How to render ground covered with glass beads?

[Jason Phillips]

I am a writer and I have written about an alien planet that has a clearing that is covered with small amber colored glass beads about 1/2 the size of a marble. Does anyone have any tips on how I could render such a thing in photoshop?

 

[IamSam]

Hello Jason and welcome to PSG.

I have tried a few techniques in trying to create the glass beads, but none that I'm satisfied with. Please be patient and hopefully some of our other members will chime in on this challenge.

I'm thinking something like this which is a gravel beach image and a color fill overlay set to Pin Light:



I'm still not too happy with this. Let me know what you think.

 

[IamSam]

Here's a version with a bit more contrast.

I'm still not happy with the out come.

 

[dv8_fx]

If it's creating glass beads/balls you're looking for, there are countless ways of doing them. Here's a specific one for creating deep amber-ish colored ball from the Photoshop Gurus archives.... http://www.photoshopgurus.com/tutorials/t020.html . It's for a much older version of PS but the controls and functions mentioned are applicable in current CS or CC.



I know you want to render a clearing or field of marbles but you may need a scene with a closeup of these "alien marbles". Once you've managed to create a ball, flatten the ball into a layer (don't flatten the work). To create your alien world scene, you have a few options...

1. Use the clone tool to clone the ball.... this will take a whole lot of clone clicking....
2, Use the psd ball image as a pattern or brush fill. But this will create a rather uniform fill.
3. If you know how to create a tileable texture image, you can create a field of amber marbles.

I can give the above a go on how to accomplish this but only later.....

@IamSam or anyone here.... wanna take a crack with this?....


edit...
ermmmmm.... come to think about it, you can just simply take the sample image, use the ellipse tool to duplicate the ball on a layer.... it's good to go.... .

 

[hawkeye]

Just a thought, Illustrator might be a possibility. I made a 3d ball then turned it into a symbol. Using the symbol sprayer tools you can vary the size, colorization, etc,

 

[IamSam]

I tried making my own glass beads as you guys have, they all looked pretty bad and did not translate to, ".....a clearing that is covered with small amber colored glass beads about 1/2 the size of a marble."

That's why I stated looking for alternatives.

 

[Jason Phillips]

Thank you all for your time and suggestions. Each of these are better than what I have accomplished so far The clone stamp idea from a custom rendered bead is what I had in mind, but it was killing me trying to get some depth. I took some excellent sample glass bead images and rendered a flat "overhead" view, but nothing I tried after that seemed to convert it to a perspective view that was realistic. Thanks for the tutorial as that is a great homemade bead! My current thought process was using a 3D engine (unity because I am familiar, or Blender since it seems more appropriate) and then render the scene. Unfortunately for me, I know nothing about rendering quality output from a 3D engine. Again, thanks for the time you spent and your suggestions!