Digital 3D Self

[Caeruleus]

This tutorial shows you how to make a portrait look like it was rendered with vectors in 3D. Requires Average Color

Hidden Content: Example

First take any photo, I will be using this one as my sample.

If you want the end result to be a certain dimension then it's very important you re-size before you start editing or it will look pixelated. I want a 200x200 image so I will re-size it right away. To help re-size I use a portrait mask layer.

Create a new layer and draw a grid on it.

If you make a mistake and start drawing a grid on the wrong layer just use the magic wand to select all black pixels, undo all the lines drawn on the wrong layer, then paste the grid on the right layer. If you're drawing a grid on something dark, feel free to make the background layer temporarily slightly transparent.

Generally I just follow the natural contours of the face making polygons as I imagine them in 3D space. If you have troubles doing this I have some general guidelines you can follow.

Hidden Content: Guide

Nose - The basic concept is to draw a rectangle for the bridge of the nose, triangles for the two sides, then a small rectangle for the underside of the nose and 2 rectangles again for both undersides.

If the head is tilted forward sometimes you won't have to draw the underside of the nose. For lower resolution pictures you may have to use just triangles.

Ear - If the ears are small you can keep them just 1 color if they are large and turned toward you, feel free to add a little lighting & shading.

Grid - Make an outline of the persons face, forehead, and ears. Draw in the nose, mouth, and put a square in between the two. Make lines for the eye, and eye ridge. Outline the hair. Make a rectangle for the chin by making two lines going down on the lowest part of the lips. Make a line going down from the middle of the eye. It should just pass the outside part of the lips. Make a horizontal line from the outsides of the lips to the lower part of the ear. If the persons face it turned to the side you may have to add another vertical part on the side of the face. You should have about 2-4 horizontal parts to the forehead. I usually start with the middle square and work my way out. Sometimes it helps to start with a blank outline then make a grid that flows with the 3d contours of the face. Don't forget to get any clothing showing.

Teeth - If a person is smiling I usually go back and put in a set of generic teeth that I made. Just cut out the area of the teeth you flattened out using average color and make a new layer then position and rotate the teeth till it looks right. You may need to use rotate/zoom depending on the angle.

Eyes/Brows - Use a line tool on a separate layer to outline eyebrows just like you did with everything else. Dark ones are the easiest. For the eyes make sure you use color picker on the pixel you feel best represents the persons eye color. After using average color on the eye it will be darker than it should due to the pupil. Make sure to fill in the color you got beforehand. Feel free to lighten the white part of the eye and outline it in black if need be.

Your grid should be enclosed with no openings. Select outside of the persons silhouette on the grid layer then delete everything selected on the main layer to remove the background. Now using the magic wand tool you will be selecting an area inside of the grid, jumping to the main layer, using average color on the selection, and jumping back to the grid layer. You will be doing this for each grid section. Make sure to select a little over the grid to parts you already color averaged then just use the magic wand tool to deselect the areas you don't want. If you don't do this you will end up with grid marks where the lines where. While you can just ignore them and go back and remove the lines later, I find getting them right away is a little faster.

At this point your vector man/woman should start looking like they were made out of polygons. The persons natural shading helps so usually you won't have to mess with the lighting. Now you can take care of your TEEE (Teeth, Ears, Eyebrows, Eyes). The sides of the mouth are very important. Even just a few pixels can make a person seem like they are smiling/frowning. The eyebrows can also affect how the persons mood looks. Make sure the colored part of the eyes looks like they are looking in the right direction.

After all that is done then you can put on a background. Here's something I threw together real quick.

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Hidden Content: Examples

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Forgive me but this is my first time using a recording program and I just used the first one that came up on Google (CamStudio). If anyone knows of better video recording software/video host feel free to suggest one. I would post in the tutorial section but

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[nitenurse79]

This is cool :star: :star:

[Aislin]

should be placed at tutorials, but great idea yeah

[barbieq25]

Pretty good tute. Lots of examples. Good explanations but not sure about selecting slightly larger than the grid if you are selecting an area within the grid?

[Goonfella]

I thought you`d misspelled `shelf' and it was a 3D SHELF tutorial!

Nice idea though.

[Lance McKnight]

This kind of tutorial could be used for cubism art. Funny, I was looking at an Illustrator tutorial, and the steps were somewhat similar.