Create a surreal retro-future illustration in Photoshop using stock photos, layer styles, and custom patterns.
To start with we need to combine two skulls, one with a nice face, and one with nice horns.
...then place it on top of the second skull.
Add layer masks to both skull layers, and use a soft black brush to mask out the horns of the first skull, and the face of the second.
Use varying brush sizes depending on the size of the area you are masking out.
To remove unwanted blemishes, select the area then go to Edit>Fill and choose Content-Aware to remove it.
When you're done, download your stars background from here, and place it into a new 1200 x 1500px document.
Paste in your skull, and resize it.
Desaturate both the skull and the background layers. First, boost the Contrast and lower the Brightness of the background layer... ...Then boost the Contrast of the skull layer.
Next, download some lightning bolts from here and here. Then open them up in Photoshop.
Go to the Channels panel and click on the channel with the highest contrast between the lightning and the sky (Green, in this case).
Adjust the Brightness and Contrast so that the sky is completely black and the lightning is as white as possible.
Do this for both images, then drop them into your main document. Adjust the size and position.
Change their blending modes to Screen.
Next we'll create some light streaks.
Use the shape tool to draw a white ellipse.
Then go to Filter>Blur>Motion Blur and set the distance to 400px.
Use the perspective transform tool to give it a cone shape.
Now add a Gaussian Blur set to 15px.
Resize and rotate it, and place it behind the skull.
Duplicate this shape several times to add more light streaks, each a different shape and size.
Next we'll add a couple of grids. To do this, first open a new 60px x 60px document, then draw a cross using the line tool set to 5px. Go to Edit>Define Pattern to save the cross as a pattern.
Back in your main document, add a new layer.
Then go to Edit>Fill and choose your new pattern.
Now double click on the layer and add a white color overlay.
Add a pink Outer Glow with the settings shown above.
And add a pink Inner Glow with the settings shown above.
Use the perspective transform tool to shrink the top of the grid.
Then vertically scale it down.
Duplicate this layer, scale it up, and change the colour of the Inner/Outer glows to a bright blue.
Now go back to the skull layer.
Double click on it, and give it a white Outer Glow with the settings shown above.
Next select the line tool set to 5px. Draw a diagonal line from the top left to the centre of the skull. (make sure you have your Smart Guides turned on to find the halfway point of your image)
Duplicate the line and flip it horizontally.
Now merge the two lines into one layer, and duplicate it. Scale it down slightly, holding shift.
Do this four times so you have 5 lines, equal distances apart.
Now lower the opacity of each line by 20% each time.
Next we'll create a star. Use the shape tool to draw a very thin ellipse.
Then motion blur the ellipse by 150px.
Duplicate it, and rotate it 90 degrees.
Give it an Outer Glow using the settings shown above.
Then, in a new layer, use the gradient tool to draw a small, radial, white glow at the centre of the star.
Now you can duplicate the star and add more at varying sizes.
Open the image in Photoshop and select just the cloud area.
Paste it into your main document, flip it vertically, and position it at the top of your image.
Desaturate it, then lower the Brightness and raise the Contrast.
Give it a layer mask, and use the gradient tool to mask out the hard edge.
The last object we'll add is another grid. Just duplicate the blue grid from earlier, and take off the glows. Flip it vertically and position it in the top section of your image.
Take its Opacity down to 50%, and add a layer mask, using the same technique as before with the cloud layer, to gradually mask out the edge.
To add a little more colour to your image, add a Gradient adjustment layer, using a 3 colour gradient with the colours #00ffe4, #ff44f4, and #0a00b2.
Set the layers blending mode to Screen, and it's Opacity to 40%.
Download the paper texture from here, and place it into your main image.
Resize the texture so it's the same size as your image, and change its blending mode to Screen.
Add a blue (#005aff) Solid Colour adjustment layer, and set it's blending mode to Exclusion, and its Opacity to 20%.
Add a blue/grey (#6976a1) Solid Color layer and change its blending mode to Lighten and its Opacity to 30%.
Finally, add a new layer above all the others and fill it with 50% Gray.
Go to Filter>Add Noise and set the amount to 100%.
Change the layer's blending mode to Overlay, and its Opacity to 20%.
