dekePod

This week, I have two very special treats for you. The first is a video in which I show you how to employ Photoshop's Dissolve blend mode to create the effect of letters hand-carved into wood. The second is a blow-by-blow text description of the technique, complete with graphics, as written by the Content Curator for lynda.com, Colleen Wheeler.

It's an experiment, so we're eager to hear your thoughts. But I'm guessing you're  gonna like it. Take it away, Colleen:

In this week's free Deke's Techniques, Deke uses Photoshop to create the effect of hand-carved letters in a wooden sign. I don't mean embossing typed-out text into a wood background, but rather making hand-drawn letters look like they were manually carved many years ago into an old wooden sign and weathered over time. To create this effect, Deke uses a blend mode that's fairly uncommon: Dissolve. Because it results in old-style dithered edges, Dissolve is seldom used. But for this particular effect, it provides the gritty, worn edges that we're looking for.

I titled this week's post "Explained" because I thought I'd show you the steps to this technique right here in the blog post. Here's how it's done: Read more » 

In today's episode of my weekly video blog, I show you how to create a party with yourself in Photoshop. Specifically, a pool party. Not one involving bathing suits, but rather billiard balls. Just you and a bunch of your favorite clones armed with big sticks and ready for battle.

What the hell am I talking about? Read the official description from lynda.com and find out: Read more » 

So far, I've really lucked out where Deke's Techniques is concerned. The series debuted with "Creating Ice Type" the first Tuesday of 2011, and it became an immediate hit in the lynda.com Online Training Library. I accidentally recorded "Creating a Star Wars Hologram Effect in Photoshop CS6" for the very same week Photoshop CS6 went into public beta. And then I inadvertently recorded "Joining Type to a Circle in Illustrator CS6" for the same week Adobe announced Illustrator CS6.

But where Deke's Techniques: The Challenge is concerned, not so lucky. I recorded an Illustrator technique ("The Octagonal Rings of the Underworld") during the second week of The Photoshop Challenge. I recorded two Photoshop techniques ("Hand-Coloring Line Art in Photoshop" and "Creating a Screen Print Effect in Photoshop") for both weeks of the Illustrator Challenge. And I created this week's technique, which pimps my Facebook page all about The Challenge, for the very week when the damn contest ends. Balls!

But, hey, it's a great technique. And, plus, it begs you to become a fan of facebook.com/dekepod. Which you should do because it's cool, stupid, frivolous, and a waste of time. And who doesn't like wasting time? On the Internet!  How hip is that?

Anyway, today's technique shows you how to create the perfect Facebook cover in Photoshop. Here's the official description from lynda.com: Read more » 

By now, a few of you may be using Illustrator CS6. In which case, you have access to the new Pattern Options panel, which---among other things---allows you to create hex patterns. By which I mean, patterns that are organized into hexagonal tiles instead of the regular old rectangular ones. And it designs the patterns seamlessly, with remarkably little planning on your part.

Here's the official description from lynda.com: Read more » 

Just in time for The Illustrator Challenge to end (my timing is impeccable!), I present you with an ultra-cool Illustrator technique. It's like this, friends. Have you ever tried using Illustrator's Spiral tool? Or better yet, have you ever used it to create an element in an actual piece of artwork? If so, my guess is that you didn't find it to be a particularly fun experience, and you probably had a hell of a time getting the results you wanted.

In which case, rest assured, it's not your fault. With all due respect to Adobe, Illustrator's Spiral tool is the kind of tool only a monkey could love. And it'd have to be a stupid monkey at that.

Which is why, this week, I show you how to create a more predictable and better looking spiral, the kind of spiral you actually want to make, using the Polar Grid tool.

Here's the official description from lynda.com: Read more »