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jderril — FMG Morphing tutorial - The basics
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Published: 2018-08-16 12:58:44 +0000 UTC; Views: 24250; Favourites: 155; Downloads: 0
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- Some basic understanding of Photoshop is probably required!
- I used OS X, shortcuts using 'cmd' will most likely need to be replaced with 'ctrl' for Windows users.
- This tutorial uses tools like Brushes, Masks, Layers, Free transform (Warp) and Adjustment layers.
- This tutorial shows how to create a 'quick' mix and match FMG morph using a male base and female face donor.
- This tutorial only shows the basics and should be considered a general guide. (Who knows, if this helps I might do some more in depth tutorials)
- A lot of additional techniques I use for details are not shown, its already TLDR the way it is!
- I hope it helps! Have fun and feel free to ask questions!
Timelapse video: [link]
The video shows the entire process that will be explained below. All steps explained below you can find in this video, so if anything isn't clear, be sure to watch me do it on Youtube. Tip: using the controls on the video on Youtube you can slow or speed up the video.
Let's get started!
This is the base image. I was so kind to remove the original face before we start as its only distracting.
- Duplicate the base image and make it smaller. Click and drag the layer to the bottom of the layers panel to 'create new layer'.
- I suggest you right click the new layer before transformation and convert to smart object.
- In the layers panel (bottom right of Photoshop), place it below the original layer.
- Hide the original image from view by clicking the little eye icon next to the layer in the layers panel.
- Use free transform (Cmd+t) on the copied layer and make it smaller. I decreased the image by 80%.
- Why? So we can copy body parts from the bigger original into the smaller composition later, instantly creating bigger muscles!
I like to start with the face as it makes the morph come to live straight away.
- I always place the donors into my Photoshop file, never work with separate files.
- Select the layer where the face picture is on in the layers panel.
- Select the pencil tool (p), and draw a path around the face. Following the hairline and adding some are of the neck.
- In the path panel (on the right side of Photoshop), turn the path into a selection by clicking 'load path as selection'
- Click 'Add layer mask' in the layers panel, this will turn the selection into a mask and remove the surrounding area of the face picture.
- Right click the layer and convert to smart object. This will blend the mask into a new object removing the mask.
- If for any reason you want to change your mask, you can double click the smart object to review the mask.
- Why: I think masks are superior to deleting stuff. Masks allow you to revert things you've deleted, but also offer way more benefits when you go into more advances techniques.
- Use free transform (Cmd+t) to move and resize the face to the appropriate position on the body.
- After positioning the face you apply a new mask to the layer, clicking Add layer mask in the layers panel, this should create a second white box next to the layer in the layers panel.
- Using the mask we will blend Daisy's neck into the background body.
- Select the (currently) white mask layer for Daisy, in the layers panel.
- Grab a soft round brush (b) with a low flow and the colour 100% black.
- (In layers, black allows you to hide parts of an image, if you want to restore parts you can use a white coloured brush)
- Now using the black brush on the mask layer you can click the neck and smoothly hide it to blend with the background body. If the blending is to hard, play around with the flow settings.
- Why I don't cut the face off at the jaw: I prefer to keep some original face neck and use that for blending, compared to a hard cut face following the chin/jaw line. I feel it creates a more organic blending.
Now comes the hard part of face swapping! The colour matching! I admit I will skim over this subject, but its so complicated it could be a tutorial in on itself.
- Duplicate the face layer by dragging the layer to the new layer button at the bottom of the layers pane. This makes sure its duplicated without moving the layer around.
- Using the shortcut Cmd+Alt+G you stack the duplicated layer (above) into the original. You will see it jump to the right in the layers panel. This allows for some more advanced matching
- I suggest you take a look at the video more closely, but all tools you need to colour match can be found under image > adjustment
- Primary tools to use here are:
- Hue/Saturation to slightly colour balance, but mostly change saturation levels.
- Colour balance to change the colour tone of the skin
- Shadows/Highlights to extend or tighten the range between shadows and highlights.
- Photo filter I only use when the face is much more pale compared to the bodybuilder body.
- Curves to change colour depth
- Exposure to change light and make skin darker/lighter looking.
Important remark for face matching: No matter the tools in Photoshop. You should always look for a face with similar colour depth and light (angles) as the picture you want to blend it with. If its completely different you will find that matching it right will become almost impossible.
We did not use a feather (you can forget that straight away) to create the mask for the face, so the hair is now cut off very hard. We are going to fix this now.
- First we draw hair!
- Add a new layer on top of the face layers
- Select a soft brush (b) of 1 pixel size and a high flow, around 80%. Also check on Airbrush.
- Select a colour from the existing hair, using the colour picker or pick a colour with the brush active and clicking on the image while pressing 'Alt'.
- Now draw additional hairs. Be sure to change the colour several times while doing this.
- Second we add shadows.
- Add a new layer beneath the other face layers
- Select a dark colour, soft brush (b), larger in size and with a low flow.
- Now draw shadow underneath the face
It looks a bit odd, but in the picture below you can see the hair and shadows drawn in.
(optional) Emphasize eye colours
- Click 'Create new fill or adjustment layer' in the layer panel, above all face and hair layers. Choose hue/saturation.
- Checkbox 'Colorize' and change the colour to what you want the eye colour to be. I made them green.
- Adjustment layers are always made as a mask and the mask should be showing as a white block in the layers panel. This means the filter is applied to the entire canvas.
- Turn the foreground colour into 100% black. (x) (if it turns white, press X again, it should turn black now)
- Then select the mask layer for the filter and hit Alt+Backspace, this should turn the mask 100% black and thus hide the filter completely.
-
- Now with a small black brush (b), colour the mask white where the eyes are. This should turn his her eye's green. (or whatever colour you want)
Now on to the bikini-top! Using the same method as the face.
- Select the pencil tool (p), and draw a path outline for the top
- In the path panel, turn the path into a selection by clicking 'load path as selection'
- Click 'Add layer mask' in the layers panel.
- Right click the layer and convert to smart object.
- Use Free transform (Cmd+T) to reposition and scale the top to your liking
- While keeping free transform active, right click the mouse and choose 'Warp'
- While warp is active you can reshape the object to your liking by pulling the various dots on the shown grid.
- When you have the shape you want, simply hit enter to commit. If you deformed it too much and need a reset, press backspace and try again.
- Add a new layer on top of the bikini top layer.
- Use the Polygonal lasso tool (L) tool to draw the outline of the new bikini straps. This should turn the shape into a selection straight away.
- Using the colour picker, select an appropriate colour form the existing top image and fill (Alt+Backspace) the selection
- Feel free to play around with more colours and create a gradient. In the video I also added some more darker black from the bottom up as the strap moves from a lighter into a darker area of the picture.
Add some shadow to create depth perception.
- Create a new layer beneath the bikini top layers.
- Using a soft, low flow brush (B), you can draw shadows. Be sure to pick black or a skin matching dark brown tone.
The bikini-top is now finished and it's time for some muscle growth!
Copy muscles from the bigger original onto the smaller working composition
- Go back to the original base image we had hidden earlier.
- Use the pencil (p) tool to draw a path that surrounds a single or several muscle groups. Like in the picture above.
- The smaller the groups you do at a time, the more detailled you can become.
- In the path panel, turn the path into a selection by clicking 'load path as selection'
- Copy and paste the selection into a new layer, simply with Cmd+C (copy) and Cmd+V (paste)
Reshaping and growing her mass
- With the copied muscle layer selected, press CMD+t for free transform.
- Position the copied muscle into the right-ish position.
- Then right click the mouse on the muscle and choose Warp.
- Now you can start reshaping and growing the muscle group to your liking.
- When you are finished, commit the shape by pressing enter on your keyboard.
- Do not stretch out the muscles too much! Bigger is better, but when you get too eager you destroy the pixel quality and it shows as bad quality! If you want to create an even bigger mass you can blend multiple muscle layers together, use other donors, clone skin or even draw skin. But I won't cover that in this basics tutorial.
Making it all blend in
In the pic above I've already repeated the process several times using the above technique. As you can see the duplicated bicep shows some clear separation. You can try and warp it to match more, but there is another way to fix this:
- Select the layer of the muscle group that needs to blend in better
- In the layers panel hit Add layer mask in the bottom of the panel
- Select the newly created layer mask on the right of the layer in the layers panel.
- Grab a soft Brush (B) with a flow of about 20
- Make sure the brush colour is set to black
- Now carefully begin fading out the edges of the muscle group by brushing over the hard separator edges.
- If you feel the brush it to strong, edit the size and flow of the brush. And since you are using a mask you can always bring back muscle when you brush with a white coloured brush.
Repeat and grow!
Repeat this process of copying muscles from the bigger donor picture and pasting them on your subject body, and then transforming and blending them together.
Now because this is a quickmorph and for the sake of not making this tutorial too long, I've decided to skip any core/waist/chest growth. But you can bet I will do this on 99% of my other morphs.
So... Is she the size you want her to be? let's continue with some basic shading.
- Create a new layer on top of everything else you've made.
- Go to the top menu Edit > Fill (Shift+F5)
- Choose 50% Gray with 100% Opacity like in the picture above.
- With the new gray layer still selected click the blending options dropdown (should say 'normal' now)
- Select Overlay. This will make the layer appear to have disappeared. No worries, this is working as intended!
Now to add some shading (depth)
- In the toolbar (on the left) you will find the Dodge tool and the Burn Tool (0).
- Use the Burn tool to make skin appear darker (emphasize shadow and depth)
- Use the Dodge tool to make skin appear lighter (emphasize (high)lights)
- As for settings, be careful here, an exposure of 5-20% Is usually plenty.
- Use these tools as you would a brush! Paint with dodge/burn over the areas of the composition you want to appear darker or lighter. Remember to do this on the gray "hidden" layer and you'll see the effects straight away as if applied on the body.
- You can always apply dodge and burn on the actual muscle layers themselves. However this is harder to revert and I feel has some other downsides I won't go into now.
- I use some additional methods to create more shading and depth. But I won't cover this in the basics.
Happy with the result?! Don't forget to crop the image down to its new size and you're all done!
