Taught by Seluna, Tony and Lance. These Are some of the photoshop works that I tried.

There are still a lot to learn, I hope others can teach me more though.










Lance taught me a "colour-gloss trick" a long time ago, so I thought that I should give it a try and tony wants me to edit the background more.




Hope people could comment and give me some help.

Your sincerely,
Dan.

They all look kinda the same, but they're pretty skraight for a first time thing.

So keep it up.

Yes, it is a long and hard road. You always start out bumpy, you might even get turned over. Don't give up though, keep trying out different things, get used to where things are on the program and other parts will fall into place. I would try to focus more on background, work the sig around a stock. Coloring everything one color can work, but when I was starting, I had a better turn out with keeping the pictures I used crisp and putting cool backgrounds with custom brushes behind it. I also prefer the simple 1 pixel borders, but I'm just old fashioned. Just keep at it, don't give up like I did. XD

Thanks Turtle Smasher and Exire for your compliments. I have been trying hard each time I have the chance to do signatures.

This is a new signature. Taught by Lance and Tony.

Lance told me to work on a different shape and taught me how to decorate the signature with simple shapes, while Tony asked me to be more creative with the background. So I came out with this



Hope to receive some comment to improve on.

Dan.

I would say it’s an improvement =) I think you blended the stock in nicely with the background, and overall it looks pretty good. I don’t really know what the text says, but I think it’s “The Ultimate Prankster”? It’s not too clear, so maybe that’d be something to fix. But other than that I have no idea what there would be to fix. Maybe someone else who’s Photoshop literate could enlighten you, but otherwise that’s all I have to offer. Keep it up =)

Ohhh, that makes sense, since she's a Prankster in Suikoden. I see it now. Better than my guess, "The Water Professor".

I think it's a great improvement over your first signatures. I like the decorations and how you made it blend with teh bacgground. Good job. Already better than me. lol But that's not saying much really.

Thanks Hiku and Dragon Brigade. Thank you both. The text is "The Ultimate Prankster"

Tony Taught me a few blending techniques of background using the layers and blending mode and Lance taught me about the 1 pixel brush decoration. so I tried it, and hope this piece looks well.



Hope to get some comments.

Dan.

All that white is too bright. Not good on the eyes. But otherwise, it's a very nice piece. You're improving a lot, Ah Dan. ^^ I think I can see bits of Vins's influence... am I right?

It's not a bad idea to have the border of the picture a glowing featherd type effect, but there's just SOO much of it. I'd definitely make your image bigger, and like Seluna said, especially for the sake of this forum colors, it's very bright. but excellent blending techniques, stock, and text. Definitely a good sig with lots of potential.

Like the others have already said, there's too much of the white border. Just trim that down and everythingelse looks nice as is. It's looking good Koala, keep it up =)

Thanks Selly, Laguna and Dragon Brigade for your comments and suggestion. I hope I edited it right this time.



Is it better? or should I change it again?

Thanks for the comments and compliments.

Dan.

Still quite bright, but I'll say within acceptable range. Can be reduced further, I think, but I don't know for sure, since I haven't been making any sigs and fear that my instinct is getting a little rusty.

Nope your instinct is still right. It's ACCEPTABLE, but definitely still on the brighter side, and by that I mean the border is still a little thick.

I like how it's not an actual rectangle shape, but more with round corners, that looks nice, but the white border inside is still just a TADDDD thick, I'd recommend changing it, but like Sel said, it's right now "acceptable"

This is as thin as I could go. I really do not think it could be any more thinner. I hope it is okay this time.



I think that if it is any more thinner, it would lose the feeling I wanted.

Thanks Selly and Lagunawannabe for your comments again. Sorry if I couldn't do any better.

Dan.

Ahh yes, it's much better now. I can see it complementing the subtle inner border patterns. I won't recommend using so much white for a sig on a black background next time though, but this piece is good now. ^^

Well, what's the feeling you wanted?? Maybe there's another technique we could use to achieve that. If it was a light, angel-like, fade in from white kind of feeling, like, surrounded by pureness/white, then there are a couple things you could do. This is the biggest thing I can think of:

Add another layer, fill it with white, and change the opacity to something like 20 or so, so that it lightens the picture, then either:

Reduce the border more (since hte middle will still be lighter), or reduce the transparency of the fade effect (thats what it looks like u made for the border), and have it fade more gradually. It definitely looks MUCH MUCH better tho, it's just that near the right and left side it still looks a little much, but only a TAD, i'm talking just a tad.

I don't see the need for the huge outer glow of white around the edge. The actual piece would've been better without the thick glowing white border in my opinion, because the background and everything else looks nice =). Just the white around the edge is so bright and just so contrasted against the red. I think if you just left the signature as red, it would've looked much nicer - the border takes away from what we can see in the background - i can see very little of it because I am too blinded/distracted by the white. Do you see what I mean?

I look at the page and see this white outline straight away - all the background details and stock come as an after-thought, as something I notice afterwards. It should be the other way around, the border should not be what I am focusing on when I first look at it.

Apart from the white, it is a nice piece in my opinion - a vast improvement from your first signatures.

Yeah, I agree with Sel. Even with how much you thinned it down, I'm not such a fan of it just because there's so much of it. I'm the type that takes greater enjoyment in subtleties though, so that's just me. I would have focused more on the red background taking up a bit more of the sig. Generally it isn't so good if your border is the most noticable feature of your signature. If the border was the opposite of what you have, black, it would look pretty badass...that's a technical term. =p

Just imagine something like Sel's current sig having a white border instead of either the black border or transparency she has. It looks a lot better mixing in with the rest of the forum than it would white, right? Sometimes it can help to look at other people's sigs and being able to notice what it is they probably did to get what they did out of their own sig.

Anyway, its best not to inately focus on one sig to get everyone to love it. That's pretty impossible for everyone to like something you do anyway. I'd edit a signature once or twice to tweak it, but I personally wouldn't go beyond that. Just concentrate on trying some different things and getting numerous sigs out. Find out what you want to work on and then you can make your sigs by focusing on a certain element you want to use and improve on. Like transparent sigs for example, so your working on that as well as hopefully improving background, text and blending those two and your stock together. So its like working on a few things at once. Either way it all takes time so keep putting out different stuff. I look forward to see what else you come up with.

EDIT: Sneaky Bubble beat me first.

Thanks Everyone with the comments. I will try to improve as much as possible.

This is a moving picture I'm trying to learn to make, but its rather huge. For some reason, Image ready made the picture very pixelish and very ugly, is there some way to improve it?

Sorry for its large size. Is there anyway to improve on its speed too?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v653/obliviono/suikoii.gif

This is the original quality

How can I improve on its quality?

Dan.

New pieces I made. Don't really look too good. Hope for some comments. Thank you. Hopefully I improved a little


The signature and Avatar are for Flame.

Hope Everyone likes it.

Dan.

Wow, those are illuminating. Please keep in mind that this forum uses a black background and therefore anything bright will have double the effect.
Therefore you might want to go for a less bright idea, or at least the border, considering that is very bright.
I like the font and the blur, but the white colour takes the entire focus out of it.

I'd consider making things a bit darker, because personally I don't really like the white in the sig.

The bigger one is a bit better, because the size is bigger and there is more red then illuminating white, making it clearer than the previous one.
I like the planet (moon I think) in the background, but I do not understand the lake, considering there is a big moon behind it. Not that it matters a lot.
The problem here is still the contrast, the bright white is fighting with the red and makes it difficult to really focus.
There is also not much editing that I could see, maybe you want to give that a go?

The personally do not like the avatar, for its colours. Can't explain it really, I just don't fancy it. I like the small lines and the font, but the colours put me off.

Personally I think these pieces would look much better on a white background, but the standard on this forum is black and it clashes with the bright illuminating colour.
It might look better if you change the background to the standard proboards one, you most likely get a better effect.

Just keep practising =).

I actually really like the regular sized sig (the second one). I don't know all the contrast techniques and stuff to use so I can't judge based off that sort of stuff. But it does look nice in my opinion, though like Pes said, the white is a little *too* illuminating and thus distracting.

I'm not really a fan of the avatar. I don't know, the red just seems to splotch out the actual features on Chaos' face.

For the last sig, I think I kind of understand why you'd have the lake under the moon, but the fact that you can see the Sun reflected in it makes the lake sort of take away from the image itself. Or maybe you were working for a night/day contrast? I dunno, it doesn't seem to fit...>.>

You're doing nice though, Koala! Keep up the good work =)

These came out outstanding. Granted they ARE really bright, I wouldn't say to get rid of it. As a BIG picture yeah iit might hurt my eyes, but as a sig, i think it'll just stand out nicely.

Definitely good job with the text effects. How'd you make it blurry like that?

Thanks Everyone for your comments.

Laguna, Lance taught me the trick about making your text blurry, yet visible with motion blur.



Hope this answer your question. I will take note of everyone's comments. Thank you all.

Dan.

Ahh thanks so much Koala. I'm going to try that in some of my newer sigs I plan on making. THat's soo helpful though and makes complete sense now that you say it haha

New signature set. Taught by Lance. Lance Told me that sometimes having text exceeding borders enhance your signature very well. Though I am not as good as him. But I hope it looks alright.



Hope to receive some comments. Thanks.

Dan.

Heh, I like the sig. It looks nice, makes you smile when you see it. And I almost forgot about Gengen until I saw him in your sig.

That looks really nice Koala. The avatar is cute =p Great work =)

its alittle bit painful to look at simply because of the brightness but its a good looking sig

Thanks everyone for your comments. I took everyone's advice for bright signature. So I made this new signature.

Inspired by Lance, some of his past works looked really good. So I took an idea here and there and combined them.

Everything was taught by Lance.



Hope you all like it. Hope to get some comments.

Dan.

Looks nice, Koala. Has a rather happy feel to it and everything. Great job =)

Thanks Dragon Brigade, I appreciate your comment a lot. Taught by Lance as usual, a new signature. But it wasn't that great and some how, its pretty bad.



Hope to receive lots of comments. Hopefully you all like it.

Dan.

Awww wow that's incredibly adorable! ^__^ I especially love the border =D

Though, personally (and this is a matter of taste) I would have put the text to the left of the girl, just to cover up that empty space. Also lower the opacity of the blur around her, as it makes her face look a little distorted. Maybe tried to sharpen her and the text up a little, only VERY slightly, depending on what he original stock looked like. I think the flower in the background looks gooorgeous and the colours are so pretty =).

As for the avvy once again the main focus is too blurred, IMHO. And the text isn't in the best place, as the lines going through it are the same colour and throw the viewer off, a vertical bold font with a colour picked from the backround with white added to it, making it pastelly, would have been my own personal preference. But we all have different tastes and you of course have your own =)

Keep up the good work and tryout as many styles as you can, it pays to know your way around photoshop as it definitely aids in the pursuit of perfect sig making.

Thanks KCshushu, For your wonderful comments. I get what you mean.

Meanwhile, I've made a new signature, Seriously hope for comments for improvement.


Hope everyone likes it.

Dan.

I think this one is awesome ^__^ Everything fits so well. I love how the background fits together but each segment is still displaced somehow. Meant to be there yet not. Can't explain xD The colours are a little bright but thats a personal preference. I think maybe the blur was unnecessary, and would have looked fine without it. The avvy looks great too! Well done!

It does look great, Koala =). I agree with KC that the blur may have been a bit too excessive though, as it’s a bit too unfocused. A little blur would work, maybe just around the edges of the characters instead of the whole being, or something like that maybe. Other than that, the signature and avatar look nice. Keep it up, you’re doing great =).

Whenever I blur something I duplicate the rendered layer about 4 different times, Gaussian blur the bottom three at different amounts, and very slightly move each one (sometimes experimenting with blending layers and differen't opacities), then put the top duplicated layer unblurred but at mayb 80-95 opacity. It works out if you just play around with it a lot. =D

To be honest, and I'm not trying to offend you or anything, but it hurts my eyes to look at this. The pictures are so blurry and unclear. One of the most fundamental things you should recognise when making signatures, is when your stocks are blurry or dispropotionate/stretched.

Secondly the colours are just too contrasting, bright red and bright yellow with no gradients in between, no shift between the colours. Try and blend the colours more instead of sticking a bit of red here and a bit of yellow here. The stocks are also not blended, and like I kept saying to Dookie over and over again, when you first start making signatures don't use loads of stocks. Try to master techniques before you start going over board on the amount of stocks you use and trying to make weird shapes to the canvas. It just makes things harder and your progress slower.

Thanks everyone's comments, I'll take it into considerations.

Meanwhile, this is my recent works.


The Rubbish Battle with Tony's signature.

and Lance's Idea




Hope you all to give me comments. Hope you all enjoy =]

Dan.

I've said it a thousand times before, I actually love your River Ranch piece and believe it should have won that battle. It has great design, the colors match together just perfectly to give it a pretty warm feel overall, its a fantastic piece.

Lademade Star can be better. If the stars didn't look so plain (you can use layer effects, images, and filters in a good way to get rid of this effect) it'd be fantastic, but they kind of dull the image down in contrast to the bright magnificent stock. The way it cuts off at the top is kind of odd too.

Thanks Tony =] Though you deserved to be that Battle winner ^^

Anyways, Edited some fault and flaws.

Does it looks better now?

Dan.

Question: I'm kinda new (just joined today...) and I was wondering how I could get my hands on a cool signature?? I don't have Photoshop/don't know how to use it. This is definatly going to sound stupid... but is there anyone willing to "donate" a cool signature for a cool guy?? (ya, corny, lame, whatever...) Any takers???

**EDIT** Haa, I found the pinned section on Avatar requests. Sorry bout this, I'll take my suggesting there :X

Hehe, My first post to Dear's Topic! Haha Gambatte =]

Anyways to answer Theferrell's question :

If you really like someone's work, you could ask for his or her's permission to give it to you. Unless its already taken, or currently in use. It should be no problem.

There is also a signature and avatar request thread in the Art forum :

http://www.rpgdreamersforum.com/index.php?showtopic=45907

But don't put your hopes too high on that thread haha.

Last but not least, there are a couple of Great Artists here. You can Private message them for your request too.

Lol Dookie and Dan you know I am only straightforward because being honest is the only way you will improve, not to be nasty in case you thought that =P.

Anyway prepare yourself for this.... I like this one =o!!!
It is so simple that I think I know precisely what you did to achieve this signature, but simple is good in most cases. I like the variation in colour, it looks so much better than something which is just monotone, something which is just red and nothing else.
The composition is nice, it looks like you really though about where to put things in this signature. the fancy brush shape sits nicely alongside the stock, and I like the text at the end of her hand.

Your style is so very different from the conventional signatures I am used to seeing, but this one is very nice. Good job =).

Thanks Bubble.

I've make two new signatures. One is requested by ferrell, the other is for SOTM Feb 08





Home you all Like it. Hope to receive some comments.

Dan.

The concept of the first one is really nice but as usual your over contrasting kills my eyes on this black background. It's all part of your personal preference though. You signatures are made to be like. You know exactly what you're doing when you make your signature bright like that and considering you have not changed your style even after people told you it was "bad", you obviously like doing it so keep doing it.

I’m quite fond of the sig you made for Theferrell. On the right side of the sig you have Ichigo blended in rather nicely with the orange streaks (don’t know a better word for them), and the sig itself I think is nice. I wouldn’t really say it’s too bright, but in contrast to the dark of the forum it is a bit. Really nice work though!

As for the SotM sig, I like the background, but it’s sort of hard (for me at least) to make out the text (which I think says “Valentine Kiss”, right?), and the images of Tidus and Yuna are actually hard to see. When I first looked at it a while back, I hadn’t even noticed them there, but when I looked again I saw them. Maybe just bring them out of the background a bit more.

Other than that, nice work Koala =).

theferrels sig is nice, I love it. It may be monotone, but the shape and the whole of the sig itself is just excellent, great work.

I'm not a big fan of your valentines SoTM though. The colors are excellent and extremely bright, but don't really work well with the picture it contains. Thats all I can critique for now!

Thanks Tony, DB and Durandal.

After hearing your comments, Lance decided to force me to make a new SOTM. This time he wants me to focus more on design and less on blending. So... this is what I made.



Something too simple ._. Hope its not too ugly...

Hopefully I could receive some comments.

Dan.

its been awhile, was being hospitalised for quite some time. So I hope it looks okay.

Getting rusty.



*Rythem*

Its for SOTM. I do hope for some comments =)

Dan.