Remarin
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PSD - Layers; Raydiin Fire effect
🕑 Added 2025-05-28 08:00:09 +0000 UTCFigured I could attatch the photoshop file with the layers here to show the effects applied to make the fire!
I'll say when it comes to lightsources such as fire, I've learned you gotta both be bold, and restrained at the same time- lmao - I'll explain my thinking:
Bold: Make use of /Big/ gradient shapes; large soft radial gradients, that can cover a large area - go with deep reds, maybe some hues of orange, and don't overcomplicate the shape.
Restrained: 1. Keep your hands off the yellow hues when it comes to glow; at least with photoshop - the glow effects just look yucky when you use yellow hues. You can go as saturated as you like, but it just doesn't look as pretty (( you can test it out in the file yourself; go pick out some of the glow shapes, and color shift them to yellow ))
2. Other than the large glows, only add a tight, form-fitting glow around the fire shape, the bright white should stransition into red - that way you give that "white-hot" feel - with this method, you can also shift parts of the white into an off-white blue/green tone, if you want the super-hot look of bunsen burners. If its surrounded by a red glow, it'll look warm!
At least, this is the method I've learned works consistently and delivers a clean and neat look, there's ofc so many variables that come into play, and other approaches that might be better for specific cases!
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But a general note here too, with fire and other in-scene lightsources, you can pay mind to the "exposure" rate that the light has. Like in this case, I'm mimicking the way a camera takes in light, where at times the points of brightest light look "overexposed" and turn into pure bright shapes with little detail inside the shape. The background scene was meant to be engulfed in shadow for this piece, but even if I had more light in the background, I'd want to make sure that the fire is the brighest light source around to sell the effect better!
I usually don't pay much attention to things like exposure and just go with the gut, but with central light sources like this, you'd benefit to try and make sure the surrounding context follows the same exposure rules, if that light is meant to be a focal point! Still got a lot to learn about the properties of light myself and how to render them properly though, so I know I'm still not able to go as indepth as I'd like :'0
