A while back, I needed to find a tutorial on how to create an effective Aurora. I searched high and low and none of the tutorials I found looked very realistic. So I had a go at creating one myself. My first attempts were sub-par at best. After a couple of trys, I had made a realisic aurora effect. And now I will show it to you.
Some of you may not know what the northern lights are so heres a brief summary. The northern lights are a visual phenomenon that occurs usually near the earths magnetic poles. They are essentially low powered solar winds from the sun hitting the magnetic shield of our earth. As this isn't a science lesson, here is a link to Wikipedia's article on Aurora's.
Choosing The Base Image
First off, lets start by choosing a base image to put our aurora on. I have chosen a picture that was taken at night. This works best in my opinion as auroras cant be seen in the daylight (as far as I know). This is what I chose after a quick Google search.
Lake Image
Resized Lake Image
Because the image is fairly large, for this tutorial I have resized it to 800x600. All brush values and styles are for this resolution. If you use a larger image, the effect may appear smaller and have less impact. Now that we have chosen the base image for our effect, lets get photoshoppin'!
Lets Create A New Document
Assuming you have copied the resized lake image, from the link in the previous section, to your clipboard, open up Photoshop and click File > New....
Click OK and then paste the copied image into the document. Edit > Paste.
Name that layer to Lake Image.
Now that's done, lets go to the next step.
White Lines...
First we need to set up our brush. The settings I am using are a white brush set to 5px diameter and 100% hardness.
Ok, now lets draw with it. Create a new layer and call it White Lines.
Then using that brush, draw on the layer until it looks something like this:
Now rotate the White Lines layer 90* clock wise or anti-clockwise. Edit > Transform > Rotate 90* CW. Your choice. Heres what I ended up with:
Here Comes A Storm...
The next part is probably the most important step in the whole tutorial. You now have to apply a wind filter to the White Lines layer. Filter > Stylize > Wind.... Set the settings to Method: Wind and Direction: From The Right.
Do this one more time by repeating the process or pressing CTRL + F. This is what you should end up with:
Now, apply the filter again but this time change the direction to Direction: From The Left.
Apply that filter again 2 more times or by pressing CTRL + F two times. You should end up with this:
Now you have done that, rotate the White Lines layer again so that the tall wind part is facing up. In other words, rotate it counter clock wise 90*. Now that its rotated, move it around so it looks like this:
Looking pretty good so far, but not finished yet! Lets apply a motion blur to it so it appears smoother. Filter > Blur > Motion Blur.... The settings I used are Angle: 90* and Distance: 60 Pixels.
This is what it should look like now:
Stop, Colour Time!
A white aurora is all well and good... but lets make it more realistic by adding some colour! Lets start by setting the Fill on the White Lines layer to 0%.
The white lines we made earlier should now disappear. Don't worry, that's meant to happen. Time to add styles. Double click the White Lines layer to bring up the styles window.
Click on the Gradient Overlay tab and click the check box so that it is ticked.
Set the settings to: Blend Mode: Normal, Opacity: 100%, Style: Linear, Align With Layer: Checked, Angle: 0* and Scale: 100%.
Now double click the gradient to get up the gradient menu.
Change the settings to be like the ones in the following picture:
Now click OK and click OK again. Now the white lines should be back and ideally should look like this:
Now, duplicate the White Lines layer. Do this by right clicking the layer and click Duplicate Layer.... Name the new layer Lines Merged.
Now hide the White Lines layer by clicking the eye next to it. Select the Lines Merged layer and press CTRL + G. This will wrap a group around the layer. Name the new group Lines Merged.
Now right click the group and click Merge Group.
Your probably wondering I told you to do this. Because you duplicated a layer, made a group, merged a group, and hid the original layer. So back to square one. There's a good reason for this. The layer Lines Merged as no styles so adding a filter to the layer will not screw up the styles applied to it.
The Final Effects
Were almost finished. Just 2 more steps. Apply a Gaussian blur to the Lines Merged layer with the settings Radius: 2.4 pixels. Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur.... You should have this on your screen:
Now for the final filter. Apply a motion blur with the settings Angle: 72* and Distance: 10 pixels. Filter > Blur > Motion Blur.... This is what you should end up with:
Not bad is it. Well we have now come to the end of the tutorial. As this was an easy tutorial, I didn't walk you through how to add the little details that make it that little bit better. With a little touch up, here's what I came up with:
Useful Links
Wikipedia - Aurora Article
Conclusion
That was the first Photoshop tutorial I have ever written. I hope its up to standard. If you learnt anything useful in this tutorial, then it was worth writing it. Lets see some of your aurora examples in the comments as well!
Ozzy