Eye Iris Exercise

A. Theinert – Becker College - 2013

• New file: 3000 x 2000 px 300 PPI• Fill the background with a flesh-toned color.

• Chose an Eye color (green, blue, hazel, brown).

• On a New Layer, Write the Eye color with a hard round brush.

• Write each letter in a different color

• The first letter should be the primary color of the eye, the rest should be accent colors

• Use diverse colors! (yellows, violets, oranges)

• On a New Layer Make a Circular Selection (hold shift with the elliptical marquee tool)

• Select the Paint Bucket tool

• Hold ALT and sample the color from the first letter.

• Fill the selection with this color.

• With the Circle still Selected (re-select it if you lost it). Hit the Layer Mask icon the bottom of the layer panel”

This will hid anything outside the selected area even after you deselect.

• On a New Layer make a smaller Circular Selection and fill it with black

• Select the Masked Layer• Since the Pupil layer is above this

layer you can make quick lines back & forth ‘behind’ it.

• Overlap these with other ‘swirly’ lines around the pupil area.

• (it is ok to be sloppy during this early stage!)

‘Swirl

y Lines’

‘Stra

ight L

ines’

• Keep sampling from the colors that you used to spell the word.

• Use a Large Soft brush to add darker areas around the outside edge.

• The center should have a slightly more solid ring of color around the pupil.

Once you are happy with the color ‘scribbles’ on your iris. Use the Smudge tool and begin smudging outwards from the pupil and inwards from the edge of the iris.

Round 2! Go back in with Brush tool with varying sizes, and add new straight strokes on top of the smudged lines.

Select the pupil layer, and use the smudge tool with a small brush size to break up the solid line of the pupil.

• Use a Large Soft Brush with 30%-60% Opacity to add larger areas of color around in the iris.

• The outer edge of the iris and the inner edge around the pupil are usually darker.

• Keep switching colors and brush sizes.

Use the Smudge tool again to push the color around.

• On a New Layer use an opaque white brush to build up the specular highlights.

• Look at reference images; highlights are unique depending on the lighting and surrounding environment

Once you are satisfied with your work, you can use Adjustment Layers to change the color. Or even the Transform and Warp tools to change the pupil

A combination of Color Balance, Hue, & Saturation Adjustment Layers work best.