Sketch Me

A friend of mine on Facebook sent me a link to a service called Sketch Me. When I clicked on the link the first thing it wanted was access to my personal data on Facebook. A big red flag went up and I immediately left the link. I think it may have been a scam to steal my personal data.

The sketch me idea did intrigue me so I did a little research to discover that Photoshop can easily accomplish the sketch technique. Here was my first experiment in the technique. I did make one change to the original in that I copy Wilbur's right eye and place it over his left because of harsh contrast difference and a better highlight in the right eye.

original

There are lots of art type filters in Photoshop

That's nice I think a bit of smudging here and there would work well too perhaps. Might try this myself, and see if I can enhance it with the pen tablet

xx

In case you're interested here are the steps I took to get to the final print.

STEP 1 - Duplicate The Background Layer
First duplicate the background layer. Go Layer> New> Layer via Copy.
Now we have 2 layers, the Background Layer, and Layer 1.

STEP 2 - Desaturate The Photo
With Layer 1 selected, choose Image> Adjustments> Desaturate.
This gives us a grayscale version of the photo.

STEP 3 - Duplicate Layer 1
At this point you must duplicate Layer 1. With Layer 1 selected, go
Layer> New> Layer via Copy. Now we have 3 layers, the Background
Layer, Layer 1 and Layer 2. Next we'll be working with Layer 2.

STEP 4 - Invert Layer 2
With Layer 2 selected, go Image> Adjustments> Invert.
This will make your photo look like a negative.

STEP 5 - Change The Layers Blend Mode To Color Dodge
In the Layers Palette change the Layers Blend Mode for this layer (Layer 2) to Color Dodge. This will make your photo almost completely white, but don't panic! Everything is going to work out just fine.

STEP 6 - Apply The Gaussian Blur Filter
Go Filter> Blur> Gaussian Blur. When the dialog box appears start by moving the Radius Slider all the way to the left. Once you've done that you can start to slowly move it to the right.

Now here comes some real Photoshop magic — because as you move the slider your sketch will start to appear. At this point take time to experiment and make sure you are getting the desired effect.

Bigger numbers create a more pronounced effect, but at some point this will turn your sketch back into a photo, which you don't want, so when you reach that point simply nudge the slider to the left just a little and that should do it! For my Wilbur sketch I used a Radius setting of 9.8 pixels.

Thanks for that Bob!

xx