We will take a photo of a nice sweet little kitten and convert it into MONSTER KILLER CAT in 5 easy steps.

This part of the tutorial will include extensive use of layer masks.The mask defines visibility of the parts of the layer: areas where the mask is black are completely invisible, and areas where the mask is white are fully visible. The areas where the mask is gray are semi-transparent. Drawing over the mask allows to reveal or to hide the parts of the layer, and it doesn’t destoy the contents of the layer - that’s why the masks are so popular!

Important: before continuing, make sure that ‘Photocopy’ layer is visible.

There are several Photoshop filters that may help to create an outline:

• find edges filter
• glowing edges filter
• smart blur filter in the ‘edge only’ mode
• photocopy filter.

There is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ filter; the result of using this or that technique depends on the image very much. We will experiment with these 4 filters to find one that suits our image best.

The goal of this tutorial is to create a digital sketch effect that would be as close to real sketch look as possible. That’s why I call it a ‘natural sketch technique’. We will try to do a little research into several possible Photoshop techniques to find out the most effective ones.

Before continuing with this tutorial look at the Introduction to find out the basic sketch features we are going to reproduce digitally.

You may also want to read the “Classical” Photoshop sketch effect tutorial to learn easy and effective way to turn your photo into a ’sketch’ in few steps.

This tutorial will explain how to apply a sketch effect to your photos. First have a look at the Introduction that defines the main things that ‘make a sketch look like a sketch’.

Before we begin with Photoshop sketch effect techniques I have to say that unfortunately it is not possible to make some steps, or may be use some Photoshop action and automatically convert your photo into a sketch. Each photo requires individual approach and a lot of “trial and error” to produce a good result.

Let’s have a look at some real sketches (portraits this time) to find out what we are going to reproduce and what will make our photos look like a pencil drawing. All drawings used in this tutorial have been made by Andrew Loomis.