Winter Dream

In this tutorial inspired by the coming Christmass season, you will learn to create glass orbs, put objects into them, and insert the orbs themselves into background.

1. First of all we will create an orb. Create a new file - 200x200, 72 dpi (the size can be different, depending on the size and resolution of your background image)

2. Go to Edit > Fill and fill the image with 50% grey.

3. Go to Filter > Render > Lens flare. Add 105 mm Prime lens flare, 100%, out of the the center.

4. Go to Filter > Distortion > Polar coordinates. Choose Polar to Rectangular

5. Go to Image > Rotate Canvas, 180 degrees.

6. Go to Filters > Distortions > Polar coordinates, set Rectangular to Polar

7. Choose elliptical marquee and starting from one of the corners make a selection of the ball you've created.

8. Open the image you will use as background and make a copy layer*.

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9. Copy the orb selection and paste it into the file with the background image. The orb will automatically be pasted onto new layer.

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10. Put orb layer into screen mode (you can also use hard light mode, but in my case screen mode worked better).

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11. Paste a selection of a girl onto a new layer and put it underneathe the orb layer.

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12. Adjust the orb and the girl figure size with Edit > Transform > Scale command.

13. Adjust orb layer transparency if needed.

14. We will create the orb shadow now. Copy the orb layer and put it under the layer with the girl.

15. Go to Image > Adjustment > Threshold and move the slider to the right until you have only one white spot

16. Starting in the shadow layer Ctrl+Click the orb layer. You will have a round selection. With the magic wand Alt+click the white area of the orb to deselect it.

17. Use gradient tool with Radial gradient setting from the center of the orb shadow selection to the edge.

18. Use Edit > Free transform on the shadow to make it flat. Deselect(Ctrl+D).

19. Use Filters > Blur > Gaussian blur on the shadow.

20. Change shadow layer blending mode to Multiply, reduce transparency. I also used Image > Adjustment > Color balance to add some blue color to fit the background.

21. Go to the background copy layer and Ctrl+click the orb layer to make a selection.

22. Go to Filters > Distort > Spherize and make an outward warp.

23. Now we put in the second ball with a girl inside. Double orb layer and put it on top.

24. To put in another orb repeat steps 9-13

25. Copy shadow layer to put under the second orb, transform it to a bigger size (as the orb is lower)

26. Repeat steps 21-22.

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27. On top of everything add a Text layer and create text you want.

28. Use layer styles of your choice for the text. For this picture I used drop shadow, bevel and emboss, gradient overlay, color overlay, and outer glow styles.

Look at the result:

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*The background image is taken from www.photosite.ua.