Create a Vivid Winter Aurora Landscape

Create a Vivid Winter Aurora Landscape
Create a Vivid Winter Aurora Landscape

In this tutorial I'll show you how to create a winter night landscape featuring a northern sky. You will learn how to combine different stocks together and blend them correctly to make a cohesive scene. You'll also learn how to create lighting effect, work with group and more.

Preview of Final Results

winter28-final

Tutorial Resources

Step 1

Create a new document with size of 1300x800 px and fill it with white (feel free to use your own size and color). Press Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+N to make a new layer. Hit G to active Gradient Tool, choose Radial Gradient with color #022240 and #093b62. Drag a line from the top to bottom to get result below:

winter1

Step 2

Open star background pack. I choose "starry 1" and use Move Tool (V) to drag it into our canvas and change the mode to Color Dodge 100%:

winter2

Step 3

To change color of some stars I use an adjustment layer with Clipping Mask. On stars layer, go to Layer-New Adjustment Layer-Channel Mixer:

winter3

You can see some stars redder:

winter3a

Step 4

Place aurora image onto the sky and change the mode to Screen 100%:

winter4

Click the second button at the bottom of Layer panel to add mask to this layer. Use soft black brush with low opacity (around 20%) to reduce some light on aurora sky. You can see how I did it on the mask and result on picture:

winter4a

Step 5

Duplicate this layer, flip it horizontally (Edit-Transform-Flip Horizontal) and move to the right.

winter5

Use layer mask to remove hard edges and blend it with the rest:

winter5a

Step 6

To edit all aurora layers together, make all of them selected then press Cmd/Ctrl+G to make a group. Change the mode of this group from Pass Through (default group mode) to Screen 100% (it's very important to keep the effect the same as before grouping). Make a new Curves layer within this group (above all aurora layers):

winter6

Because the mode changed to Screen 100% so this Curves layer only affects the layers inside this group (aurora ones).

winter6a

Step 7

To enhance sky light I make a new layer and use Rectangular Marquee Tool to make a selection on sky part. Use soft brush with two colors (#f79ead,#acbbc5) to paint on the edges of this selection as shown below:

winter7

Convert this layer to Smart Object. Go to Filter-Blur-Motion Blur:

winter7a
winter7b

Use Cmd/Ctrl+T to rotate and enlarge this part:

winter7c

Step 8

Use layer mask to blur some parts on the top of this effect:

winter8

Change the mode to Hard Light 100% and name this layer "sky light" or whatever you want:

winter8a

Step 9

Extract left mountain and place it at the left of our picture (you can use your own photo).

winter9

Step 10

I use some adjustment layers (Clipping Mask) to darken and change color of this mountain:

winter10

On second Curves layer I use soft black brush to erase the left side as I want it to be darker than the rest:

winter10a

Step 11

I want the contour of this mountain a bit brighter (near the sky) so I make a new layer (Clipping Mask) and use soft brush with color #acbbc5, opacity and flow about 50-55% to paint along the contour:

winter11
winter11a

Step 12

Cut out the right mountain and position it at the right:

winter12

Step 13

I use Curves and Color Balance to change color and darken it:

Pages: 1 2 3

Create Dot Grid Art in 1 Click
Sponsored

Turn any photo into a dot grid artwork with these Photoshop actions. You'll get great results with dots that change size. They get larger in brighter areas and smaller in darker areas. Free download available.

11 comments on “Create a Vivid Winter Aurora Landscape”

  1. OMG!! What a humongous polar bear!

    Not bad for a tut but you need to learn perspective... unless you intentionally decided to make a dinosaur-sized polar bear.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

cross