Create Running Water Effect

This tutorial will show you how to create realistic effects of running water which you can apply to water taps, hoses, or even with some tweaking, a waterfall!

You will learn how to use blend modes, the warp tool and how to create realistic textures using clouds, plastic wraps and apply some chrome effects.

STEP 1

Create a new document of 300×300 pixels in size. Press “D” to reset your color palletes to black and white.

Go to Filter > Render > Clouds

STEP 2

Once it’s done, apply Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur

Set Value = 5

STEP 3

Now go to Filter > Artistic > Plastic Wrap

Set Highlight Strength = 15 Detail = 8 Smoothness = 8

STEP 4

Apply Filter > Sketch > Chrome Set Detail = 1 Smoothness = 5

And go to Edit > Fade Chrome Set Opacity = 100% Mode = Hard Light

STEP 5

Go to Image > Image Size Set Height = 600 pixels

UN-CHECK the “Constrain Proportions” Option

STEP 6 Then go to Edit > Transform > Warp

Move the anchors around, and shape it like running water.

(Depends on what shape of water you would like to apply)

STEP 7

Open another image (Water Tap Image ID: 3076412, © Kiyoshi Takahase Segundo 123RF.com) and drag the running water into the water tap image.

Make sure to change the water layer’s blending mode to “Hard Light” (To create some transparency effect)

STEP 8

Press CTRL+T/CMD+T to transform and resize the running water till it fits the water tap.

STEP 9

Create a layer mask for running water (Layer > Layer Mask > Reveal) to remove the excessive part of the running water. (Layer mask tool is used instead of eraser tool to avoid accidentally erasing parts of the main image)

STEP 10

After completing the layer mask, go to Level or Curve to adjust the color and contrast of the running water.

P/S : all “Filter” values are appropriate recommendation for this project. Feel free to play with the setting to see what works best for you!

SAVE WATER!!! Make it a Photoshopped one 🙂

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