Tutorial: AKVIS LightShop

Thunder and lightning

The author of the example is Héctor Calle E.

Shaftsbury is a small town in England. The dwellers of Shaftsbury, as many other people in small and big towns and villages, listen to the forecast every day and don't like when the weather lets them down.

Let's try to change the weather dramatically and shake the authority of weather forecasters.

For this tutorial we use AKVIS LightShop plug-in and Adobe Photoshop.

• Step 1. Open the image in the photo editor.
  
• Step 2. First we will change the color of the sky. So let's select it.

  You can use any selection tool. In Adobe Photoshop the easiest way is to use Quick Mask mode . Click the Quick Mask mode button in the Toolbox and use the Pencil tool to draw a line below the sky.

  Note that to select the sky in Quick Mask Mode we will have to mask everything but the sky because when we switch back to Standard Mode only unmarked areas will be selected.

  

  Activate the Paint Bucket tool and left-click on the area below the drawn border. This area will be highlighted in red. The border must be without space to prevent the highlighting of the whole image.

  

  Switch to the Standard mode by clicking on .

• Step 3. The sky is selected.
  

  Let's recolor it.

• Step 4. Press the button Set Foreground Color in the Toolbox and choose an appropriate tint of blue color in the Color Picker dialog box. Then press OK. Now press the button Set Background Color in the Toolbox and choose a white color. This is necessary to make the color of the sky look more natural.
• Step 5. In the menu of the photo editor choose FILTER->RENDER->Clouds.

  Here we have a new sky.

  

  If the border between the sky and the ground is rough, use the Blur tool to smooth it.

• Step 6. Now we'll make a rainy day.

  Choose the Brush tool, set grey color and brush size=1 px. Cover the whole image with thin diagonal strokes as if it rains.

  So we get a rain in SHAFTSBURY.

  
• Step 7. Call AKVIS LightShop to make a lightning. (FILTER->AKVIS->LIGHTSHOP)
• Step 8. Choose SAMPLE N46 from the AKVIS presets and adjust some settings. Deactivate the Whirlpool modifier in the list of MODIFIER.

  By default the color is blue, but we want to make a natural lightning. Double-click on the left slider of the gradient line and choose a white color from the Standard color selection dialog box. Then double-click on the right slider and choose an orange color.

  Change the parameter of ANGLE=10. Press the button .

  

  See the result in the plugin's window. If you don't like the result you can change the modifier properties. You can place the lightning on any part of the image. To apply the result press the button .

   

  Here we have an image with a lightning.

  
• Step 9. In the same way we can add one more lightning.
  

  Using AKVIS LIGHTSHOP we have finally spoiled the weather in this small town. Well, the town-dwellers will have to stay at home and drink their 5 o'clock tea near the fireplace. Do not believe the weather-chart makers!