Hi,

I have some rather blurry photos of the bar in a local pub - which I am modelling, so I want to recreate the design in PhotoShop rather than pasting the blurry photo on to the texture for the 3D model.

Here is the texture and the photo:

I've used rectangle shape for the top and bottom lips of the bar - not sure how to add depth to that... using some sort of shadowing in layer styles I expect, but how do I re-create the curving lines?

I've tried the pen tool but I'm extremely unpracticed with that so I don't really know how to do this.

I know to click on the pen tool and then position points with the cursor, and I know about using the bezier handles to change the angles of the curves - but that's it. 

I'm not sure how to get the pen tool to actually leave a line behind, or how to make the straight lines and then get the pen tool to make a new line in another layer for the 1st curve - when I try that, the 2nd line becomes connected to the 1st line - despite me moving to a new layer - and it just messes up both lines....

Help!?

Ermm... First, what version of Photoshop do you have?.. it will make a difference in what I could tell you. second.. the Pen tool is for drawing paths.. not for lines.. those have many uses, you would use the pencil tool, to be found in same place as brush and so-on... also, in the shape, for straight lines. you CAN use several options.. depending on what you want to accomplish.. filters can help.. or even edit>transform, to MAKE a line "wandre.

for straight lines.. this is pretty universal, go to shapes in your floating palette and select the straight line looking one.. then, in toolbar, set up the characteristics.. thickness, colour and so-on... the straight line will make just, exactly that.. left-click and hold the start and release at endpoint.. poof, straight line.. a note here... this will show up a a new layer in your layers palette... a good thing to do... when you have things as you want them, select evrything that IS goung to be on the layer.. for SURE .. go to layers palette, "turn OFF anything else.. make invisible.. then use "Merge visible".

One other thing... you CAN selectively "drag" a part of your image by using one of the selection TOOLS on your tool palette.. the one that is always floating there.. .. you van use either of the two .. the top left and the one just below, for specific selections.. just click and hold for the options to appear.

I will check back.. it would really help if I knew what version you are using, though. Lou.

If need's be, I will post a tutorial.. but that will take probably, a day to make.

Quote - Ermm... First, what version of Photoshop do you have?.. it will make a difference in what I could tell you. second.. the Pen tool is for drawing paths.. not for lines.. those have many uses, you would use the pencil tool, to be found in same place as brush and so-on... also, in the shape, for straight lines. you CAN use several options.. depending on what you want to accomplish.. filters can help.. or even edit>transform, to MAKE a line "wandre.

Sorry, I should have said - it's CS4 extended.

"wandre"? sounds French.  If you mean  Transform/warp, I don't think that's acurate enough, I don't think it would make an easily controlable line in the right sort of curve -  not enough crossing points to control with just 16 controlable points - it's not enough.  PLUS could you then apply shadow to that line afterwards?

Yeah for straight lines the line tool is easy - I was using that to define the gaps between floorboards only yesterday.  It's the curve that I find hard to manage. 

I can't hold my pen steady enough to acurately draw a freehand curve, which is why I hoped the pen tool (which can manage beautiful curves) could do it for me.

Quote - for straight lines.. this is pretty universal, go to shapes in your floating palette and select the straight line looking one.. then, in toolbar, set up the characteristics.. thickness, colour and so-on... the straight line will make just, exactly that.. left-click and hold the start and release at endpoint.. poof, straight line.. a note here... this will show up a a new layer in your layers palette... a good thing to do... when you have things as you want them, select evrything that IS goung to be on the layer.. for SURE .. go to layers palette, "turn OFF anything else.. make invisible.. then use "Merge visible".

Yeah, yeah, I do that 'merge visible' and 'stamp visible' stuff a lot - helps no end.

Quote - One other thing... you CAN selectively "drag" a part of your image by using one of the selection TOOLS on your tool palette.. the one that is always floating there.. .. you van use either of the two .. the top left and the one just below, for specific selections.. just click and hold for the options to appear.

Sorry? I didn't quite understand that last bit.

Quote - I will check back.. it would really help if I knew what version you are using, though. Lou. If need's be, I will post a tutorial.. but that will take probably, a day to make.

If there's a way to get more than just 2 control points, I can't find it.

ok... I know you do have Warp... to recreate it.. you would simply select the area.. I see three areas that have to be Warped...using different settings for the two outside areas.. Inside area, I would suggest you use Arch.. don't worry if it seems to go the wrong way.. just grab the anchor square and drag. it does stop at +- 100% but, if you need more, just accept it  then just keep it selected and do the warp again. I suggest you have a try at the different settings, you can achieve quite a spectrum of effects with it. Lou.

mmm.. looke like I am going to have to PM you the image, sorry

  OH!.. what I was talking about... the selection tools.. there is the marquee... several options an Lasso, just below it... most of the tools have several options for use.. if you left click on them, after a second, those will display for you to select one.

  I suggest playing with the controls.. or maybe I said that last time. anyway, hope this helps. Lou.

I think I might have to find out what is involved in the term: ""stroke" your path with the paintbrush" because unfortunately I do not have "Puppet Warp" in this version (CS4 Extended) of PhotoShop.

Normally I have Edit/Transform/Warp, but on a line the normal number of control points (which in my opinion are already too few) are further reduced to just 2 (pairs).

As I posted earlier, (previous pic) this shows the type of transform available for a line - which is "Transform Path" - and as the pic shows, that only gives you 2 places on the line for transforming it, and what's worse is that when you try to move those points they break up to show that they are in 2 parts - one handle for each side of the line.

Giving you this mess:

Now even if I felt I could spend a few hours getting the second handle to within 1 pixel of the first handle - to create the first part of the curve (bending downwards) (I've tried everything I could think of, shift, cntl, alt plus combinations of those, to move both handles at the same time, but I can't get it to select more than just a single handle at a time) - with only 1 pair of handles left to control this line - I could only manage the second part of the curve - up to the centre of the pattern.

So I think I need to understand about this path stroking you briefly mentioned Lucie.

I apologise Archdruid, it seems all your interesting efforts will be wasted, because I don't have this puppet warp you're talking about.  Shame, that was a very helpful and highly detailed looking list of instructions - just the kind I like (cos I can usually follow those ones with pics).

Can I cry now?

Give me an hour or two, I'll do it, take some screenshots and try to explain a little bit more in details, there's a couple of things you're doing and I know why it's not working the way you want to, just need to take some screenshots because I don't think I can explain it with only words...

Attached Link: http://www.finfond.net/temp/strokepath.html

Lucie,

That looks like just what I need, I'm just off out to a local exhibition, so I'll try that when I get back.

Prior to this I tried using 'StampVisible' to collect all the lines I wanted to warp together on a single layer, but as you can see it just isn't possible with so few control points.

Hopefully the method you've outlined (with lovely screenshots!!!) will at least let me create the wavy curves on each line one by one, I just hope I can line them up so they look like the curves of each line match all the others.

I suppose there's no way to draw all the lines (straight) with the pen tool and then use the bezier handles - AS A GROUP - is there?

These are the lines I need to make wavy. Just these horizontal ones, not the vertical ones.

Seems like you have what you were looking for.. but, those instructions were for Edit>Transform> Warp. Lou.

archdruid,

I did find I could get transform warp on a line, but I'm not sure what 'Arch' is, and I still think the number of controls are too few in Warp for what I wanted to do.

Thanks for the details about using that for this job, perhaps it's just that I've only used Warp in a limited number of ways, and so am unused to the method you use, which seems to use a few things as well as warp - or somewhere deeper inside warp than I have used before - and anyway Lucie's method with the pen tool just felt more controllable on this occasion - the bezier handles giving a finer method of adjustment.

The good news is - it worked, so that I now have:

So thanks Lucie, and Archdruid, your help was much appreciated - both of you.

Cool!!  I'm glad it worked for you!  :)

It did, Lucie, very easily in fact.  And I've saved the page you created - so that I have a chance of finding it again, next time I need it.

Of course if I can think of other ways to use this method, then I can get used to doing it, and thus am more likely to remember it.

I actually used your exact method for the upper and lower lines, then reduced the number of points on the line for the smaller curve.  That part would have been possible with using Archdruid's warp instructions (and/or the way I normally use warp) but might not have been able to copy the curve of the upper and lower lines so well as using the bezier handles did.

Do you use the pen tool for anything else, Lucie?

I want to practice with it more and need a reason to use it.

Fran

I do a lot of digital painting in photoshop and I use the pen tool all the time to draw the different shapes, like if I paint a flower I'll use the pen tool to draw the shape of each petal, in that case instead of "stroking" the path I'll "fill" it with the color of my choice.  I'm sure I use it for other purposes, they're just not coming to me now.  It's a really useful tool.

Oh yes?  Are there any tutorials for that sort of thing?  I'd like to have a go at that painting a flower method.

What's the difference between 'filling' a path rather than 'stroking' it?

Stroking a path will paint a line with the brush you've chosen on the path you've drawn, filling a path will fill a shape you're drawn with the pen tool with a color or pattern. 

Jaguarwoman and I wrote a tutorial a while back  that shows how to paint bows which is a bit like painting flowers, my part in it shows how to use paths for it (it's in my little store).  I don't know if there are any others like it elsewhere, probably, I'm sure we didn't invent the wheel, ours is just my own way and Jaguarwoman's way of going about it.  Jaguarwoman also has another one in her store specifically for flowers, not sure if she uses path for it or not though.

Apologies for plugging my own stuff, but I really don't know of other tutorials for this...

Yes, I've been looking around for something, but I keep getting distracted by other interesting sounding tutorials and so I stop and try them, then I get to the point where the author has left numerous gaping holes in their instructions, finally stumbling over the one I can't figure a way around, and thus get disappointed, and frustrated.

I really wish I could just buy stuff when I need it, but I can't.

Oh well. I'll keep looking, and even if I can't learn more about the pen tool, I might be lucky enough to learn something.