X-Ray Effect of a Flower (Exclusive Tutorial)

After visiting the local hospital where I had my hand x-rayed, I decided to write a tutorial about creation of an x-ray effect. The result was different from what I had planned but I like it. I will demonstrate here using a flower as an example.

Well let's begin by creating a new document, approximately 400x800 pixels. First fill it with black. Then activate rulers (Ctrl+R) and draw a vertical line in the middle. Now take the Pen tool (make sure that you use Paths). Click the left mouse button once in the upper part of the line, then do the same approximately 150 pixels higher and while holding the mouse button pressed draw a line about 100 pixels horizontally in either direction, then release the button. After that click on the starting point again.

This is a petal . While holding the Pen tool, create a new layer (Ctrl+Shift+N), click the right mouse button on any part of the petal and select Fill Path... Color it with white. Now deselect Path (press Esc), duplicate the petal layer (Ctrl+J) and apply Free Transform (Ctrl+T). By pressing Ctrl+T you can see a dot - this is a rotation point. You should move it beyond the petal downwards by 15 pixels (just click and drag it where you want it to be placed). After that type in the value of a rotation angle - 180° .

Merge these layers ( Ctrl + E ). Now duplicate a layer (Ctrl+J) and rotate it by 90 degrees in either direction with the help of the Free Transform tool (Ctrl+T).

Merge these layers ( Ctrl + E ). Then duplicate a layer (Ctrl+J) 2 times and rotate the newly created layers by 30 degrees with the help of the Free Transform tool (Ctrl+T) (they should look in the opposite directions).

Merge layers . Well, the flower bud is ready. Now it's time to add a stem. Create a new layer and draw the stem using the Pen tool. Then, just like during the previous steps fill path with white and hide it.

You can draw separate paths for leaves, or you can take the one you used for the petal creation. Go to Paths menu (Window>Paths) and press path with the petal. Go back to Layers (Window>Layers), create a new layer (Ctrl+Shift+N) and fill path with white. Deselect path ( Esc ). Use the Free Transform Tool for moving the leaf to the necessary place and change its position.

Add one more leaf using the same method.

Now, the most interesting part - we start to create the x-ray effect. Select petals (Ctrl+left mouse click on thumbnail with petals). Then Feather selection (Ctrl+Alt+D) - 3 pixels and press del . Then deselect ( Ctrl + D ).

Do the same with the other layers .

So, the flower is almost completed . But we still can add some nice effects. The simplest way is to paint it by changing Color Overlay and Outer Glow values in Blending Options.

Merge layers (Ctrl+E), then duplicate (Ctrl+J). Hide the lower layer (Layer>Hide Layers), and for the upper layer use the following Blending Options (Layer>Layer Style>Blending Options):

In order to make the flower coloring more vivid, unhide the lower layer (select it, then Layer>Show Layers) and apply Gaussian Blur (Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur) with pixel radius value - 3.6 pixels.