In the first part of this series, I detailed the compositing modes that I use most frequently, along with a few other hints and techniques. The second part detailed project number 1, taking a black and white photograph (grayscale) and adding unconventional colors to transform the image into a blue-skinned alien on some strange other world. As originally conceived, that post would in fact have contained no less than five projects, but it takes so much longer when you stop and explain every step (and any false starts), and explore any relevant side-issues (such as how to build up realistic skin, or how to do eyes), that I was only half-way through that project when I realized that time would not permit that approach.

The revised plan is:

• Part 1: Fundamentals
• Part 2:
  • Project 1, An Alien Woman
  • Extra Topic: Skin
  • Extra Topic: Eyes
  • Extra Topic: Resizing Images
  • Extra Topic: The Sharpening Trick
• Part 3 (this post):
  • Project 2, Aging an image
  • Extra Topic: Desaturation Options
  • Extra Topic: Four Adventurer’s Club Examples
• Part 4 (still to come)
  • Project 3, A Blue Monkey
  • Extra Topic: Image Extension
  • Extra Topic: Hair and Fur Headaches
  • Extra Topic: Starfield Trickery
  • Extra Topic: Matt Vs Glossy
  • Extra Topic: Shiny, Shiny Metal
• Part 5 (still to come):
  • Project 4, A Sci-Fi Buddhist
  • Extra Topic: Making and Moving Shadows
  • Extra Topic: My Krita Layout
  • Extra Topic: Working with textures
  • Extra Topic: A little color theory
• Part 6 (still to come):
  • Project 5, A Fantasy Citadel
  • Extra Topic: Working with fonts
  • Extra Topic: Tools and Tricks
  • Extra Topic: Brush Tips (for Krita)
• Part 7 (still to come):
  • Project 6: A Sci-Fi variant Citadel
  • Extra Topic: The Layer Menu
  • Extra Topic: The Filters Menu
  • Extra Topic: Simple Image Transforms
• Part 8 (still to come):
  • Project 7: Maps 101
  • Project 8: Map Composite
  • Extra Topic: Advanced Masking
  • Extra Topic: The “Image” Menu
  • Extra Topic: Complicated Image Transforms
  • Extra Topic: Noisy Image Cleanups
  • Project 9: Original Maps using a fantastic Compositing trick

As you can see, I’ve put a lot more thought into this than I had when preparing part 2 of the series – I was scrambling a bit just to get that finished. And thinking about the many extra topics that I wanted to cover along the way and the most logical way to structure them also served to inform the structure; to avoid overloading any one part of the series, I ended up adding a couple of projects that I was tossing up about for copyright reasons to the list.

As always, all this is subject to change without notice – this is a statement of intent, not a guarantee of delivery!

There’s a lot to cover in each remaining part of the series, so let’s get busy!

A Preamble

As a bit of a preamble, I want to start by sharing four images from the Adventurer’s Club campaign with you. All three are heavily edited from their original sources.

This is a composite of a great many different images and parts of images.

• The base image wasn’t quite this cream-colored but is otherwise genuine.
• The stamps are genuine but were separate images.
• The different postmarks are also genuine but from separate files.
• The “Registered Mail” mark is also genuine but from an eighth file.
• The typewritten name and address was created and added. A careful use of blur was added and faded to create the impression that someone had typed the address and then gone over it a second time with the same typewriter because it wasn’t dark enough the first time. Look at this closeup:

• The shadow was also created and added.
• If you look very closely, you’ll see texture within the paper of the envelope that gives the impression that it has been handled. This was done with a very subtle shadow addition and an equally-subtle lightening of the paper to one side of the shadow. You can see it more clearly in this closeup:

• Finally, there was more lightness added to the bottom edge of the envelope – it’s subtle, but it gives a far stronger sense that this is a three-dimensional object.

Next, I want to draw your attention to this rather more distressed padded envelope.

• The padded envelope image is real and is the base image. It was slightly color-shifted and contrast-enhanced. It was also rotated in three different dimensions so that it was no longer seen as being ‘flat’ against the screen but against a table surface.
• The dark blue background was added to make the envelope color “pop” a little more. It fades to black toward the top of the image, suggesting an increase in distance between that part of the background and the light source. This accords with the apparent light source of the envelope.
• There is a very subtle shadow underneath the envelope. It was shaped and distorted to give the impression that it was lying flat on a surface.

Water stains and grease stains were added.

• Three separate coffee stains were added. These are actually “ink spot” clip art that was color adjusted, rotated in 3D to match the envelope, and split into two duplicate layers – one very transparent and one for the edges of the stains. This permitted them to overlap.
• In the same “coffee” color, two or three individual coffee-cup stains were added after rotation to match.
• The top edge was lightened even though that doesn’t match indicated light because it permitted a deeper shadow on the part of the bag right next to it, making the bag look like it held content.
• The bottom edge was lightened slightly and desaturated to give the impression that it was at a different angle relative to the light source, again giving the impression that the bag held content of some thickness.

As before, closeups show these edits in detail. Before I started, the envelope was pristine, though it showed the texture we were looking for (bands and dimples), even though the cause of such texture (bubble-wrap) would not be invented for many years – a plain envelope simply didn’t scream “protective envelope” on casual inspection, and that was what the plot called for. This was a case of needing to yield historical accuracy in order to better communicated with the 20th-century players.
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Third, I offer up this image of the George Medal. The objective here was to make them look ‘as new’, i.e. as issued, because that was only a short time ago in the pulp campaign.

In many ways, this was quite straightforward; in others, it was quite complicated. There were none of the tricks with Composite Modes; this was all masks and dismembering the source images.

There were two sources, both of different scales. One of them had a clear image of the faces of the medals but was too dark; the other had clear highlights but the faces of the medal were quite worn and the medal was quite battered and misshapen. On source had a single side of the ribbon in good condition, the rest was badly frayed; the other had another side in good condition but the rest was badly faded and discolored.

So half of one side of the ribbon came from source 1, the other side came from source two, and after compositing them I did a mirror image and shaded the image slightly so that it looked just a little different from the first combined ribbon. The front face of the medal was a composite of the too-dark image, with brightness and contrast enhanced, and highlights from the second source; this was reversed with respect to the rear side of the medal.

The results, so far as I am concerned, are a seamless composite. You literally could not tell without a forensic examination of the image data that these were not a real par of photographs of pristinely-preserved military decorations.

Last is this distressed, torn, and faded clothing label with laundry mark (I’m especially proud of it).

• The base image was the texture of the cloth. It was slightly distorted to give the impression that it was being viewed at a slight angle and not perfectly flat to the “camera”.
• The shadowed warp was added to the texture by using four layers – two partial texture layers and an airbrushed shadow running at an angle. There was also a pale lightening layer to improve the contrast; different sizes of airbrush at different opacity settings meant that the lightness came on more gradually on the bottom part of the cloth, emphasizing the shape in the z dimension..
• A mask was created with a ragged edge – I forget from what – and used to erase the part of the cloth that was not wanted. Until it was applied, the cloth texture filled the image.
• A different mask was created (based on the first) and applied to a copy of the base image to yield the threads around the edges.
• These were then merged and similar warping was used to suggest parts of the edge were hanging loosely from the main body of the cloth.
• The text was created and distorted to match the warping of the cloth. I wanted to create the impression that there was a fold in the cloth when the watermark was applied.
• A symbol was created and the same technique applied.
• A copy of the base image was used to ensure that the watermark was only visible on those parts of the texture that were supposed raised, creating the texture within the text.
• The letters were then faded because this was supposed to be a temporary laundry mark according to the plot. “Ontario” is clearly visible, but the smaller text below it is very hard to make out. This was very intentional!
• A blurred background (brown) was created, and a stiff black cardboard panel added in front of it – this is the only part of the image that wasn’t quite satisfactory.
• A black shadow was added and carefully shaped to suggest that the scrap of cloth was not perfectly flat on the cardboard. That background is so dark that it’s very hard to actually see it, but it is – and it creates a subconscious impression, even though you aren’t sure why it feels three-dimensional.

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Viewing it reduced in size to fit Campaign Mastery’s display footprint doesn’t do the image justice. Here’s a closeup:

If you look really closely at the closeup, you can also see the occasional thread from the dark gray-brown inner lining of the cheap brown suit from which the watermark was inadvertently torn.

These examples show how much can be done with the simple techniques demonstrated thus far.

So now it’s time to up the ante and tackle a project that takes things a step or two further. This project wasn’t originally part of the plan, but it should have been!

Project 2, Aging an image

This is basically six sets of layers that total more than 18 layers. From bottom to top:

• 1: Background
• 2 & 3: Desaturated Main Image, possibly erased at the edges to create tears in the paper. Copies of the same erase layer will be needed for each of the layers above as well, letting the background show through. Advanced technique: “tear” one corner from the image and position it, offset and slightly rotated, close to where it came from. Don’t forget a border of very pale gray.
• 4 & 5:. A color layer in a slightly-gray very pale yellow, erased as above, in Color mode.
• 6 & 7: Non-desaturated Main Image, erased as above, and faded to an opacity of a handful of percent – 5% or less. You want the slightest hint of color tweak, nothing more.
• 8-11: A copy of the desaturated Main Image, erased as above, in Multiply mode, merged with a copy of the desaturated Main Image erased as above, in Addition mode. The Multiply mode will be set to a low opacity, the addition mode layer may have any opacity that looks right. It may be necessary to treat different areas of the image separately, with different opacity levels for both layers, using masks to split them up – and don’t forget to then apply a blur layer underneath! The background within the ‘photograph’ should generally be lighter than the foreground.
• 12-17: An extract from a copy of the main image removing the lightest 1/3 of the original and splitting the rest into dark areas and moderate levels (this is done with the Similar Color selection tool and the delete button on your keyboard. Erase as above. You may need to blur the result slightly. This then gets merged with a darker yellow-brown Color layer, and is then set to Multiply mode and the opacity adjusted.
• 18+: A set of ‘distress’ layers which add crease / fold marks in a slightly desaturated version of the pale yellow color used earlier. A copy, offset a pixel or two, above this layer in a suitable merge mode, and a desaturated and slightly darkened version offset a couple of pixels in the other direction and blurred very slightly, can give these “wrinkles” a subtle 3-D effect. Control this with opacity of the different layers. As a bonus, add stains, scratches, etc, with additional layers.

The result should be a photo that looks like one of those very old ones from the Wild West, all yellowed with age.

I thought about illustrating this structure with the end product of project 1 but at the last minute decided to use a more appropriate image.

I’ve created this base image by combining the foreground of

with

as a backdrop.

This is the resulting base image:

Desaturation Options

Next, I need to work out which Desaturation Mode I’m going to use. There are seven options – six of them through the Modify > Desaturate dialogue, and one that results from the Modify > HSV panel, sliding the ‘saturation’ all the way to the left. The results can be quite different as the set of images below shows:

I’ve used the technical names for the two Luminosity Desaturation Modes, but I never think of them that way – I simply consider them “Luminosity 1” and “Luminosity 2”.

At first glance, there’s not a lot of difference between them, with a couple of obvious exceptions. But look closely at the face. Look at how easily you can distinguish between sky and mountain. Look at the contrast in the name of the tavern. If you need to, click on the image above to open a much larger version of the image.

Typically, I have different favorites for different parts of the image.

• For the mountains, I like the Lightness result. That is also my preference for the smaller sign below the walkway of the Yellow Rose.
• For the buildings, I mostly like the Saturation Slider. But for the lettering of the “The Yellow Rose” and a few other highlight areas, I want the brightness of the Average desaturation mode.
• For the face, I can make a case for Minimum mode (the shading makes him look angrier and more villainous); for Maximum mode (the washed-out loss of detail in the face gives the impression that the photographer has just set off a colossal photo flash of the explosive-powder type that was in use back then; and for the HSV Slider (most realistic skin tones) by a narrow margin. I decide to go with the HSV
• A quirk of the process and the original colors has the sky turn out darker than the ground. That’s obviously technically accurate, but it looks wrong. I like the way that you can see texture in the ground in the Minimum-mode desaturation; so that gives me a minimum acceptable darkness for the sky if it is to be lighter. The sky is completely washed out in the Average-mode desaturation; the next lightest is the Maximum mode which is definitely lighter and only just distinguishable from the white of the border. It is, perhaps, just a little too light. The optimum answer would seem to be a composite between the Maximum mode and a reduced-opacity version of the HSV-Slider desaturation.

So my first step is to break the image up. In fact, I break it up into 8 pieces (including two copies of the sky), each in a separate layer. And, of course, I still have the original base image safely set aside:

When I apply the individual desaturation models that I have selected, and add a white frame, I end up with this image;

This preserves the best aspects of all the composition modes. But note that most of the time, one desaturation mode will be satisfactory, though which one will vary from image to image.

Anyway, with this desaturated base layer in place, it’s time to implement the process that I described earlier.

• 1: Background

I initially thought about using a wood-grain texture, but with the photograph becoming principally yellow, I thought that might not stand out the way I would want. So I’ve chosen instead a tablecloth pattern that seems era-appropriate, provided by Gaby Stein via Pixabay

But I’m going to rotate it slightly and then enlarge it to fit the size so that the photograph and the tablecloth have different alignments.

What you can see to the right is the result (reduced dramatically in size). I intend to leave incorporating this until the very last step, as it would complicate processing the photograph.

Eventually, I’m going to give the photograph a slight rotation in the opposite direction, leaving one torn-off corner correctly oriented.

• 2 & 3: Desaturated Main Image, possibly erased at the edges to create tears in the paper. Copies of the same erase layer will be needed for each of the layers above as well, letting the background show through. Advanced technique: “tear” one corner from the image and position it, offset and slightly rotated, close to where it came from. Don’t forget a border of very pale gray.

The photograph is clearly wider than it is tall. That means that the greatest stress will be on the top and bottom, and folds are most likely to occur vertically.

I drew the erase layer in blue so that I could see it over the top of the black-and-white image. As you can see, i tore away one side of the photograph, added one large crack in the top and a smaller one at the bottom, and tore away the top right corner. There is evidence that this tearing did not happen all at once, hence the tears both above and below the main tear; it seems likely that there were two tears that eventually joined up to excise one corner. I also wanted to be sure that this was a large enough piece of the photograph that it could conceivably not have been lost in the intervening years.

• 4 & 5:. A color layer in a slightly-gray very pale yellow, erased as above, in Color mode.

Actually, this oversimplifies the process. After this was done, I used the noisy airbrush and large bristles to ‘dress up’ the texture a little.

And, when I apply this color layer to the image, i get:

The intensity of the effect is too small, so I decided to add a duplicate of the color layer set to Multiply mode. The results are exactly what I had hoped:

• 6 & 7: Non-desaturated Main Image, erased as above, and faded to an opacity of a handful of percent – 5% or less. You want the slightest hint of color tweak, nothing more.

I ended up going with 10% opacity because the colors blended well, something that doesn’t always happen – if blue is too dominant in the color layer, it will turn to green very quickly.

I note that I failed to specify the Composite Mode. I’ve used Grain Merge this time, though I always check to see if Multiply or Alanon give me better results. The effect is subtle but definitely present.

• 8-11: A copy of the desaturated Main Image, erased as above, in Multiply mode, merged with a copy of the desaturated Main Image erased as above, in Addition mode. The Multiply mode will be set to a low opacity, the addition mode layer may have any opacity that looks right. It may be necessary to treat different areas of the image separately, with different opacity levels for both layers, using masks to split them up – and don’t forget to then apply a blur layer underneath! The background within the ‘photograph’ should generally be lighter than the foreground.

The Multiply Mode layer ended up working best at rather greater opacity than I was expecting, mostly because the Addition layer was so effective. The Multiply mode layer has an opacity of 66%, and the addition layer above it is at 35%.

But the result is rather more desaturated than I intended, so I have added an extra copy of the color layer in multiply mode.

Much of this stage is just fine tuning to get the color right in the lightest parts.

• 12-17: An extract from a copy of the main image removing the lightest 1/3 of the original and splitting the rest into dark areas and moderate levels (this is done with the Similar Color selection tool and the delete button on your keyboard. Erase as above. You may need to blur the result slightly. This then gets merged with a darker yellow-brown Color layer, and is then set to Multiply mode and the opacity adjusted.

As you can see, the lightest grays have been extracted into a layer, shown at the top of the image; the middle grays are in the middle layer, and the darkest grays are in the layer at the bottom.

The next trick is to turn off all the layers except the one desired, select it, and use the similar color selection tool to choose everything except the transparent parts where there is no longer any image.

Then I can create a new layer and fill just the relevant parts of the image with the dark brown. It may also be necessary to add a brown layer set to addition, and then darken the multiply. The goal is to take the blacks and turn them into browns.

With an addition layer at 100% opacity and the multiply layer at 36% opacity, this is what the dark layer now looks like:

Next, using a slightly lighter brown, I repeat this for the middle browns. This time, the opacity of both Addition and Multiply layers get set to 75%.

For completion, I then repeat this for the lightest grays using a slightly lighter brown again.

It doesn’t matter if the color is a little off, that can always be tweaked, as can the brightness and contrast of each brown layer.

You can often get an early check on that question simply by examining all three sets of layers at the same time

They all look fine to me, but they reveal something I already knew: some detail has been lost. That missing detail has to come from the image as we left it before beginning this stage.

First, I have to consolidate each set of three layers into a single layer, then turn all the other layers back on. I then switch the Composition Mode of the darkest brown layer to “Lighten” and play with the opacity until it looks right. That happens at 67%.

Next, the middle browns. I use Alanon as the Composition mode and 100% opacity.

Finally, the lightest brown. I use Soft Light as the Composition mode and 64% opacity.

• 18+: A set of ‘distress’ layers which add crease / fold marks in a slightly desaturated version of the pale yellow color used earlier. A copy, offset a pixel or two, above this layer in a suitable merge mode, and a desaturated and slightly darkened version offset a couple of pixels in the other direction and blurred very slightly, can give these “wrinkles” a subtle 3-D effect. Control this with opacity of the different layers. As a bonus, add stains, scratches, etc, with additional layers.

I have to admit that I didn’t spend as much time on this step as I probably should. Using various brushes I laded parts of the image. A couple of scratches put in with the bezier curve and then distorted using the palette knife, and some more with the large brush, some spots that might be mud, or might be blood, and then some quick-and-dirty creases where the photo had been folder roughly in half.

Finally, consolidate the entire image, then remove the corner into a separate layer, and I’m ready to drop in the background and apply the promised rotation. I then add just a hint of shadow.

It sounds like a lot of work, but really, it isn’t. I could easily have knocked out this image in just an hour or two – it’s taking the time to document each step in the process and explain them that caused this to take all day.

Next time, I’ll finally get to what was originally going to be the second project of this series, the Blue Monkey.

But Before I Go…

A couple of projects of a different sort have come to my attention in the last week or so that I thought readers might find of interest..

Everyday heroes

The first is from Evil Genius Games and it’s an updating of d20 Modern to operate with a foundation of D&D 5e.

It’s a measure of the complexity of the modern world that no RPG or game supplement contains all the reference material that you really need, no matter how complete they might seem at first glance. The more resources you have at your disposal, the better prepared you are for everything that actual play will throw at you.

Although d20 Modern isn’t in the first tier of references for either the Adventurer’s Club or Zenith-3 campaigns, it is second-tier – one of the first places I look when the first tier lets me down. In part, that’s a genre impact; the game system is not quite on point for neither of those campaigns as they are Pulp and Superheroes, respectively. For the Zener Gate campaign, though, it graduates to a top-level reference at times. But it’s a couple of decades out of date, so a fresh update definitely gets my attention.

The original d20 Modern was written by Bill Slavisek, Jeff Grubb, Rich Redman, and Charles Ryan, and Grubb has returned to be part of the new design team, giving this product instant credibility. Grubb himself is quite enthusiastic about the update, saying “It’s exciting to revisit the d20 system I helped design 20 years ago. How we think about game design has evolved significantly so this is a great opportunity to bring concepts of the ‘d20 Modern’ game into the fifth edition era.”

Everyday Hero builds on the basic classes of d20 Modern with several new subclasses, a new wealth system, and a fully revamped chase mechanic. Now, those last two are some of the most difficult game subsystems to implement smoothly or in a satisfactory way – though I have some ideas of my own for the former, which will make their way into a post here at CM sometime in the near future, maybe even next week – so I’m always interested in those subsystems.

The design team also includes two additional veterans Stan! Brown and Steve Miller, and two emerging game designers, Chris Ramsay and Sigfried Trent. Evil Genius Games is preparing for a Kickstarter Campaign “in the Spring of 2022”, and I’m really looking forward to this one!

Bookmark this link and check it regularly: Kickstarter!

Space Age: Voyages

The other project that has leaped out at me is a little closer to production. From Thunderegg Productions, Space Age: Voyages” is a Standalone expansion for Space Aces TNG (The New Guidebook), subtitled “Voyages In Infinite Space”.

This is a slightly lighthearted family-friendly sci-fi sandbox setting book with over 160 pages of planets, locations, and adventures, along with a galactic-sized modular hex map.

I can’t do better in describing what appeals about this product than to quote the “What’s Inside” section of the Kickstarter:

What’s Inside?

• EXPANSIVE & CUSTOMIZABLE GALAXY: 47 sectors on modular hex cards for creating your own one-of-a-kind galaxy.
• VISIT NEAT PLACES: Over 120 unique planets, anomalies, space stations & other locations to discover and explore.
• EXPLORE COOL STUFF: Each location features its own page of information, features of interest, hazards, encounters, dungeons to delve, beings to meet, rich illustrations, and more!
• MEET NEW PEEPS: Dozens of species to botch first contact with (Aristo-crab spice moguls, Space Otter salvagers, Beauro-Cat bounty hunters, oh my!).
• ADVENTURES IN SPAAaaace: Hundreds of randomly rolled deep space encounters to survive that ensure the journey is as much fun as the destination.
• MULTITUDINOUS MISSIONS: Tons of missions and quests to pull off so your crew can pay the bills and fend off the debt collectors.
• SPACE LOOT: Hundreds of pieces of weird gear, rare resources, starship upgrades that go “ding” when there’s stuff, and more to find.
• A TOWEL GENERATOR: Because every space adventurer needs a towel.
• CHUCKLES GALORE: More inside jokes, nerdy references, bad puns, and heartfelt homages than you can shake a non-copyright-infringing light sword at.
• ADVENTURE AWAITS: An infinite amount of amazing adventures to be had on-the-fly with zero prep work!

I use space stuff extensively in the Zenith-3, Warcry, and Doctor Who campaigns, and occasionally in the Zener Gate campaign, and you can never have too many sources of ideas!

The Kickstarter campaign has about two weeks left to run, and has already raised more than 260% of its target budget.

And, if you want it, you can even include a copy of the original game system as an add-on – though it’s not necessary to use this product.

This is a product that’s definitely on my Radar, and it’s as safe a bet as a Kickstarter campaign can get.

The Lazy DM’s Companion

Finally, something for all you Fantasy gamers out there! “The Lazy DM’s companion” by SlyFlourish is a 64-page PDF available through DrivethruRPG. There’s entirely too much good stuff to try listing it all, so I’ll just advise you all to check out the product page for yourself: The Lazy DM’s Companion

Something for everyone, I hope! Until next time, have fun :)