Cracking face with light bleeding out - how?

[Deathbliss]

I've been playing around with some of my own homegrown techniques to do this, but all have failed so far, and I have no idea how to Google this. I don't want a cracking face, or a face filled with light.

What I want to do is to take a picture of my face, generate cracks through it, and then create a light effect that bleeds through the cracks. I want it to look like there is a force of light beneath the face, and the skin is just breaking away. Really bright light too. Yeah, you probably don't want to get Freudian here with me :P

Can this be done? If so, could you post any links, tips, etc. that would help me do this? In return, if there is not already a tutorial specifically for this, I will create one and provide all appropriate credit to those who contributed, if they wish to be mentioned.

Thanks!
:rocker: Deathbliss

[AG.]

My suggestion would be to overlay cracked walls or peeled surface textures that you can find on cgtextures.com, then erase unnecessary detail and paint the light bleeding through manually.

[Deathbliss]

Thanks for the suggestion! I was getting worried there for a little bit...

I'll give it a try, but you should know I've tried painting the cracks in on a separate layer, filling those cracks with white painted lines on another layer, then finally applying an incremental Gaussian blue, but the end result doesn't bleed through. I'm assuming I'll run across the same issue with a cracking texture.

But hey, I'll do it anyway just to see what happens!
- Deathbliss

[ikken]

ugh
you will find some better advice posting your wip painting in critique section, because seriously...
there're a lot of ways to achieve the same effect
starting from painting in every crack to some crazy layer manipulations

[JohnMalcolm1970]

I've been playing around with some of my own homegrown techniques to do this, but all have failed so far, and I have no idea how to Google this. I don't want a cracking face, or a face filled with light.

What I want to do is to take a picture of my face, generate cracks through it, and then create a light effect that bleeds through the cracks. I want it to look like there is a force of light beneath the face, and the skin is just breaking away. Really bright light too. Yeah, you probably don't want to get Freudian here with me :P

Can this be done? If so, could you post any links, tips, etc. that would help me do this? In return, if there is not already a tutorial specifically for this, I will create one and provide all appropriate credit to those who contributed, if they wish to be mentioned.

Thanks!
:rocker: Deathbliss

I'm not sure if this is the kind of effect you are looking for - if so, draw the cracks in white. Then either flatten your layers or create a new composite layer at the top of your layer stack (CTRL+A, CTRL+SHIFT+C, CTRL+V). Then get a nice soft edged air brush, pick a colour, change the brush's mode to Linear Dodge (Add) and gently go over the cracks - allowing the light effect to build up slowly. You can also try this on a separate layer with the layer mod set to Linear Dodge (Add), but I find it more effective the other way.

[Deathbliss]

Hey thanks for all your posts!

I'll start a WIP thread within the next few days. As far as AG's advice I've had no luck so far. It just doesn't come out quite right. But I'm saving this thread and trying JohnMalcolm1970's tip, that looks closer to what I'm after.

Thanks again everyone!
:lifedrawing: Deathbiss