Turn Photo into Art

In this Photoshop 7 tutorial we will employ the Equalize, Hard Light, Chalk and Charcoal and Spatter filters to create a painting with strong colors and texture.

Save a copy of the original photo in the clipboard (Select All and Copy).

Click on Image>Adjustments>Invert

Click on Image>Adjustments>Equalize

Save the file with a new name

Open the Layers Box in the Window Menu

Create a new layer with the original image

Set the current layer to Mode: Hard Light

Flatten the image

Click on Filter>Artistic>Cutout

Slide No. of Levels ruler to Maximum (8)

Slide the Edge Simplicity ruler to 4

Slide the Edge Fidelity ruler to 2. Click OK

Click on Edit>Fade Cutout>Luminosity

Set Opacity to 80%. Click OK

Use your best artistic judgement and repeat the process as many times as necessary until you obtain the best coloration and essential detail.

Create a new layer with the original image

Set the current layer to Mode: Hard Light

Click on Filter>Artistic>Cutout

Slide No. of Levels ruler to Maximum (8)

Slide the Edge Simplicity ruler to 4

Slide the Edge Fidelity ruler to 2. Click OK

Click on Edit>Fade Cutout>Luminosity

Set Opacity to 80%. Click OK

Create a duplicate layer by clicking Command-J (or drag the background to the New Layer Icon)

Set the foreground color in the toolbar to a gray tone (approximately 60% black) and the background color to white.

Click on Filter>Sketch>Chalk and Charcoal

Slide the Charcoal Area ruler to 6

Slide the Chalk Area ruler to 20

Slide the Stroke Pressure ruler to 1

Click on Filter>Brush Strokes>Spatter

Set Spray Radius to 10 and Smoothness to 5.

Click OK

Click on Filter>Artistic>Underpainting

Keep the Brush Size at 0

Set the Texture Coverage to 20

Keep the Texture as Canvas and slide the Scaling to 100% and Relief to 4

In Light Direction choose Bottom Left

Click OK

Set the Current Layer to Luminosity in the Layers Palette with 75% Opacity.

Flatten the image and adjust the contrast. Click on Image>Adjustments>Selective Color and add the "final touches" to the digital painting by tweaking the colors and values.

Red Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Yellow Slider: C 0% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 50%
Green Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Cyan Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Blue Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Magenta Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
White Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Neutral Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%
Black Slider: C 50% / M 0% / Y 0% / K 0%