Hiboo's Blog

STEP ONE

OK, I am going to show you how to create 'pixie dust', also known as 'fairy dust' or 'sparks' or 'glowy thingos'. It's a nifty trick to add to your bag, and can really help to make a piece. Please note, this tutorial will only be of any real use to PhotoShop 7 users. ^ and below can probably pick up a tip or two, but wont get the full effect.

First things first, open up the piece you want to add some pixie dust to. I have grabbed a generic piece of abstract from my HD, and colorized it.

STEP TWO

Select the brush tool, and hit up the brush menu. Select the star brush, at 33 pixels, and move spacing out. For a more concentrated line of dust, set the spacing to 4-50%. For a wider, more general burst of dust, jack it up to about 100%.

NB: This technique can be easily modified to give a different effect by simply modifying the style of brush used. For example, you may wish to just have brushed circles, or you may wish to define your owns brushes to get some original effects (like i did in a piece called 'bubble' using a bubble brush..

STEP THREE

Next, click on the 'Shape Dynamics' tab.

Slide the size jitter all the way up to 100%.

This will give you multisized sparks, so they arent all one uniform size.

STEP FOUR

Now, the masterstroke! Go to the scattering tab, check the 'Both Axis' box, and jack it up to about 400%. Look at those sparks fly!

You may also want to jack the 'count' up a bit - i find it helps to have count jitter on 100% if you want to do this.

This is the hard part done, you're well on your way, you little Tinkerbell you~!

STEP FIVE

Now, the all important brushing. Brush the sparks on to the areas you desire. With the settings specified, it should be a walk in the park! Don't forget, for a more localised streak of pixie dust, put the initial spacing to a low amount (20-40%), and for a general blast, jack it up past 100%.

As an additional option, right click on the sparks layer, and click blending modes. Add an outer glow fo your choice for a really full on spark effect!

For more information/clarification, please feel free to download the PSD for this tutorial.

DOWNLOAD .PSD

w00t! All done! Hope this was helpful. If you'd like to know anything else, or give me some feedback, please use the contact form!