New to the sig making thing?

Slider · Last edited by Slider on Thu Jan 13, 2011 3:24 pm; edited 8 times in total

HELLO all you eager children

In this topic, you'll learn general things to making a signature.

Programs
You'll probably want something better than MS Paint. Photoshop is what most people use, can be found here. GIMP is also a decent alternative if you don't have a way to get Photoshop.

Images
Tag making is very heavily focused on spamming of images and other resources. The images you use in your sigs should be of decent quality (duh), and work best at higher resolutions. Note that you cannot up the size of an image properly without specific enlarging software.

When people are talking about a "stock", this is usually what they mean. "Stock" isn't a photo-manip only term, but that's usually what the images are called.

Basic Tools
Paintbrush - This is your basic tool. You'll probably be using it for a lot of your early tag making. However, it's a very good tool, and shouldn't be ditched no matter how "experienced" you are in sig making. It has adjustable opacity, so you can brush lightly or as heavily as you want.

Eraser - Erases things, of course. Like the paintbrush, it has adjustable opacity and selectable brushes to use, and can erase that way.

Bucket Fill Tool - Click and fill that area.

Layers
Layers play a big part in sig making! You can have multiple layers, which can make it much easier in making a sig. Layers have modes and "styles", which you can edit the layers box... whatever it is. Layer modes can really help make a tag look good.

Actually Creating The Tag
Let's get to actual sig construction.

When you open your image editing program, you should start by creating a new document/canvas. This will be your base.

Get your resources. Remember what I said, tag making has a lot of spamming of image resources, so don't be afraid to have a ton of stuff to use.

For your next step, slap everything on. Seriously. Go crazy. Well not exactly.

When you're done, you can save it as a work-in-progress, as a .psd or .xcf (exclusive to GIMP), and/or save it as a .png or max quality .jpeg.

Cruxis · Joined: 19 Jul 2004 Posts: 18323 Location: The Acid Queen

Great idea.
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Slider · Posted: Mon Jul 20, 2009 11:44 pm Post subject:

Thanks. You guys tell me if you notice anything that must be put in there/edited plz

Mishi · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 12:18 am Post subject:

This is great! For pen tool, I suggest maybe just linking to sep's old pen tool tut. here

The only thing I would add to that tut is that in order to get the smoothest line, I suggest a 2 px or 3 px brush instead of a 1 px brush to stroke.

Jazzin' · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 1:55 am Post subject:

Awesome. Sticky this shiz. Either that or throw it in the tut directory, but I'm afraid if that happened, it wouldn't be quite as noticeable.

And I'd just like to stress that the pen tool is amazing and that it may seem difficult at first but it really helps to master it.

Another thing: the biggest thing that helped me out when I was a starter with Photoshop was http://www.good-tutorials.com/ . I just read tons of tutorials and gained so much knowledge. It definitely speeds up the process of learning how to use whatever program you may be using.
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Slider · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 2:25 am Post subject:

K, I'll add this stuff to the OP. Does anyone have like a good blending tutorial here?

Cruxis · Joined: 19 Jul 2004 Posts: 18323 Location: The Acid Queen

Blending is such a broad topic. There's so many different ways to blend. I was actually making sort of a blending tutorial a while back, but that was before my computer had crashed.

D:
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Gothic kratos · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 6:28 am Post subject:

Cruxis · Joined: 19 Jul 2004 Posts: 18323 Location: The Acid Queen

I think the polygon lasso tool is horrible, to be honest.

I could never use it without annoying myself. I'd be making a selection, and I accidentally click the mouse button, and bam. It closes the selection and you can't fix it, so you have to do it over again.
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Gothic kratos · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 6:36 am Post subject:

Cruxis · Joined: 19 Jul 2004 Posts: 18323 Location: The Acid Queen

I don't think I said what I meant. lol

I know you can bring the selection back up, but can you alter the shape of it...is that what I'm trying to say? I don't know. lol I'm having a moment.

>__<
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Seppuku · Joined: 13 Jun 2005 Posts: 4244

Omg that pen tool tut of mine that was posted looks horrible. it hurts my eyes hahaha. It's weird to look back at things you did a few years ago lol.

Cruxis · Joined: 19 Jul 2004 Posts: 18323 Location: The Acid Queen

Thank you, Seppy-poo. Someone who understands!
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SEP LOVE <3. | Photos of me in Lingerie!!!!

Zaith · Joined: 07 Jan 2005 Posts: 5530 Location: Not here.

Jazzin' · Posted: Tue Jul 21, 2009 9:13 am Post subject:

I understand you, O Great Countess Lillagna <3
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