Turning Photograph Into Cartoon-Style Picture

Digital Media I

West High School

Susan M. Raymond

Part 1: Creating Outline

• Wondering how those guys on the internet turn photograph into a nice cartoon-style picture? Eager to make one yourself but don't know how to do it? Looking for an Adobe Photoshop tutorial on it but couldn't find any that satisfies your need?

• Search no more. You've already found it!

• Now here's how to turn your favorite photo into a cartoon photo.

• Be aware though, a photo cartoonization process (or cartooning, some people may say) is a patience-demanding job. But the result is very much satisfying.

Rihanna

• Here is the original photo: • Here is the final result of this tutorial:

Step 1: Preparing the Canvas

• First of all, download the original picture of Rihanna here

• Open the original photo in Adobe Photoshop. (In this tutorial I use Adobe Photoshop CS. I haven't got other versions of Adobe Photoshop, but I guess the entire steps described in this tutorial can be applied on any version of Photoshop)

• On choosing the photo to be cartoonized, choose a clear and sharp photo with the face of the person clearly seen. Blur, out of focus, or under-exposed photo is a bad choice. The larger the resolution of the photo is the better

On the 'Layers Palette', drag and drop the 'background' layer to the

'New Layer' button to duplicate it.

Rename the new layer to 'original'. (To rename a layer, right-click on

the name in the Layers Palette and select Layer Properties).

We will keep the original photo (the 'original' layer) intact in case

something ''wrong' happened in our cartooning activity and need the

original picture.

• Lock this layer (click the 'lock all button ), and turn the visibility of this layer off

• Double click the 'background' layer. Click 'OK'

• Create a new layer. Rename it into 'background'. We will use it as background layer for our cartoon photo. Fill it with orange using Paint Bucket tool.

• Move the layer to the bottom.

• Now our layers will look something like this:

Step 2: Removing Unwanted Areas of the Picture

• Isolate the object. Clear out all unwanted parts of the photograph. Use the Magnetic Lasso tool for this

• Take the Pen Tool, create a path around the object (Rihanna for this case), load path as selection (ctrl + Enter), inverse the selection (ctrl + shift + i), cut (del), then deselect the selection (ctrl + D).

• Note: You could use Eraser Tool, Magic Eraser Tool, or Background Eraser Tool which is simpler and faster for this purpose, but the result won't be as professional.

Step 3: Creating Outline of the Photo

• Copy the 'Layer 0' layer (drag

and drop it to the 'create a

new layer' button).

• Rename it to 'outline'.

• Menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Shadow/Highlight...Click OK.

• This step is not a must. But most of the time it will improve the clearness of the outline.

• Make sure color palette is black for the foreground and white for the background. (Press 'd' if they're not).

• Turn the picture into an outline using photocopy filter

• menu: Filter :: Sketch :: Photocopy...

• Set 'Detail' to 3.

• Set 'Darkness' to 8.

• Click 'OK'

• The value for 'Detail' depends on the picture. Most of the time a value of '2' gives the best result.

• Experiment with this setting. The goal is to make the outline as detail as possible so we can recognize the result as Rihanna, but not over-detailed that the outline becomes 'dirty'

• Turn the outline into solid black lines.

• menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Threshold...

• Turn the slider right and left, experiment with it, until the preview displays the best outline you can get (a compromise between 'detail enough' and 'clean enough').

• Click OK when you're satisfied with the result

That's it. Now we're done with the outline.Here's the result so far..

Part 2: Coloring the Skin

• Select the 'outline' layer. Press Ctrl-J to duplicate the layer (or drag and drop it to the 'create a new layer' button). Rename the new layer to 'white'.

• Let's make this layer pure white.

• Choose menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Brightnness/Contrast...

• Move the 'Brightness' slider all the way to the right (+100) and the 'Contrast' slider all the way to the left (-100).

• Click OK.

• Now we have something like this:

• Note: If you cannot get a pure white layer using the above method, try this alternative:

• Choose menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Levels

• Set the 'Output Levels' to 255 and 255

• Click OK

• Drag the ‘white’ layer below the ‘outline’ layer

• Change the blending mode of ‘outline’ layer to ‘Multiply’

• Press 'd' to set the foreground color to black and background color to white.

• On the Layers Palette, select the 'white' layer.

• Click the 'Create new fill or adjustment layer' at the bottom of Layers Palette. On the popup menu, choose 'Solid Color...'. A 'Color Picker' dialog box will be displayed.

• On the 'Color Picker', pick a creamy brown color. This color will be used for the skin color. (I picked #FAD594 for the skin. You don't need to be too picky here. We can change the color easily later whenever we need to).

• Click OK

• Now we have something like this:

• Choose 'Paint Bucket Tool' . Click on the canvas to fill skin's layer mask with black color.

• Rename our new layer to 'skin'.

• And now we have something like this:

• Create a clipping mask between 'skin' layer and 'white' layer. Press and hold Alt while clicking on the line in between the skin and white layers.

• On the 'Layers Palette', click on the 'outline' layer while holding (pressing) the Ctrl button. This will tell the ants to march around Rihanna. Oops, I mean, this will put a selection mark around Rihanna.

• Press 'x' to switch foreground and background color.

• Choose 'Paint Bucket' tool, click inside the selection on the canvas to fill it with white.

• Press Ctrl + D to deselect the selection area.

• And we’re done coloring the skin

• Here is what we have so far:

Applying Some Shading

• A 'flat' picture is not too nice to look at. We have to apply some shading to the picture to give it depth.

• What's more, giving some shading to the picture (especially the face area) makes the person in our cartoon photo more recognizable because the viewer will be able to see the cheek bone, jaw bone, etc which differentiate someone from the others.

• We would like to have three colors for the face:

• 1. skin base color

• 2. shade (a darker color)

• 3. tint (a lighter color)

• We already have the skin base color (i.e. the 'skin' layer), so now we need to add the shade and the tint.

• Let's go!

• Duplicate the 'Layer 0' layer.

• We will have a new layer named 'Layer 0 copy'.

• Move it (drag it) to the top of 'outline' layer.

• Blur this layer a little.

• Menu: Filter :: Blur :: Gaussian Blur...

• Set the radius of the blurring to 4 pixels. (Typical values are between 2 and 4. A value of 2 is usually enough).

• Click OK

• Select menu: Filter :: Artistic :: Cutout...

• Set 'Edge Simplicity' to 2.

• Set 'Edge Fidelity' to 1.

• Experiment with 'Number of Levels' value while looking at the preview window (pay special attention to the face). Typical values are between 5 and 8. Choose a value giving the best result for the shading of the face.

Some variation for 'Number of Levels' and the corresponding result:

Let's choose 8 for 'Number of Levels' for it gives the nicest shading on the face.

Click OK on the Cutout dialog box.

• Using the result of the Cutout filter, we will create a shade and a tint.

• Rename the 'Layer 0 copy' layer to 'shade'.

• Duplicate the 'shade' layer. Rename it (the duplicate) to 'tint'.

• Now we have two new layers, tint and shade. Let's work on the shade first.

• Turn visibility of the 'tint' layer off.

• Select the 'shade' layer

• Choose menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Threshold...

• Turn the slider right and left, experiment with it while looking at the preview.

• Click OK when you are satisfied with the result

• On the 'Tools Palette', pick 'Magic Wand Tool‘

• On the canvas, click on the white area.

• Press Delete to cut the white area of 'shade' layer.

• Press Ctrl + D to deselect the selection.

• Change the blending mode of 'shade' layer to 'Soft Light'.

• Change the opacity to 40% (experiment with this value to get the desired result).

• We're done with the shade. Now let's continue with the tint.

• Basically, the steps are the same as what we've done to create the shade.

• Select the 'tint' layer.

•

• Choose menu: Image :: Adjustments :: Threshold...

• Turn the slider right and left, experiment with it while looking at the preview.

• Click OK when you're satisfied with the result.

• On the 'Tools Palette', pick 'Magic Wand Tool' .

• On the canvas, click on the black area.

• Press Delete to cut the black area of 'tint' layer

• Press Ctrl + D to deselect the selection.

• Change the blending mode of 'tint' layer to 'Soft

Light'. Change the opacity to 60% (experiment

with this value to get the desired result).

• That's it. Now we're done with the shading step.

• And here's the result so far:

Part 4: Coloring

• On the third part of the tutorial, we have applied some shading to the cartoon photo. By the end of this section, we will have this as the final result of our cartooning work:

Step 6: Coloring

• Our next step is coloring.

• For our Rihanna picture, we need to colorize her shirt (tank top?), lips, teeth, eyes, and hair.

• Let's begin.

• On the Tools Palette, choose 'Paint Bucket Tool' (or press 'G').

• Press 'd' to set the foreground color to black and background color to white.

•

• On the Layers Palette, select the 'skin' layer

• Click the 'Create new fill or adjustment layer' at the bottom of Layers Palette.

• On the popup menu, choose 'Solid Color...'. A 'Color Picker' dialog box will be displayed.

• On the 'Color Picker' dialog box, pick a dark red color. This color will be used for the shirt. (I picked #B24747 for the shirt. You don't need to be too picky here. We can change the color easily later whenever we want to).

• Click OK

• Now we have something like this.

• Click on the canvas to fill our shirt's layer mask with black color

• Rename our new layer to 'shirt'.

• And now we have something like this.

• Create a clipping mask between 'shirt' layer and 'skin' layer. Press Ctrl + G while the 'shirt' layer is still selected.

• Repeat step 4 through step 9 to make layers for the color of lips, eyes, iris, and hair.

• By the end of this step, our layers will be like this:

• Now that we've done preparing the layer for each color , we can start coloring each part of the picture.

• Let's start with the hair.

• From the 'Tools Palette', pick 'Pencil Tool' (or press 'B').

• On the 'Layers Palette', select the 'hair' layer.

• Make sure the foreground color is pure white. (Press 'X' if you have to switch foreground and background colors).

• Start painting the hair. Use a hard brush with the opacity set to 100%. Make sure that you zoom in when coloring, so that it is nice and tidy. (The clipping mask help us a lot here. It won't let the color run out of border)

• Now let's move on with the next layer, the 'iris'. On the 'Layers Palette', select the 'iris' layer. Repeat steps 13 through 14 to paint the iris.

• Here's what we got:

• The eyes (the white part of the eyes) and teeth (for they have the same color, which is white)...

• The lips…

• Shirt…

• And anytime you feel the need to change a color of any layer, just double click the layer (not the layer mask!) and choose a new color on the Color Picker. Very easy.

• That's all!

• We're done cartooning the photograph

Finished!

• And here is our cute cartoon photo of Rihanna:

• Make sure you email it to me as an attachment in the jpg format

• One more thing….

It is all about you!

• Do all of these steps again only this time, use a photo of yourself and email it to me when you are finished.