When I read the Cybergenics 2 contest requirements, an idea of what I wanted to do had already formed. Then the search for some good source images began. This is something I usually find to be trickier than the actual Photoshopping. After finding this gorgeous image of Catherine Zeta Jones (image 1), I still had to find some compatible hardware for the head (image 2) and arm (image 3). Setting up the layer-sets (image 4)early is a good idea. It keeps everything neat and tidy. Of course I did this after I finished the head part. :)First I did the paths (image 5). They gave me a good sense of how I could achieve the image I had in my head.
I decided to start with the head, because that would the most difficult part of the image.Using the path I created to make a selection, with a feather radius of 0 and anti-aliased selected (this goes for any selection I make with a path), I copied her face into a new layer and moved it around 30 pixels to the left (image 6). Now you can see why I decided to do the head first. The lock of hair had to go!Of course, some careful cloning, using a variety of opacities, and healing, got rid of those pesky hairs and shadows (image 7). Still, it took quite some effort to do it right. Next step was an extra layer of flesh colored airbrush, some layer masking on the left and highlighting/darkening parts of the edges with the dodge and burn tools (image 8).Next step was an extra layer of flesh colored airbrush, some layer masking on the left and highlighting/darkening parts of the edges with the dodge and burn tools (image 8).
With the "face" about done, it was time to reveal the inside of the cyborg head. Using the same path with which I made a selection for the face, I made a layer and filled the selection with a color. Any color is fine, because you won't see it later on. Above this layer I copied the "head hardware" image into a new layer. Holding the alt-button with my cursor between these layer I connected them and made the bottom-layer into a mask (image 9). This way I could easily move, rotate and resize the image within the mask. However, if the image in the layer above it becomes smaller than the mask, you will see the mask itself.After resizing, rotating and moving the image of the head hardware, I added some shadows with the burn tool for depth, with the "face" as a guide (image 10).To reveal the thickness of the rubbery "cyborg-flesh", I made a few paths (image 11). After making a selection with the face path, I intersected them from that selection. I filled this with a dark red-brown and used the dodge and burn tools to add depth (image 12).In image 12 you can see the lock of hair had to be placed over the mechanical inside. I copied that part of the hair into a new layer and masked it clear (image 13). Then I duplicated the original image of Catherine and highlighted and darkened the edges of the head here and there, as well as added some shadows (image 14).
Next up: the upper arm. Using the paths I had created earlier, I made selections for the upper and lower plate and copied each into a seperate layer, rotated them clockwise and counter-clockwise respectively. Then I highlighted some of the edges for depth and moved them apart (image 15). Now to show the inside of the arm. Like I did with the head, I made a selection where the arm would reveal the hardware and then alt-connected it to the hardware image in the layer above it (image 16). After resizing, rotating and positioning the image of the hardware to the form of the arm, I added some shadows with the burn tool for depth, with the armplates as guides (image 17).Making shadows is quite a delicate task. When not done right, shadows can be a dead-giveaway that an image was altered. For me, using the burn-tool with different brush sizes, exposures and ranges (highlights, midtones and shadows) gets the best results. And sometimes, when the image allowes it, using the images own shadows can work as well. Or even better.Back to the arm. Revealing the thickness of the "cyborg-flesh" (of the arm and the arm plates, in different layers) is done in the same way as with the head (image 18). Then I worked on the duplicate image of Catherine to highlight and darken the edges of the outer arm here and there, as well as some shadows (image 19).
To have the illusion of cyberflesh being prefabricated before being applied to the cyborg, I wanted to have some seams showing. Subtly, but visible nonetheless. To do this, I decided to use a layer style on a stroke created by the paths for the seams. After I created a new layer, in the "seam lines" layer set of course, I selected the seam paths. For the stroke I needed a size 2 hard brush. Then I chose "stroke path, tool: brush" twice, to thicken the stroke (image 20). The color used for this is not important, it will not be used. While having my cursor over this new layer, I control-clicked on it to get a selection of the seam strokes. With this selection I copied a part of the original Catherine image into a new layer (control-c/control-v) and moved this layer into the seam lines layer set. Having the layer active, I selected Layer Style: bevel and emboss. With preview activated I tweaked and tweaked (image 21), set the contour range to 70% (image 22), until the seams were how I wanted them (image 23).
On to the cables, or wires, in her back. I created a new layer in the "back" layer set, activated a size 4 hard brush with a greenish color and then selected one of the cable-paths (image 24). I chose "stroke path, tool: brush" once. In this case the color IS important, because it WILL be used (image 25).With the "cable1" layer active I selected Layer Style: bevel and emboss for some tweaking (image 26). Keep in mind though, that if you change the Shading angle or altitude, it changes those for ALL layers using the layer style bevel and emboss. For the shadow mode I chose a very dark red, so it would look like the cable reflected a bit of the color from Catherine's back (image 27).
I repeated those last steps for cables 2 to 7 and chose different colors for each of them. After that I arranged the order of the layers to my liking and placed some shadows here and there for depth (image 28). Then I selected the spine and some of the hair that would cover one of the cables from the original Catherine image and copied that into a new layer above the layer to be covered by the hair. I did some masking to reveal the cable and then set work on making bulges (clone-tool) and holes (burn-tool) on the spine, were the cable would enter the flesh (image 29). The bulges could also have been achieved with the Liquid-filter or some airbrushing of course.Now to cover the lower end of the cables. I selected part of the dress from the original image, copied that into a new layer and placed it above the cable layers. Then masked away the flesh to have the cables appear going into the dress (image 30). Finally I duplicated the image (image > duplicate > activate Duplicate Merged Layers Only) and did some more blurring, highlighting, shadowing, cloning, a bit of noise and gaussian blur etc.
And there she is!Making this tutorial took quite a bit longer than making the image itself. English isn't my native language, so maybe it sometimes takes a second reading. But it was fun to do and I hope you'll like it.If you have questions or suggestions, please message me here.And hey, isn't Worth1000 just the greatest? :)