a messy blog of muse

Katie Brooks on Instagram

* if you want, you can always give smart sharpen a try, rather than just using sharpen. you can control the amount and how it’ll affect the surrounding area, rather than just an overall application of sharpness.

* photo filters are also a neat thing and can help unify colors of a piece or even set a mood. there are cool and warm filters, along with colors (red, orange, blue, purple, etc)

* i tend to do a separate layer filled with grey (7f7f7f), then noise > add noise > gaussian at around 3-5%, then set that layer to overlay. it adds noise to your picture and helps break up the color of your image and adds a neat effect!

* having trouble with a particular curve of your lineart? use path (pen) tool. trace out the shape that you want and then loop it back around to the origin point. go path > make selection, right click the selection, then use stroke. after that you can just erase any of the line that you do not want.

* if you want a straight line with your brush, click the starting point on the canvas, hold shift and press another point. viola! straight line. 

* if your image looks a bit flat, i find that adding a new curve layer and setting it to ‘linear curve’ helps immensely. 

Bioluminescence | jordan_robins