Create Patterns On Clothing in Photoshop
You can turn anything into a Pattern in Photoshop using the Define Pattern command. It will take what ever is visible on a canvas and turn it into a repeatable pattern stored on the computer.
It is a good idea to use a “seamless” or “repeatable” pattern here, making sure that when tiled the Patterns will not break. In this episode we download a pattern to use for creating Patterns on clothing in Photoshop.
Download Patterns
You can create your own Patterns in Photoshop but to save time we use a pre-made pattern from Christina Jewels. Download her Pattern here.
Free Seamless Vector Houndstooth Pattern – Christina Jewels Graphic Design
Warping Patterns
Creating and tiling a pattern is the first step to getting a Pattern on someone’s clothing. Next you have to make the pattern look as though it actually follows the clothing lines. To do this we use the Warp command and layer blending modes.
Soft Light blending mode will always do a good job blending in one layer into another. We set our blending mode to Soft Light and lower the Opacity to see through to the original image.
After getting the Pattern to blend in better we Warp it to follow the general shape of the garment. The next step is taking care of each fold of the fabric.
Making Selections with the Pen Tool
In order to make the pattern look as though it really is applied on the skirt we have to take into account each fold and turn of the fabric. This can be a tricky process depending on what piece of clothing you are using but the principles are the same.
We use the Pen Tool to make selections of each fabric fold and then use the Warp Tool to Contour the pattern to match the fabric. To make this process a bit easier we use the Hide (Cmd + H) Command to remove Guides as we make the transformation.
Repeat this process for each fold and bend of the fabric and before you know it you will be done.
