40 Amazing and Fantastical Winter Photo Manipulations
Winter is now in full swing for the Northern Hemisphere. Snow and cold have engulfed the northern latitudes. In the Southern Hemisphere, summer has taken hold, bringing with it blazing temperatures. For those of you in the north, the image manipulations below can help us appreciate the beauty of winter. And for those in the south, they can bring some much-needed relief from the heat.
Photo manipulations are probably one of the most entertaining and interesting things to do with Photoshop. Combining unrelated elements into a single image, often combined with other filters, textures, and effects, to create one-of-a-kind works of art can be as challenging or simple as you want it to be, depending on exactly what you’re trying to create.
There are a variety of ways these artists use to combine individual elements into a cohesive whole. Lighting effects, texture overlays, softening, and more are all put to the test with some of the examples below. And if you try all of those and aren’t happy with the results, sometimes emphasizing the fact that the image is a composite can work wonders.
Lighting Effects
One of the quickest ways to tell that an image is a composite is by the lighting. Combining elements that have different light sources can be a dead giveaway, and takes extra time to correct in Photoshop. Added lighting effects can also obscure the edges of individual elements, further unifying the overall composite.
HumanKite
by Ydole
Lighting effects can bring consistency to images with otherwise-disparate elements.
Disenchanted Lullaby
by Queenofladiestoilets
An unexpected element (such as the hummingbird in this winter scene) adds interest to photo manipulations.
Frost-bite
by Mindfreak-Kid
The icy colors and glowing snowflakes make this evoke the chilly temperatures of winter.
Ice Eye
by Lorency
Moon Race
by Loojeen
Snow Storm
by SophieBuckley
The Coming of Winter’s Rain
by Aussie-gal
Snow Queen
by iKink
Another image that includes unexpected elements.
Winter Fairies
by Remembering-amnesia
External Force
by AniOcean
UpSideDown
by Glenn Karlsen
Ice Age
by Geir Akselsen
Snow has Funny Ways Sometimes
by DaizyB
Color
Color, specifically saturation and tone, can go a long way toward bringing harmony to individual elements within a photo manipulation. The examples below showcase this technique beautifully.
Ice Queen
by Pedaltone
Using the same hues and saturations throughout a composition does wonders to unify the overall image.
Ice Queen
by Mustesielu
Icy eyes are a popular manipulation subject.
The Goddess of Winter
by Jenna-Rose
Winter at the Ruins
by Jenna-Rose
Winter’s Princess
by DevilKittyDesigns
Wintergreen
by RumiAji
This is My Winter Song to You
by Bebelabree
Another case where a monochromatic color scheme lends consistency to the image.
Winters Dream
by Brenda-Starr
Listen to the Silence
by Talie Lines
Early Morning Snowfall
by Talie Lines
The Road to Recovery
by Talie Lines
Frozen
by SalaBoli
Snow…Winter…
by Draganea and Ljilja
Texture Overlays
Adding texture overlays to your images works well to obscure the edges of individual elements.
Frost Horse
by Abyssus-Angelus
The hint of wings in this image adds an element of fantasy, and the use of textures throughout and the monochromatic color scheme blends everything together.
Spirits
by Mondpferd
Adding a texture to the entire image can help blend the elements included and obscure any outlines.
Queen of the Winter
by HeyJude4
Another example where texture (in this case, a ripple filter) blends everything beautifully.
Snow Blue Blood
by Sturmfeuer
Winter Wanderer
by Lilykoi
Softening
Adding a bit of blur, layer feathering, or a soft glow filter can work wonders on the overall effect of a photo manipulation. These filters do tend to add a feminine touch to images, so they’re best reserved for compositions where that’s desirable.
The Sugarplum Fairy
by Happybubbles
Softening the edges throughout your image helps tie everything together.
A Snow Covered Dream..
by Arcangelic
Falling Dreams
by Depth02
The Swan
by iKink
Winter Angel
by Destinysolo
Winter Walk
by Klibnob
Emphasizing Separate Elements
When all else fails, stop trying to hide the fact that your image is a composite. Sometimes emphasizing the separateness can make your manipulation look more artistic, and lets you stop bashing your head against the wall trying to get it just right. If done right, it’ll look like an artsy collage.
A World Apart
by Skalydark
Increasing the contrast around individual elements can be a good way to add unity to an image when obscuring the outlines is proving difficult.
Collector Of Hearts
by Ablackwind
Winter Remorse
by Brutal-bianca
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This is awesome . Nice collection
Nice collection. Some nice pieces in there.
http://resourcehive.com
Amazing
some of them are really bad in my opinion.
MOST of them are really bad. IMO.
i agree
exactly, eyes ones r great, some r not too bad at the beginnin, but most of them look like made by beginner… and they all look the same… im sure there is more amazin artwork on the net
This is reply for above msg
Not impressed at all.
almost all of them are bad! A lot of them look really like beginners’ and just don’t even go together. dA and flickr are great for looking around, but not exactly “amazing and fantastical”. I was disappointed.
agreed. I would say 99.999999 percent of those were bad.
Some are good – but overall not very impressed…
Same here.
Wow …!! aweomse collection..
http://smashingwebs.com/
not the best collection ….
but ok ;d
nice collection. thanks for the effort of putting it together!
What the $*#&?
Is this site like wikipedia nowadays? Can anybody get away with posting anything? These are not top notch artworks.
Yeah I agree. The majority of those images looked tacky and cheaply done.
Can ANYONE get away with posting anything? Cameron is the content manager here at Tuts+! Great collection Cameron!
that’s scary
Not that amazing at all, only some are good.
Rather poor quality manipulation jobs listed here
b/w I just forgot to tell something !!!
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Why are you spamming your site so much?
Anyway, I agree with AEVION. Most of these are terrible.
’80 kitsch revival
Not a single astonishing one in there actually.. I’m sorry but this just doesn’t get me started. At all. Horrible post.
Beautiful, nice job guys. Some talented artists.
why majority of the picture contains a woman?
cause they sell more
haha.. I <3 "fantastical"
Is it me or do most of these look like crap?
Totally agree :/
not crap, but not interesting either
I think you’re all just a bit jaded. Do I see any of your work displayed? No? If you don’t like it, why bother commenting? Let those of us that DO enjoy these displays enjoy them … in peace. I’ve seen nothing but complaining for several weeks, yet no one else seems to be stepping up to the plate to show of their AMAZING work. For newbies–such as myself and MANY others–this type of display offers tons of ideas and instruction on how different elements can be blended together to achieve a great, or even not so great, “masterpiece”. Don’t you remember the first time that you created your first image? Was it crap? Yeah, it probably was, but it was YOUR masterpiece.
i don’t think this is all great, but i agree on what you say, totally! but still, some of this is still good and even if it sucks, it still can inspire you to use some elements and use it in your own “masterpiece”
People enjoying these works has nothing to do with them being poor quality, which most of these works are indeed. And “Well YOUR works aren’t on there!” is not a valid argument. I’m sorry, but even when you’re calling yourself a newbie in terms of photoshopping, it should be visible even to you that in most of the displayed images, the colors are oversaturated or simply don’t go together, the single elements are blurred and have horrible cutouts, and so on and so forth.
And all things aside, afaik this site is meant to display high quality works and advanced tutorials. NOT a site for displaying “oh look this is what you can do when owning photoshop for 5 minutes already!”.
If you wish to see beginner’s pieces and tutorials, go to deviantart or somewhere else, but the widespread criticism concerning this article is well founded. This article is displaced and I’m seriously surprised it could make its way to be published. I’m highly disappointed.
First thing that came to my mind… all those girls are gonna get hypothermia.
no, they are daughter of Conan the Barbarian who is always wandering around the wild wearing nothing else but his underwear, in a snow storm.
Most of these are pretty damn bad. What are they doing here?
There aren’t enough women in dresses, women with wings, frozen eyes and horses! I demand that we have more women in dresses, women with wings, frozen eyes and horses!
lol, i was just thinking that
These are hokey, cliche, tired and/or ameteur at best. The Ice eye was the only one that sticks out to me as being done well. I don’t mean to judge too harshly it’s just I have seen much better especially from this site and I come here for inspiration and learning not to view mediocre works of art.
amazing..
there are so many beautiful winter manips on the web …these look like crap …where did u find such horrible “art”, i don’t know, u have to search real hard to find this noobis manips…realy
Most of these are horrible and/or cheesy and/or cliché. There are just a few f pictures here that caught my eye saying “Well this is good”
Do not let Cameron Chapman do another collection post like this.
While some of these are good, I agree that they do not offer a lot of deviation in either style or theme.
Thank you for featuring my manipulation on this site (Winter song – the wolves). It was a lot of fun to make, and I can understand if other people think that there is better work out there – There is! I believe a lot of these people featured are beginners like me and who never thought their work may be featured.
Thanks again.
Okay, I have a question for all you “professionals”, why don’t you guys post some of your artwork on here and let us “ametures” judge your art? Not to be rude but you guys who complain about every little thing that’s posted, go and post your own tutorials/work on this site and see whether the community agress it’s “professional.” Bet most of us would still complian it’s crap because we have no clue to what we are looking for in a decent tutorial/art.
Those artists’ worked hard and were brave enough to put it on the web, and to me, that’s a true artist dedicated to become better.
http://homer8190.deviantart.com/gallery/
judge away… please, be brutal, that’s the only way anyone can improve
Go to deviantart, and find the user name homer8190 (my work). I can’t stick the link in because it won’t post.
Judge away, and be brutal… that is the only way anyone can improve!
Click on my name and it will take you to some of my stuff.
Judge away, and be brutal… that is the only way for anyone to improve!
Mediocre at best. I appreciate the attempt at a winter themed post, but this fell very short imo.
Wow, this is the first time I’ve posted on this site. I just have to point out that a lot of these are terrible. I would be ashamed to have my work up alongside some of this garbage. I hope this isn’t the direction this site is headed in.
This is AWESOME POST
I LOVE IT
by
http://www.tutoreffic.com
well if anyone can create anything like what Ice Age by Geir Akselsen, please let my know because hi is real good at what he does. big fan. just look at his flickr page and you will se some serious stuff. i would love to learn what he does to his pictures to achive that effect.
adhere to said above – CRAPPY / BORING works.
хуйня кошки в арту ебутся
хуйня
some sserious garbage going on in here
Most of them all real but real crap! My mother can do better than this. Respect for the ‘ice eye’ though, that’s a good one.
@Cameron Chapman: Amazing and Fantastical Winter Photo Manipulations -> A title like this on a post like this??? Come one! Are you 12?? If you find this amazing and fantastic you need to go and visit your first art gallery or museum! Even my sunday newspaper posts better crap than this…
No Offence…
I think these images are awesome – especialy: Disenchanted Lullaby
Thank you for sharing.
How many photoshop filters does it take to create a “Masterpiece”
Lovely…..
so beautiful.