Step 1 - Creating the Motion Blur Effect
In Photoshop: Open you're favorite car image. I chose a picture of my
2000 Toyota Celica GTS
for this example. To make things easier and keep the photoshop settings
in line with this tutorial we will size the image down to 1000 pixels
wide. You may also want to boost the saturation a bit to make the car
stand out. Duplicate the background layer and name it
motion.
Now we need to create a selection that we will use a few times in this
tutorial. Grab the polygonal lasso tool (feather radius 1 or 0) and
select the entire outline of the entire car including wheels. Go to
[Select -> Save Selection] and name it
car. Now you
can de-select the selection. On the motion layer go to [Filter ->
Blur -> Motion Blur] with angle 0 and distance of 250 pixels. Create a
layer mask on the motion layer and load the
car
selection [Select -> Load Selection], fill the selection with black
to get the car back into the picture. You may want to take a small brush
to the mask to catch any details you may have missed. You may also want
to paint back some blur where you see reflections in the metal surface
Using a low opacity brush. What we have now should look like the bottom
image on the right.
Step 2 - Spinning and Smoking
Our fast moving
car
wouldn't be very realistic with the wheels just standing there would
it? It's time to add some Photoshop spin! First we need to copy them
into a new image so we can work with them. First, drag the rectangular
marquee tool until you have the entire wheel selected. Go to [Edit
-> Copy Merged] then create a new image and paste the selection into
it. Select [Filter -> Blur -> Radial Blur] with amount set to 50,
method set to spin and best quality. Now copy and paste the image back
in to the main car image on a new layer on top, you may have to lower
the opacity to align the images together. Repeat this technique for the
other one and merge them together into a layer. Now add a layer mask and
blend the images together. You should now have something similar to
this image.
Step 3 - Adding Smoke and Finishing Touches
No
speeding car would be complete without smoke particles coming off the
tires. Lets get to it! Add a new layer on top, fill it with black and
set the layer blending mode to pin light. With black and white as your
foreground / background colors, go to Filter -> [Render ->
Clouds] until you see some nice puffs of smoke around the wheels. Now
add a layer mask and paint out all the excess smoke. With the smoke
layer selected use [Filter -> Blur -> Motion Blur] with a distance
of about 20 pixels. Finally we want to make the image a little more
like a
car ad so lets adjust the background a bit. Select the motion layer. Now load in the
car
selection we saved earlier with inverse checked so we have a nice
selection of the background. Add a Photoshop Hue / Saturation adjustment
layer and check the colorize box. Move the sliders around until the
background complements the car. There you have it, your very own fast
car with the help of
Adobe Photoshop.