Watercolor painting effect in web design has become very important the last couple of years, many professional designers are using this style. Effect of a watercolor painting can be achieved digitally using graphics editing program, in our case Photoshop. I used Adobe Photoshop CS5, but previous versions should do just fine, since the tools used are quite basic.

So today, in this Photoshop effects tutorial, we’re going to learn how to easily make a photo look more like a watercolor painting. Creating the effect is as simple as applying a few filters, and using layer blend mode, and the whole thing takes only a couple of minutes from start to finish.

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Tutorial details:

  • Program: Adobe Photoshop CS5
  • Difficulty: Beginner
  • Estimated Completion Time: 15 Mins

Creating a Watercolor Painting Effect in Photoshop: Final Preview

Creating a Watercolor Painting Effect in Photoshop

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Lets start to create our painting effect tutorial in Photoshop.

Step 1

First of all insert your picture in Photoshop as like in preview below:

Flower Picture

Step 2

Now duplicate this flower picture layer and hide the original flower layer.

Hide Original Flower Layer

Apply a Watercolor Filter to the duplicate layer, Filter > Artistic > Watercolor. The amounts shown on the left looked the best for this picture.

Watercolor Filter

When we applying watercolor filter then we get a new effect as like in preview.

After Applying Watercolor Filter

Step 3

Now in this step we applying an Emboss Filter on duplicate flower layer. Go to Filter > Stylize > Emboss.

Emboss Filter

After applying emboss filter, we have get a cool effect as like in picture.

After Applying Emboss Filter

Now we change the blend mode into Linear Light.

Linear-Light
Change Belending Mode to Linear Light

Step 4

In this final step we will show the original flower layer. Now we have successful to create the watercolor painting effect in Photoshop.

Show Original Flower Layer

Final Preview:

Creating a Watercolor Painting Effect in Photoshop

I hope you have enjoyed this watercolor painting effect tutorial, now you can create painting effects own your pictures with these useful techniques. Never forget to share your comments with us. Follow TutorialChip on Twitter or Subscribe to TutorialChip to Get the Latest Updates on Giveaways, Tutorials and More for Free.