

Hi,
Thank you for purchasing 'Pencil Art - Photoshop Action' on Graphicriver.

This guide will cover the installation and basic usage of the package.
For a detailed walk-through about basics and techniques for customization 
to use after the action's playback, please watch this video tutorial:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3XQIpHtAiU


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This Action has been tested on Photoshop CS4, CS5, CS6, CC+, English Version ONLY.
If you’re using Photoshop in another language This Video shows how to change it temporarily:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJAiu5W2gLE


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INSTALLATION
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1. Open Photoshop go to menu 'Window' then select 'Actions', the Actions panel will open.

2. On the actions panel click the arrow icon at the top-right corner, when the drop down 
   menu opens select 'Load Action'. Select the action file 'Pencil Art - Photoshop Action'.

3. To install the Brushes and Patterns go to menu 'Edit'>'Presets'>'Presets Manager'

4. When the panel opens, on the top select 'Brushes' as 'Preset Type', 
   then click 'Load' and select the file 'Pencil Art - Brushes'

5. Change the 'Preset Type' to 'Patterns' and load also the file 'Pencil Art - Patterns'


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BEFORE PLAYING THE ACTION
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1. Make sure your image is in RGB 8 bit color mode.

2. You're on the English version of Photoshop.

3. Your image has a good resolution, use images between 2000-5000 pixels 
   (at least one of the axes should be in this range).

4. Make sure that the option 'Add copy to copied layers and groups' is active.
   To do it click on the arrow icon on the top-right corner of the 
   layers panel, then select 'Panel Option', select the option and click OK.

5. Make sure that the image has a nice contrast, select the image's layer and press CTRL+L (CMD+L on Mac)
   to open the Levels panel, check in the histogram if the image has black point and a white point.
   If not you can both tweak it on the Levels panel or apply an 'Auto-Contrast' to the image,
   to do it go to top menu 'Image'>'Auto Contrast'.


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HOW TO USE THE ACTION
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1. Open an image to work with in Photoshop.

2. Make sure that the image's layer is locked and it's set as 'Background'.
   To set a layer as Background go to menu 'Layers' -> 'New' -> 'Background from Layer'

3. Create a new layer above the Background layer and call it 'mask'.
   The name MUST be lowercase.

4. Select the mask layer and brush over the interested area of the image below.
   For better results use any soft brush or the 'Pencil Art - Soft' brush included in the pack.

   The action will create a detailed pencil drawn effect in the masked area, while the rest will be sketched.

   Make sure at the end that you have a nice mask of the image and the rest of the layer 
   has transparency.

5. Before playing the action make sure to have only 2 layers in your file 'mask' and 'Background'.

7. Open the Actions panel. Select the 'PENCIL ART' action and click play! 
   At the beginning of the playback a message will appear asking to check on the top menu if the opacity/flow
   parameters of your brush tools are set to 100%, if the parameters are correct click 'Continue', 
   otherwise click 'Stop, adjust the parameters and playback the action again.

   8. The playback will take about 5 minutes and it will generate many graphic elements
   that can be tweaked and combined to achieve different results.

9. When the playback finishes the message 'Render Completed' will appear, click 'Continue'.
   
   There will be many opened groups and layer styles in the layers panel and it'll look messy,
   to make a quick re-organization hold ALT (or OPTION on Mac) and click the arrow of the main group 
   'PENCIL ART - Output', this will close the group, then release ALT.
   If you open again the group normally all the layers and groups will be re-organized.


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LAYERS STRUCTURE
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Inside the main 'PENCIL ART - Output' group there are different sub-groups.

List of sub-groups:

- GLOBAL POST FX
- DETAILED PART - Post FX
- DETAILED PART
- SKETCHED PART
- BACKGROUND

Unhide each sub-group starting from the top to see what each one does.

Here is a quick description of each sub-group and how it can be modified.
It starts from the bottom since it is the easiest sequence to use to do the customization,
start deciding the 'BACKGROUND' and tweaking at the end the 'GLOBAL POST FX'.

Also it's a good practice to close each sub-group once it's customized, 
some of them contain many layers/sub-groups and focusing on only one sub-group helps
to keep the layers panel tidy.




[BACKGROUND]
This group of layers simulates the paper, open the group, inside you'll find two sub-groups.

The first is 'Background Color', un-hide each layer one by one and choose you preferred color for the paper,
you can double-click the thumbnail of each layer and choose a custom color.

The second sub-group is 'Paper Texture', here you'll find 6 layers, take a look at them one by one. 
The first three are different types of paper (Standard, Recycled, Canvas), 
the other three can be combined with these three to create various paper effects.
You can modify the opacity of these layers.

Also remember that for all the layers created by the action, you can use the mask channel to hide or 
show parts of the layer. 
To do it select the mask channel, then select a black brush and paint over the area you want to hide.
A black brush will hide parts of a layer and a white brush will reveal them.




[SKETCHED PART]
This is the part of the image that was Not "highlighted" from the 'mask' layer created at the beginning,
the action extracts this part and creates a sketched effect with it.
Inside this group there are three other sub-groups 'Sketch Lines','Edge Sketch','Masked Part'.

Sketch Lines: The three layers inside this group add some roughly sketched lines to the background,
they have a low opacity by default, you can modify it to make them more visible.

Edge Sketch: Here there are six layers that add some sketched lines around the masked area,
un-hide them one by one to see each one, you can combine them and blend them together 
by modifying their opacity.

Masked Area: Here you'll find the main sketched outlines, as you can see they are masked and not visible
in the detailed area. 
You can always modify the mask channel with a black/white brush and adjust it to suit your needs.
Also you can move in or out from this group the layers of the sketched part to achieve different results.

Inside the group you'll first find 4 'Sketch Outlines' layers, check them one by one and find a 
good combination for your image, you can modify the opacity or also hide some of them.
Then there's the 'Sketch Detail' layer, this will add some details to the background, 
it is usable only if the image has some nice details in the background in the first place,
otherwise it can be skipped.
The next two layers, 'Rough Outlines', are hided by default and they add a rough sketch effect to 
the background.


IMPORTANT, and valid for all the pencil effect layers:
Use the mask channel to fine tune the layer hiding undesired parts of it. 

Also all these layers have a color overlay layer style, double click it to customize the color of 
each layer separately.




[DETAILED PART]
This is the pencil drawn part determined by the initial mask, inside there are seven sub-groups, 
it's easy to understand what each sub-group does by simply hiding/un-hiding them.
For all of these layers the same customization methods can be applied, you can modify opacity, 
hide/Unhide them, modify the mask channel, 
change color using the layer styles and if needed also move/rotate/scale them.

Some sub-groups contain many layers that are hided by default, you can try many combination between 
all these layers using this methods. 
The best combination depends on the image used and the mask made initially.
For example if the image has a lot of black parts, try to hide 1-2 layers of the 'Base Shading' group,
because they darken the overall effect, and un-hide if needed some layers in the 'Internal Sketch' 
group to restore some detail.

In the sub-groups 'Fill Patterns' and 'White Parts' you'll find some layer that have a 
Pattern Overlay layer style, you can use to modify the scale of the patterns.





[DETAILED PART - Post FX]
Inside this group you'll find some post processing layers dedicated to fine tune the detailed part.
The first three layers are simple adjustment layers for Contrast, Levels and Hue/Saturation, you can
modify the first one by changing it's opacity and the other two by double-clicking their thumbnails.

Color: Unhide this layer if you want to add some color to the detailed part,
modify it's opacity to make it more or less visible. Notice that you can delete or mute the mask channel 
(by shift clicking it) to colorize also the background.

Detail Enhance and Overlay: you can modify the opacity of these two layers and try 
the blending modes Overlay and Soft Light.





[GLOBAL POST FX]
Here you can find some post processing layers that blend all the elements together.

Starting from the bottom there is the 'Color Correction' group where you'll find eight different 
color correction options,check them one by one and choose your favourite, if needed you can lower 
their opacity to soften the effect.
Also they are not indispensable to achieve a good result.

The layer 'Grain' adds some noise to the image you can modify it's opacity.

Next there are 'Vignette' and 'Spotlight' which are counterparts, the 'Vignette' layer darken 
the edges and the 'Spotlight' layer brightens the center. 
Also here you can modify opacity and blending modes.

The 'Spotlight' layer is a Gradient Adjustment layer, you can modify it by double clicking it's thumbnail. 
For example by changing the 'Style' parameter it is possible to turn it into a line instead of a spot,
change it's rotation, scale and color by changing the other parameters.

The next 3 layers are 3 simple adjustment layers that act on the whole image for Contrast, 
Hue/Saturation and Levels.





! Please WATCH THE VIDEO TUTORIAL for a better demonstration of this basic steps and also 
a walk-through of customization techniques.


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If you need any further help please contact me through my profile page on Graphicriver:

http://graphicriver.net/user/BlackNull



Check also my other products at this link:

http://graphicriver.net/user/BlackNull/portfolio


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Thank you for the support,

BlackNull




