How To Make Waves On Photoshop

Master the art of painting water in Adobe Photoshop! In this tutorial, I'll show you how to paint beautiful ocean waves using a few stock photos for reference. Learn how to fix your document with the initial sketch before tackling the actual ocean painting.

Get inspired! For more than sea inspiration check out these incredible Water References on Envato Market.

Tutorial Assets

The post-obit assets were used in the production of this tutorial:

Water Reference 1 - no longer available
H2o Reference 2

1. How to Sketch the Ocean Waves and H2o

Before nosotros pigment the ocean, we'll need a bones sketch. Please annotation that a graphics tablet is essential to consummate this tutorial.

Footstep 1

Open a New Document in Photoshop at 1700 10 1700 pixels and 300 dpi.

Footstep 2

Now prepare up your references. A nifty way to keep references nearby is to set up them on a separate document apart from your painting. So open your references in Photoshop and place both documents side by side like this.

Here I'll be using these water references to help me understand the real movement of h2o equally well as any details I'll need to capture it completely.

Step three

Let's depict the water! Select the Brush Tool (B) and utilise a Hard Round Pressure Opacity Brush with 100% Flow and Opacity. Make sure the Pen Force per unit area for Opacity pick is also checked.

Start with the horizon line. Concord Shift to draw a straight gray line across the middle of the canvas on a New Layer. Then draw a second line below it that is slightly angled in the management y'all would similar the wave to crash.

Step four

Lower the Opacity of the guidelines (highlighted in blue). Draw more details on a New Layer, starting with the foreground elements. Use these lines as guides to judge the depth of field for the foreground, middle, and background waves.

Focus get-go on the center wave since it volition be the main star. Then apply flatter, squiggly lines to show the waves moving backwards in the distance. The "cloudy" parts of empty space are where we will paint the ocean spray later on on.

Don't get besides fussy with your sketch—simply create natural brush strokes that are besides a lilliputian wavy.

Now draw the clouds above the horizon line. Create big, cotton wool candy-similar shapes that alloy into each other. But similar before with the waves, employ horizontal lines underneath the clouds to show where the clouds are falling back into space or but disappearing.

ii. How to Paint the Base Colors

Step 1

Working with colors can be hard. That's why I similar to separate my base colors onto their ain New Layers for more than control. Create a New Layer for the background heaven, centre footing water, and foreground waves.

Use the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) to make a selection effectually each area before Filling them with colour using the Paint Saucepan Tool (G). Here are the colors I'll be using:

Foreground: #41896d
Middle footing: #254b5c
Background: #5d8191

Stride 2

Get rid of the harshness of the gray sketch by blending it in. To do this, set the Layer Alloy Mode of the sketch to Hard Calorie-free.

three. How to Shade the Water and Waves

Pace 1

Add three more New Layers. Right-click each layer to set up them as a Clipping Mask to each color.

Feel gratis to label these layers however you lot'd like—hither I just labeled them "shading."

Footstep ii

Now grab the Slope Tool (K). Select the Shading layer for the eye basis h2o and create a dark blue #0c3649 to transparent Linear Gradient. It's important that the water is darker when it's closest to the horizon line so that it appears as though information technology'due south further away.

Do the same for the foreground h2o. This fourth dimension, use a slightly different bluish color #184b5a to apply a Linear Gradient that fades out as it moves upwards and to the left.

Stride 3

Y'all'll also need to use a light blue #7ba4b3 Linear Gradient to the top of the sky. Make sure the blue appears lighter at the meridian of the cloud forms.

Step 4

Select the Castor Tool (B) and use a Soft Round Brush with 0% Hardness to add together more than color to the canvas. Every bit long equally the Pen Pressure for Opacityoption is yet checked, your graphics tablet volition control the corporeality of pigment that'due south practical.

Paint highlights for the body of water, as well as soft clouds in the heaven.

This painting took over 100 layers to consummate, so I won't list each layer, but for at present, just make sure that the initial layers are prepare equally Clipping Masks to the respective area that you're working on.

Paint highlights with a soft round brush

Footstep 5

Deepen the foreground water by setting a New Layer to Multiply and using a calorie-free blue color to tint the water. Try to make the colors transition well as they move farther into the distance.

Step half dozen

Earlier we move on, let's tackle the sky again. Employ a Soft Round Brush to paint more clouds with a slightly yellow tint #b5ccc8. So Fill a New Layer above the clouds with an orangish Linear Gradient that fades as it moves upward.

4. How to Transition Past the Base Colors

Step 1

Once the initial shading is done, y'all tin can now push button the realism of your painting. Do this by painting on New Layers to a higher place the Sketch layer until there's nearly no more sketch in sight. You can keep a hint of the sketch underneath since it'll help usa build the waves afterward on.

Stride 2

Tweak the colors of the painting so that everything works harmoniously. First add a Color Lookup Aligning Layer ready to Kodak 5218 Kodak 2383.

Then add a Levels Adjustment Layer to boost the overall intensity. Alter the settings under the RGB Aqueduct to the following numbers:

0, 0.86, 206

5. How to Paint Realistic Waves

Try to perfect the color scheme before moving on. This will assist you lot avoid whatever trouble further down the line.

Step 1

An essential part of any realistic painting is texture. Nothing in nature is completely smooth, then you lot definitely desire to add texture to this painting. Using the starting time brush from this lesson, commencement painting more waves onto the water.

Guide the waves with a few directional strokes based on your references.