Self-portrait tutorial

Step 1

Pick/take portrait of yourself

Step 2

Open image up in Photoshop (file open)

Step 3

Firstly we are going to vectorise our image. This is done by creating blocks of skin then adding in the rest of the important details.

Create a new layer (ctrl + shift + n) name it skin! Select a colour you want to use for your skin. I decided to go with the colour #f8daa1

With the magic want tool (press letter W on keyboard) click the body and hold the shift button until all of the bodys silhouette is covered. Dont include any clothes or hair.

Fill shape with skin colour (tool bar-edit-fill-foreground colour-#f8daa1)

Hide this layer

Step 4

Create new layer called skin layer(ctrl+shift+n)

Select a brush (press letter b on keyboard)

Change colour to dark brown

Pick brush with 3px radius

Go to skin line layer

Create line work to outline the body using the pen tool. (press p on kepboard)

Use pen tool to create lips, eyes, nose, eyebrows and all defined features on body/face.

To get into more detailed areas e.g eyes change the size of the pen (make sure the fill colour on brush is on transparent.

Step 5

Create new layer. Name is hair

Using pen tool again outline hair(when reaching finer bits of the hair change the size of brush to give a more gentle look

Fill colour into match the colour you want your hair to be

(OPTIONAL) If you want to make your hair look more detailed on a different layer (name it hair) you can give your hair highlights by using a darker/lighter colour using the pen tool.

Step 5

Below skin layer create a new layer (name it colour) on this layer paint eyes & lips & face.

To get in closer to the shape zoom into image (ctrl +) use brush tool to fix image to desired colour

When doing the highlighted bits on the cheeks/chest/nose bring the opacity down low and change to a soft brush

Step 6

To add the background you go to filter section on the tool bar at the top filter-blur-motion