When a star like our own reaches the end of its life, it begins to run out of hydrogen fuel in its core. Like a car running out of gas, it will begin to sputter, swelling to a size that could encompass every planet in our solar system out to Mars. When this happens, the sun will swallow the Earth and will spell certain doom for all life on our planet. Today’s tutorial is part of a 4-part series depicting the journey of the inhabitance of a dying world that must travel into the unknown to find a new world to call home. In this series, we will explore the cosmos from the perspective of this fictional civilization making their way through the universe and will demonstrate the techniques that you can use in Photoshop to depict your own cosmic scenery. In addition to written content, this tutorial also includes about an hour of video instruction to help you along the way. So what are you waiting for? Let’s get started!

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When stars die, they explode in a brilliant burst of light that releases more energy than our sun releases in its lifetime. This brilliant burst of light is so bright that for a brief moment can outshine an entire galaxy. Supernovas occur in our galaxy about once every 50 years. Put another way, somewhere in the universe, a star explodes every second. This is important because the left over debris from these explosions eventually become planets, moons, air, water, and even life itself. Today’s tutorial will demonstrate how to create a supernova that is about to devastate an entire solar system. Our scene will depict a ringed planet and a fleet of ships struggling to get out of the way in time.

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