Posted by Havelok on 24, 2000 at 5:25 AM:
In Reply to: Re: Photoshop rulez - joystick design - posted by Druin on 23, 2000 at 4:41 PM:
Everything was made without any external images, except for the background texture (the wooden table). I desinged the box, the button and the joystick layout in Coreldraw with real dimensions and then I export it to Photoshop, (the drawing lines). The thing that required more time and effort on my part was the desing of the buttons. Of course you just desing one, and then copy that layer, changing its tone to get the different colors. I had to apply a bevel to the external part of the button and then to the button itself, so as to get a first emboss look. The shape of concave button which is hard to represent in 2D: you have to aply a bevel, and another bevel with the contrary direction, and then fill the interior part of the button with a radial gradient to finally get that concave aspect. The rest was easy, again with the aid of filters. In fact, I have not made much by myself, since I don't know much about desing and I prefer not to take many risks (I usually don't desing myself, but create with Photoshop what other people ask me to do). The glowing aspects of the buttons is just a glow filter, although you can do it with a blur. Same with the joystick, but to this one I aply another filter (Eyecandy collection) with produces some kind of turbulences: to simulate the flames of the star. The little stars are created with a filter for water drops, which I managed to transform into stars looking. The reflections were made with some brushing and gaussian blur. The I added a radial semitransparent gradient for that violet colour. Of course every element of the pic has it's shadow (can be done manually but I have a filter for this too). I specially like the aspect of height of the button which is achived with its shadow. The stick was given shape with a radial gradient, and it has some texture, which cannot be noticed in this low res pic. The rest of the layers also have bevels and shadows: screws, the box, and the stick (for the stick's shadow I had to copy the shape of the original happ super joystick). And I thing thay's all I have to say about the making of this image. Easy, but requires time and dedication. Actually I spent more time decided what I wanted to do, than doing it. One thing that is very important is: work with layers. In this pic, every element is a separate layer: even one single screw is a layer, every button, every part of the artwork, etc etc. This way, you can hide, delete or modify whatever you want very easily. For instance, I can easily change this by hiding all space images and aplying the box a wooden texture, or changin the colors of the buttons, or the layout of the buttons, or adding more brightness to the stick, or changin the color of the gradient from violet to red, etc.