I just got photoshop. 7.0 to be exact. I have never used any type of photoshop, so I am going into this blind. I want some pointers. To start with, I am in the USFL multiplayer league. I want to create a helmet with my logo. Any and all help is appreciated. Thanks again.

The manual might be of some help :)

Yaeh, Yeah, Yeah. I am just looking for some quick pointers.

Find the helment template on the net. Find a logo slap it on there, then twist the logo some.

Here is somewhat of a tutorial, but not for Photoshop. Their must be a similar tool in PS though.

http://www.nationalchamps.net/Helmet_Project/faq.htm#11

go to the TechTV website and search for articles by Bert Monroy, a Photoshop expert. There's a tutorial on making a waving flag up there right now. He has lots of cool tips that should give you practical ideas. Best advice is simply to play around and see what happens.

Webmonkey.

http://hotwired.lycos.com/webmonkey/design/graphics/

http://www.misterhabs.com/helmets.htm

http://www.nationalchamps.net/Helmet_Project/faq.htm#11

The "sphere" tool that the second one talks about is analagous to Photoshop's Filter->Distort->Spherize

I have also found the "stroke" and "outer glow" layer effects particularly helpful for outlining the logo, as is Image->Adjust->Replace color for tweaking the helmet or facemask colors.

Yaeh, Yeah, Yeah. I am just looking for some quick pointers.
pointer: use the manual

pointer: use the manual
He said he just got it. He didn't say he just bought it.

Thanks for the pointers guys. I would like to add that I do own a leagal version of photoshop. The manual is at home. I have been at work, working a lot of overtime.

I don't understand why there are the "subtle" hints that he may have pirated the software. I could see if the man was asking for basic or obvious information that he could clearly find in the manual, but dude's just asking for help doing a specific task. I don't have Photoshop, so maybe I'm mistaken, but is there a section in its manual that describes how to create a football helmet/logo? If there is, wouldn't it be less confrontational to just tell him which section of the manual that exercise is in? I just don't see any reason not to give the benefit of the doubt when the guy asked for a little help.

Only one thing you need to know about photoshop.. Gaussian Blur is king, it makes everything look good. ;)

Your always going to be learning, shoot 4 years into Photoshop and I am not even close to being an expert, and it's open a few times a week. :)

Thanks guys. I brought the manual to work with me. Its going to take a bit to learn. Really wish I wasnt working so much overtime, so that I could sit down at home and play with it. Also really looking forward to getting my helmet done. I am also think about BUYING a copy of Madden and doing the graphic things with that. Is it easy to load the helmets? Any suggestions for that?

If you are teaching yourself, it's going to be a lot of trial and error. Be prepared to put in a whole lot of hours before you really feel comfortable with it.

For creating helmets, I wouldn't worry too much about spherize. You won't use it too much, and even when you do, it doesn't seem to make that much of a difference. Don't try to create your own helmet template, just take one from the misterhabs site that Cuervo posted.

Some important tips I can give you.
-Use Layers. It allows you to work with each image/background seperately and will make things a lot easier to correct when you make a mistake.
- Learn what all the tool icons are for. You will use these a lot, and the faster you learn them, the better off you will be. Also know that each tool icon has multiple tools under it. (In PS 6, you right clicked to get the other options)
- Edit->Transform-> all these tools are important for twisting and reshaping images.
- { and } keyboard buttons allow you to increase/decrease brush sizes
-Right click on any layer and look for blending options. These things are very useful, and will be used a lot early on.

I've been getting into doing the helmets for madden as my copy is set to arrive sometime this week ($15 at Amazon), and they're pretty easy with photoshop. For some templates, check out hxxp://www.emeraldfusion.net/maddenart/ .

I would say that regarding spherize, in many cases I've found it to be very helpful in adding "curvature" to the helmet (along with a gradient shadowing layer). For some logos, this won't make too much of a difference, but for others it will. What I will typically do is take a 250x250 blank image and drop the logo into it (copy merged from your master logo, this will pick up any stroke/glow or other effects, and all the layers), shrink it as appropriate, and then spherize. From there you will copy that onto the helmet and shrink to fit. Spherize will unfortunately blur the logo a bit, but that is sometimes corrected when you shrink the image, and can also be "fixed" a little by tinkering with the brightness/contrast.

Definitely use one of the templates from misterhabs' HHH site. Just select one with a similar base color and stripe scheme, and use the replace color tool (oh, and of course paint on top of the existing logo). Occasionally you will need to cut and past facemasks or stripes if you can't find exactly the right helmet.

Oh, and for helmets you won't need gaussian blur....but it does come in handy for banners sometimes. :)

And to pimp some of mine again:
http://cuervo72.majecc.net/helmets/IHOF.html
http://cuervo72.majecc.net/FOFL-Helmets.html

edit: Raven's suggestions are very solid, btw.

Some very nice work there, Cuervo.


I'll pimp a little of mine too.
hxxp://www.rwbl.ootp-leagues.com/images/RWBLPage2.html

Really nice work guys.

heres a good tip for beginners, always work in RBG mode. Say you want to modify that template on misterhabs.com... once you open it, go to Image->Mode and select RGB Color. Whenever youre working with an image, you should generally be in RBG mode.