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Hello paint.net users. This is a tutorial on how to create a nice, cool looking lava texture in a simple and easy to follow manner. For this tutorial 3 additional downloaded plug-ins are used and these can be found on the getpaint.net website. (here!)
Plug-in links
Essential: Flames (aka Burninate) by Bolt-Bait : Flames plug-in
Grim Color Reaper (only needed for the smoke effects) by Jotaf:Grim Color Reaper plug-in
Color Filter by Ed Harvey (not essential but it helps): Color filter
This tutorial is in two parts. Part 1: Lava and Part 2: Smoke effects
Part 1:Lava
1.Firstly open paint.net and press Ctrl+N to open a new image. You can choose whatever image resolution you'd like. I am going with 800 x 600.
2. We'll be using the Clouds texture in paint.net (a good old classic). So go ahead and click Effects > Render > Clouds and make sure your colors are black and white
3. Set the blend mode to "Difference". The default value of 0.5 for roughness is fine but you change it (Important: Don't set the roughness too low or too high.) A default scale value of 250 is fine, although I used 200. You can experiment with this scale value but I would suggest avoiding very low values for scale (Like 15)
4. Now use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+F to repeat these difference clouds. Do this about six times
Ooo. Its looks like some gray alien mud. Don't worry, we'll be flaming this up in a bit.
5. Optional: Apply Brightness/Contrast (under Adjustments) and set the increase in brightness by a small value (such as +8). This will just make the lava more 'fiery' and hotter. You may also want to adjust the Contrast slightly but I just left it as it is.
6. Now let's start stoking flames here with BoltBait's Flames plug-in. Go to Effects > Render > Flames. (aka the Burninate plug-in)
7. I went with a roughness of 0.60 and a scale of 150 for the flames. You can try out what suits you. Avoid very low values for scale and very high roughness values.
And make sure 'Black and white is off' because you will have really boring 'lava' with this on!
Cool but it just needs a few touches. You will notice a few 'white patches' that you might like to get rid of. Also the lava needs some more 'glow'
8. To fix the patches go to Effects > Color > Color Filter
Hue: 30 to 50
Filter density: 110 to 150
Preserve Highlights : zero (and exact zero or maybe 5)
9. To make the lava glow. Go to Effects >Photo > Glow and run glow with settings similar to these
10. You may also want to do another Color Filter
That finishes off the lava.
Part 2: Smoke effects
The lava at this stage looks goods but you may want to add some smoke effects.
11. To do this first add a new layer
12. On this new layer run Effects > Render > Clouds. We are using normal clouds and not difference clouds. Scale is up to you but keep the roughness in about 0.50 to 0.72. We'll need some 'detail' in the smoke.
13. So now you have a cloudy blanket. But how does this become smoke? Go to Effects > Color > Grim Color Reaper and experience automatic color destruction. We need to lose all the black, most of the grey and just some of that white. So Color tolerance at 1.00 won't do. Decrease the tolerance to about 0.3. Yes this will make the white more transparent but hey its what we want for smoke.
14. Neat but we do not want smoke all over the place. Time for the Eraser tool - set its hardness all the way down to zero. Adjust the size to your liking and remove some smoke.
15. So here is your smoke. (optional) But you may want a more 'transparent' smoke effect. If so follow the images below.
The Opacity is the value to alter to make the smoke more transparent.
16. Well that's all. The end-result =
Thank you very much for reading my tut.
