Draw Graffiti

Learning to draw graffiti from knowing absolutely nothing about the style is just like learning to draw for the first time. First you must study the art. Just like any subject you must recognize what properties make it unique and give it identity. While there are countless styles of graffiti, I have noticed few properties identified immediately within only minutes of reviewing the works of other artists.

There is no spoon.

1. Most are unrecognizable regarding text. Be it the name of the artist or a message, I cannot recognize enough of the letters to make sense of it. Don't be discouraged, I relate this property to the work of Picasso and look at the price tags on his work.

There are different reasons the words cannot be read:

A. Often the letters are so warped they lose resemblance. This is key to drawing graffiti that looks authentic. Often times the artist will put to much effort into drawing a character just right.

B. Most of the letters look mashed together, squishing each other or placed behind each other. Again, artists will initially draw character with appropriate spacing. This is merely mental programming. We are trying to write a word, but it is not a word that should be written. It is art, abstract and warped.

C. Elements used within the design confuse the mind. Several colorful pieces use gradients, block lettering and artificial lighting techniques that produce a 3-d effect. While the mind does perceive the character to be three dimensional, the plethora of values and colors help to obscure distinguished between each item.

2. Much word art is accompanied by imagery. Cartoon, or realistic, it is the imagery outside of the word that helps draw attention, and can bring the first glance.

Prep

Prepare your brushes. I am using a drawing tablet and suggest you do the same. It allows me to move my hand fluidly as if it were a paintbrush or pen. I have created a document the same dimensions as my monitors resolution. You can do this by pressing Ctrl + Print Screen. The print screen button is usually located near the scroll lock, home and insert buttons above the arrow keys. After pressing that open a new document in photoshop by pressing Ctrl + N. I am shortcut intense. The new dimensions should already be in the appropriate boxes. Make sure the settings are 72ppi and RGB. Click Ok.

Press D to get the default colors. Filter menu > filter gallery. Texturizer, brick, then copy the settings shown here.

Next create an adjustment layer by clicking the circle icon that's split black and white in the layers palette.

Select gradient. Click on the actual gradient preview and choose black to white. Then select the white stopper (little white square) on the bottom of the gradient slide bar. In the color picker choose a dark brick red.

Click ok until no more windows remain. With the gradient layer selected change the blending mode to linear burn.

Open the brushes palette F5. In the brush shape diagram pull one of the tiny circles on the larger circle in to create a narrow oval. Then drag the point of the oval to the upper left or right at an angle. Make the brush some what soft with no spacing. On the left of the palette check the Shape Dynamics box. Under that menu select the Control drop down menu under size jitter. Change that to pen pressure. This is the feature that will help your drawing look more traditional.

In the beginning was the word.

With this said let us begin with determining the word. What word will be used in our art? For me, I will choose "Street". I chose this word because graffiti is a type of street art.

After choosing your word you must break down the characters used to writer it and redraw each one again and again until you find a distortion of that character that appeals to you as authentic. Remember 1:A. It may or may not be recognizable, either is ok.

Next, practice drawing the new characters together with different spacing. Draw some over the others. Draw them squished and slender like their crammed in a small space. I practiced for about 15 minutes before I came up with what I was going to use.

Now that your word is drawn how you want it, make sure your word layer is selected and duplicate it Ctrl + J. Select the original layer and name it "Word". Open the layer effects and choose gradient overlay. Choose two vibrant colors with similar temperature. I chose a very hot yellow and orange. Make the gradient flow from the bottom of the word to the top by changing the angle.

Click to enlarge

The easy part.

Now you must create a block effect. Open the action palette F9. Create a new folder called Graffiti by pressing the folder icon. Create a new action by pressing the page icon.

Call this action Block. Press ok. With the action recording ( the circle button on the palette is red) begin by duplicating the layer Ctrl + J. Then make sure the move tool is selected V. Using the arrow keys on the keyboard press down and then right one time. Press the record button in the actions palette to stop recording. You should now be able to select the action and then press the play button to repeat the process. Continue to do this until the block characters appear wide enough for your art. I must have pressed the play button 40 times.

Now select all those new layers. In CS you can simple lock them all but running your mouse down the lock boxes located on the left of the layer but to the right of the eyeball icon. In CS2 you must shift-click the layers to highlight them all. Instead of shift-clicking each one individually simply select the top most layer and then the bottom one.

With all the block layers either linked or selected press Ctrl + E to merge them into one layer. Most that layer below the "Word" layer. Name it "Block".

The other easy part.

Ctrl click the "Word" layer to create an outline selection around the pixels on that layer. Then Shift + Ctrl click the "Block" layer to add its outline to the selection. Select the background layer with the brick pattern and press Ctrl + J to duplicate the selection to a new layer. Name this layer "Pattern". Move it above the rest of the layers. Change the blending mode in the layers palette to linear burn and the opacity to approximately 32%.

Click to enlarge

Finally, Ctrl click the "Word" layer. In the select menu > modify > contract. I chose 30 pixels but it depends on the size of the characters. You want the selection to shrink around 80 percent of the character width. The select menu > modify > border. I chose 10 pixels. Now with this selection active create a new layer by pressing the page icon on the bottom of the layers palette. Change your brush back to a standard round soft brush with white as the foreground color. Fill in the selection on the new empty layer only to the top left of the characters. This will create a shiny effect. Call the layer "Highlights". Move it to the top.

Now that your done add some cartoon character.

Click to enlarge

Tip the man.