a child to die. It hopefully exposes the true injustices of life, and shows the irony of the movie like violence that the poster first exhibits.

To make this part effective I choose to reduce my words in size as they got further away from the child, to heighten the effect of an explosion. I also used edit>transform>rotate to create a seemingly random explosion of words. I used Helvetica Neue (Condensed Bold) for my text, but if you don’t have this font you can use whatever looks good.

Step 11

Now to help frame the image a little I created some dark bars at the bottom/top of my image. To create them I simply used my marquee selection tool to create two black rectangles. Then I changed the layer blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduced it’s opacity to 20%.

Step 12

Now I add the main tagline to the bottom of my image. I used a larger font Helvetica Neue and rotated my text once again.

Step 13

Now I add a 3d looking drop shadow effect to my tagline. To do this I duplicate my text and move the bottom layer down 1px and right 1px using my keyboard cursors. Then I duplicate this layer and repeat. I repeat this step over 10 times and then eventually merge all of my shifted text layers together (you may need to rasterize them first). Finally to keep the effect subtle I reduce the opacity of the merged layer to 15%.

Step 14

Now create a new layer called ‘clouds’ below your photo layers, but above your background and ‘bars’ layers. Then change the layer’s blend mode to ‘multiply’ and reduce it’s opacity to 50%. Finally use a large, soft eraser brush at around 20% to erase away all parts of the clouds apart from around the child’s head. This should create some further depth/focus for the image.

Step 15

Now grab the sticky tape image from our Grunge Essentials Freebie Pack. Paste it onto a new top layer and then reduce it’s brightness/saturation. Then rotate it to fit nicely above your main slogan. Finally, reduce it’s opacity to around 80%.

Step 16

Now apply a drop shadow to your sticky tape layer in order to make it appear more 3d.

And We’re Done!

To finish the poster I add another tagline to direct people to a place to donate. I hope that you found this tutorial helpful, and learned some interesting techniques to give your images extra impact. Remember, if you’re going for high impact, then depth, high contrast and boldness all go a long way!