# So U want to learn how to create light rays and fog in Photoshop. Enter the Tutorial



## vipgraphx (May 16, 2012)

I have been asked by several people how I add light rays, fog, atmospheric fog, dust particles and what not. It gets hard to explain so I thought it would be better to create a video tutorial showing a method I use. There are other methods but this is very simple to do your self and save money on purchasing brush sets.

I will be discussing how to create a brush and then how to use that brush in the image. I do not have a lot of time as you tube only allows me to do 10 min videos so I wanted to keep it simple. The more time you put into yours, the better it will look.

Videos have been broken down to three parts. I suggest watching in 720p and full screen.
















*EDIT: 
Added these two videos on how to create light rays on in image without using brushes*












Now you do not want to over do it as sometime I have. Its sometimes the little things that make a HUGE difference and also don't over do it on every photo unless you want to. many of my photos (HDR's) get the light rays from shooting into the sun, however when you are indoors and there is a bright window and you really wish you could capture some of the misty foggy light rays look, this is a great way to add it in if you are not carrying a bag of dust to through up in the air hahahahahahahha..

I hope this helps you folks.


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## Compaq (May 16, 2012)

Awesome. I haven't watched them yet, I'll save them for later tonight when I can just sit back and enjoy. Making carrot cake just now


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## vipgraphx (May 16, 2012)

uuumm carrot cake....


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## Compaq (May 16, 2012)

In red, white and blue 


I'm trying out this stuff. It worked for me in the beginning, but suddenly I couldn't press the "define brush preset" button any more. And I had spent a good 10 minutes perfecting a ray brush for a specific shot  I did everything the way you did, but suddenly I couldn't press the button.

But I was thinking about something. Is it possible to create these brush presets ON TOP of an image? It would be very easy to make sure the rays hit certain parts of an image, and having ideal angles and such, if one could just turn down the opacity of the image to around 40%, and just create the brush on top of that, to see where the rays would hit...if you get my drift.

Thanks for the videos, I'm sure many people will appreciate them! I do, at least


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## vipgraphx (May 16, 2012)

You can't create the effect the way you think. What will happen is that when you make your brush it will also add in your layer with the image. When you paint you use that brush and paint with it, it will also paint that photo, 

However, you can create the effect manually on top of the image. That is what I do many times. Like I have said before brushes are great to use but sometimes they do not work out for curtain images.

IF you get your image you want and select add layer. Get the polygonal lasso tool and select the area that you would like the ray of light. Then fill it will white. Then add a Gaussian blur to it so the edges are soft. Then get your eraser tool and start erasing areas creating light rays. Adjust opacity as you want add in some noise from the filters menu and you could always add a glow or color layer. Also create that layer as a mask and use your gradient tool to fade the light so there is fall off as it really would be.

I can do a quick video to show you what I mean....if you can read and understand what to do with what I just wrote your ahead of the game. Other wise I will post a video in a bit.....


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## Compaq (May 16, 2012)

Never mind, apparently I used too big a canvas. How this?


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## vipgraphx (May 16, 2012)

Compaq - I think the first one looks better than the second one. I would cover more window though in the first one rather than just the bottom portion. The light would be coming in from top to bottom and from the looks of the shadows  left to right.

Nice to see you were able to use this tutorial and put it to use. Thats what makes it worth it to me is to help you folks out. You can do soooo much with photoshop that the sky is truly the limit. There are tons of different ways to to the same thing.


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## peanut170 (May 16, 2012)

Glad you spent time and made these, i cant quite use them yet since im still new to hdr in general, but i will deff be marking this thread, thank you.


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## vipgraphx (May 16, 2012)

Compaq - I just added two new videos on how to create light rays on in image without using light ray or fog brushes as per your previous question. It does take a little longer but you have more control over your rays of light when you do not use custom brushes. 

hope this helps.

this was the final image using that method




thinking_spot copy by VIPGraphX, on Flickr


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