Photoshop Tutorials - 40 Cool Abstract and Background

40 Cool Abstract and Background Photoshop Tutorials

Attractive backgrounds to any graphics, banners or ads are relatively important. Getting the correct theme, whether it’s an abstract art, vector, or texture pattern, it somehow makes the entire artwork looks more interesting.

Some might not have noticed the great roles background images have played. For instance, forumites uses cool design background before messages in their forum signatures; some product graphic advertisements uses light subtle background to help create focus point; your website and desktop need nice backdrops too. Sometimes when I get a little limited by the amount of content I can insert onto an ad design, I’ll paint a light background behind it so the entire creative don’t look so empty.

Here’s 40 really nice abstract and background design Photoshop tutorials you might want to take a look at. It’s probably not about getting the exact effect they’ve got, but to pickup the technique and see how you can advance from there.

Looking for more photoshop tutorials? Here’s what we’ve previously compiled:

• 41 Nicest Photoshop Photo Effects, Part I
• 30+ Nicest Photoshop Photo Tutorials, Part II
• 40+ Hand-picked Photoshop Icon Designs
• 40+ Greatest Web Interface Design Tutorials
• 22 Best Photoshop Text Effect Tutorials
• more..

Full list after jump.

• Abstract Signature
  Learn how to create a detailed signature using several filters and effects.
  

  

• Chroma Wallpapers
  How to create a energetic, vibrant, colorful wallpaper
  

  

• Windows Vista Aurora Effect
  How to create the Vista aurora effects in Photoshop.
  

  

• Abstract Walkthrough
  

  

• Luminescent Lines
  This technique is fairly simple and is a great way to create an abstract wallpaper or looks good integrated into another image.
  

  

• Abstract Background of Colored Bars
  Short but attractive way to create a graphic for backgrounds, wallpapers, greeting cards, designs, and all that other good stuff.
  

  

• Leopard Aurora Borealis
  Not exactly the Mac OSX Leopard aurora wallpaper, but great effects to create something simillar.
  

  

• Brilliant Light Streaks Simple technique for creating brilliant light streaks which can be used in different ways to add motion and brightness to your designs.
  

  

• Space Lighting effects
  How to create a space scene with some nice Lighting Effects in 10 Steps.
  

  

• Calculations And Colorization
  How to create an Alpha Channel using the Calculations dialog and we’ll use it to get a really great abstract photo effect.
  

  

• Abstract image tutorial Create a beautiful and extraordinary effect with some simple steps.
  

  

• Cool abstract background
  Create abstract background from bubbles and waves.
  

  

• Abstract Light Rays
  

  

• Yet another abstract signature
  

  

• Abstract Summer Illustration
  Learn to create an illustration picturing the summer.
  

  

• Swoshy lines
  How to make an abstract ribbon-like effect using only Adobe Photoshop.
  

  

• Abstract Energy Lines
  How to create some energetic lines you can use to create more lively digital creations.
  

  

• Easy Abstract Photoshop Tutorial
  How to create a very simple abstract shape using a few brushes and effects.
  

  

• The lightning effect
  

  

• Intense Solar Flare (Filter) Effect
  

  

• Signature tutorial Movement
  

  

• Abstract Art Piece: "Lonium"
  In this Photoshop tutorial we’ll be walking through the process of making an abstract artwork, using abstract 3D renders, textures, and more.
  

  

• Light Rays
  Create a fantastic light ray background texture
  

  

• Abstract Background
  

  

• Abstract art wallpaper
  How to create blue abstract wallpaper for your desktop. Also, these techniques in Adobe Photoshop CS3 are suitable as design elements used in web design, printing design, etc
  

  

• The OS X Wallpaper
  Learn to create the iconic wallpaper using effects, gradients, masks and blurring.
  

  

• Digital Art Piece
  

  

• Grungy Metal Texture
  How to make some grungy metal with a star
  

  

• Signature Backgrounds
  

  

• Abstract Airbrushing
  

  

• Wallpaper Effect
  This tutorial walks you through steps in creating a warped effect that you can use to create artistic and profressional background and wallpapers.
  

  

• Trendy Background Textures
  Simple technique using brush strokes for making some trendy background
  

  

• Digital Star Effect
  

  

• Stripy Abstract Wallpaper
  Simple effect that can come in really handy.
  

  

• Magic light streak wallpaper in photoshop
  

  

• Mac-type background
  This tutorial is about making a "mac" style background.
  

  

• Colourful swirl
  

  

• Colorful Tornado
  

  

• Firey Explosion
  Spice up your space art with this explosive tutorial
  

  

• Abstract Artsy Background
  

  

Photoshop - Selection Tools(Marquee,Lasso,Magic Wand)

Let us see how to use the selection tools in Photoshop.....

What are Selection Tools?

The selection tools allow you to select a portion or a subset of an image to work on. Most of Photoshop’s other tools and filters can then be applied to this selected area, altering its color, shape, texture, position and/or other attributes, while leaving the rest of the image untouched.

Photoshop contains three types of selection tools: the Marquee Tools, the Lasso Tools, and the Magic Wand.

The marquee tools are used to select a specific regularly shaped area. The marquee tools include the Rectangular, Elliptical, Single Row and Single Column Marquees

The lasso tools are used to select an irregular area. These tools include the Lasso Tool, the Polygonal Lasso Tool and the Magnetic Lasso Tool.

The Magic Wand tool is used to select areas of an image based upon color; the Magic Wand does not have additional tools.


How do I use the Marquee Tools?

The marquee tools let you select rectangles, ellipses, and 1-pixel-wide rows and columns.

To use the marquee tools:

1) Select a marquee tool: Rectangular (for a rectangular selection), Elliptical (for an elliptically shaped selection), Single Row (for a one-pixel wide row) or Single Column (for a one-pixel wide column).

2) Set the options you want in the Options Bar.

3) Drag over the area you want to select. Hold down the Shift key if you want to constrain the selection to a square or a circle.


How do I use the Lasso Tools?

The Lasso Tool and Polygonal Lasso Tool let you draw irregular selection borders (both straight-edged and freehand):

* If you want the selection to be completely or primarily freehand (with a minimum of straight edges) then use the Lasso Tool.

* If you want the selection to be completely or primarily straight edges (with a miminum of freehand edges) then use the Polygonal Lasso Tool.

With the Magnetic Lasso Tool, you can draw the selection border, and it will automatically snap to a high-contrast edge in the graphic.

To use the Lasso Tool:

1) Select the Lasso Tool from the Toolbox.

2) Set any desired options in the Options Bar.

3) To draw a freehand segment of the selection, simply drag the mouse.

4) To draw a straight-edged segment of the selection, hold down the Alt key and click at the desired beginning and end points of the segment.

5) To close the selection border, let go of the mouse button (without holding down the Alt key).

To use the Polygonal Lasso Tool:

1) Select the Polygonal Lasso Tool from the Toolbox.

2) Set any desired options in the Options Bar.

3) To draw a straight-edged segment of the selection, click at the desired beginning and end points of the segment.

4) To draw a freehand segment of the selection, hold down the Alt key and drag the mouse.

5) To close the selection border, double-click the mouse button.


Tips: Think of the Lasso Tool and the Polygonal Lasso Tool as opposites of each other. One (the Lasso Tool) usually does freehand selections, but can be forced to make straight lines by holding down the Alt key, while the other (the Polygonal Lasso Tool) does straight line selections, but can be forced to do freehand by holding down the Alt key.


To use the Magnetic Lasso Tool:

1) Select the Magnetic Lasso Tool from the Toolbox.

2) Set any desired options in the Options Bar.

3) Click to set the first endpoint of the selection.

4) To draw a freehand segment, move the mouse pointer along the edge you want to trace. (You don’t have to hold down the mouse button, although you can if you like.)

5) As you move the pointer, the selection will automatically snap to the strongest edge in the area around the pointer, based on the Width set in the Options Bar. Periodically, intermediate points are added to the selection border. While tracing the edge, click to add a point if needed.

6) If you want to switch to either the regular Lasso Tool or the Polygonal Lasso Tool, hold down the Alt key. At that point, dragging the mouse will let you draw freehand borders; clicking will let you draw straight line segments.

7) Close the selection border by double-clicking the mouse.



How do I use the Magic Wand?

The Magic Wand Tool lets you select areas of an image based on similar shades of color simply by clicking on the desired color.

To use the Magic Wand Tool:

1) Select the Magic Wand Tool from the Toolbox.

2) Set the desired options in the Options Bar:

* Choose whether to
- create a new selection,
- add to an existing selection,
- subtract from an existing selection, or
- intersect with the existing selection.

* Enter a value from 0 to 255 in the Tolerance box. A low number will let you select colors very similar to the pixel you click; a high number will let you select a broader range of colors.

* To select only adjacent areas using the same colors, select Contiguous. Otherwise, all pixels using the same colors will be selected.

* Check or un-check the Contiguous option. If Contiguous is not selected, all pixels that are the same color as the selected pixel will be selected, wherever they occur in the image. Otherwise, only adjacent pixels of the same color will be selected.

3) Click the color you want to select.

css benefits and uses

Before coming to the point, let us know what is css,why to use it and what are the benefits........?
Now visit one by one.....

What is CSS?

CSS is a simple file which controls the visual appearance of a Web page without compromising its structure. Using CSS we can control our font size, font color, link color and many other attributes on our web page. This will make our HTML code much more readable and the page size will be reduced.

Why to use it and how to use it properly?

If you don't use CSS on your web pages and you have many tables and content on them, chances are that your HTML file size will be quite large. The fact is that we live in a busy world, and people are not willing to wait more than 5 seconds web page to load.

Well, imagine that you have site with more than 50 pages. One day, you decide that you want to change font color and colors of the links on your site. You will have to edit all the pages on your site, and do to that you will need time, because you place your CSS in your web page.

What are the benefits of using CSS?

The list is quite long and I will list here only the most important.

• Your pages will load faster
• Web pages will become more search engine friendly
• You can change you site appearance in minutes
• You can write separate CSS file for handheld devices which will be called up instead of the regular CSS file
• You can forget about creating printer friendly version of your site using separate CSS file when a user chooses to print the page.

Avoiding standard HTML commands like Product will help us to reduce file size, but that is not the only benefit. Using CSS word product in this example will be moved closer to the top of the dOCument. Search engines will pick up more content and less code.

Imagine that you have a 3 column table on your page. When you see the code, you will notice that first comes code for your table, and after that comes your content.

Again your code is much more clear, and your content is moved toward the top of your document, making your HTML page search engine friendly, and reducing your file size.
Content is one of the most important factors in Search Engine Optimization, and you will benefit by removing any unnecessary code in your HTML and creating search engine friendly web pages.

Validate the CSS:

The browser wars are far behind us. The reality is that most people today use Internet Explorer, but you should try to be on safe side and ensure that your CSS code is valid. Not all browsers interpret CSS the same way.
You can validate your CSS here: HTTP://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/

A easy way to change hair color in Photoshop!

From this video, you can easily learn how to use the quick mask and magic wand tool in photoshop.