STEP ONE

Now it's time to learn how to do some cool lighting. I'm going to show you how to do light streaks, aka lightning. The good thing about this is that it doesn't use any airbrushing, which will make most of you very happy. Personally, i prefer airbrushing, but this is a quick technique to get you some results.

Firstly, open up a document. It will probably be a rendet, but for the purpose of the tutorial, I will just use a gradient.

STEP TWO

Make a square selection in a new layer. Fill it with black.

Go to 'Filters -> Render -> Lens Flare' and create a flare at about 140%

Apply the filter. Should look like the image opposite.

STEP THREE

Set that layer to 'Screen' (complicated hey?). This is the essential step, as it make the light movable and transparent. Adjust the contrast/brightness down so that there is no sign of the square selection you rendered in.

Then hit ctrl-u to bring up hue/saturation, and take all saturation off.

Going well!

STEP FOUR

Now comes the fun part! Distort that useless glob for all you are worth! Wave it once or twice, fading the wave (edit -> fade wave) as you see fit (always remember to move the layer so a different wave hits it), throw in a twirl (don't forget to fade it) until it is nice and long.

For this exercise, when waving, it is best to have more than 5 (i use 7 or 8) generators, to really get some distortion going.

To create additional detail, duplicate the layer, and wave it harshly, not fading. Move that layer down and to the right a bit. Voila, instant streaks!

STEP FIVE

To finish off, go to 'Layer-> New adjustment layer -> Color Balance'. Play around with this as you see fit, but to get the best results, select 'Highlights' and move it towards yellow. This gives it a great glow.

As an additional trick for mroe advanced users, duplicate your streak, and gaussian blur it. set the opacity to about 25% - this gives additional glow!

To show off, I added a bit of abstract to demonstrate the effect.

For more information / clarification, please feel free to grab the psd i used to make this tutorial.

DOWNLOAD .PSD

w00t! All done! Hope this was helpful. If you'd like to know anyhting else, or give me some feedback, please use the contact form!