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Loading pre-made textures: Actions...
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Loading Pre-Made Actions: Textures
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1.
Good News!
I'm going to show you how to make a design like the cool wood grain thing to the left and many others... with only one click! Real no-brainer stuff!
It all begins with a trip to the Actions Palette. If you've read my tutorial on Creating An Action, you know this baby can be a real time saver. With the palette, you can record any series of acts and replay them to repeatedly perform routine tasks with a single click. It also come with a few pre made actions Adobe thinks you might need. But the real fun is hidden! Go to the little triangle in the upper right of the actions palette and click on it to access the command menu. Choose Load Actions....
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2.
Once you make that choice you'll have to navigate to wherever your Photoshop Application is and delve
into it. To the left you can see the reverse order of where I'm going. I want to access the
Actions folder, which is inside the Adobe Photoshop Only folder, in the Goodies folder, etc..
This Goodies folder is a great thing. I don't remember when I discovered it. I think it may have been version 4.0, but don't quote me on that. But regardless, I had been using Photoshop casually for a couple years (since 3.0 came out) and I'd never known about the fun extra stuff you can find there.
Once you're in the Actions folder double-click on Textures and a new set of pre-made actions will load into you're palette.
Keep in mind when I wrote this, I was using Photoshop 5.5. Lord only knows what you'll find in your Goodies Folder if you're using a different version. I know version 5.0 had the same stuff, and I think the actions palette has been with us since 4.0. |
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3.
Take a look at what's in
your Actions Palette now.
What we're seeing here are actions that some kind souls have gone to all the trouble of making for us. How nice. All you have to do is select one of them and click the Play Button  . In whatever file (or selection) you have, you'll see the "texture" you selected appear before your eyes in a matter of seconds. The names are pretty good at describing what textures they create (the Bricks action does indeed create cartoon"ish" brick-like things), but you should still try them all out to see what you like. |
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4.
Enough of the boring
stuff! Let's see some of the textures. I'll show you some of the more exotic ones. How they'll
appear for you will depend on the size and resolution of your file. For this one I created a new,
rectangular 6" x 4", 300dpi, RGB file and you're seeing much smaller versions of my images.
To the left, we've got Molten Lead (top) and Cold Lava. Pretty cool stuff. That lava one is quite convincing and the lead one remind me of an aerial view of an asteroid of some lifeless moon. |
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5.
Now let's look at
some of the more colorful ones. To the left, at top, we have the aptly named Neon Rubber Bands. In the
middle you can see Stained Glass. The one on the bottom is named Pastel Glass Tiles.
Remember, all you have to do is have a file open with no area selected (if you want to fill the entire space) and hit the Play Button at the bottom of the Actions Palette with one of these action selected. However if you only want to fill a specific area, load or create a selection with one of the marquee tools.
Everything's very cool except I'm starting to feel a little guilty. Photoshop is doing all the work. Soon I'll be showing all the other kid's on the block my crazy designs and taking all the credit. Let's see if we can salvage a shred of dignity by understanding what's going on.
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6.
Here's that same
texture I showed you in step one above (by the way it's called Split Wood.) If you have your History Palette open while you play an action you get to see an interesting side show. As the multi-step action is made, each task gets a new step in the History of your file. In your Actions Palette, another option is to click the little triangle next to the actions name until it points downward. To the left here you can see part of what Split Wood is made of. Double click any individual step to play it alone. You'll be able to see that most of the actions are made of a combination of several Filters and image adjustments. Most people might see the individual filters as an end. Have you ever tried combining a few of them to produce an effect? This opens up a lot of possibilities. Now see if you can come up with some of your own textures. |
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7.
To the left here, I've
taken that a texture that the actions palette created for me and changed the hue and contrast. I also
duplicated the layer it was on and applied a motion blur, then turned down the layer's opacity. Just
experimenting here. It creates a much more abstract and indistinct background. If you stare at it long
enough you might start to see what looks like a face in the center of the design. See it? Weird! I
think my copy of Photoshop is haunted! |
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8.
Now I'm going to apply an action to a selected area. I had this image of a woman's profile from
another job. I created a layer mask to select the woman without the background. Here's what I did: I
loaded the selection of the woman, and played the action, Pastel Glass Tiles. It was created on it's own layer for me Then I went back to the woman's layer and copied and pasted her above the texture layer. I turned down the opacity slider at the top of the Layers Palette to 55%, so the texture would show through a little. Then I pasted the woman yet again on a second layer above the texture but cranked the contrast way up so that the dark areas were about all that was left. The I turned this layers opacity way down to 5%. That last step made the details of the woman, such as her eyes, a little clearer. Looks cool, no?
Now I think I've done enough work to look myself in the mirror again. I hope you do, too.
Now go load some actions! |
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