Photo Effects Tutorials for Photoshop
Add light, atmosphere, and style to any photo in Photoshop: glows, light rays, lens flares, motion blur, textures, double exposures, film and vintage looks, glitch and painterly effects, and other visual effects. More than 180 free and PRO video tutorials from Aaron Nace, each building a complete effect from scratch.
Learn how to create a double exposure effect in three minutes or less using the magic of Photoshop! Follow along as we put our subject on a pure white background using Levels and then blend two images together with Blending Modes.
Sample Image & Custom Brush Included
Photoshop | Compositing | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
2 Sample Images | 1 PDF Guide
Make almost anything look miniature with this easy tilt-shift effect in Photoshop!
Sample Image Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 PDF Guide
Learn how to draw more attention to your subjects with soft, natural-looking vignettes in Photoshop!
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 PDF Guide
Draw more attention to your subjects with our easy-to-use Smart Vignette Photoshop Actions. Just download, install, and click play!
Photoshop | PRO Photoshop Actions | Easy
4 Sample Images | 8 Photoshop Actions | 1 PDF Guide
Add realistic light rays to any backlit photo with our easy-to-use Photoshop Actions. Learn how to install the Actions and apply them to your images!
Photoshop | PRO Photoshop Actions | Easy
5 Sample Images | 13 Photoshop Actions | 1 PDF Guide
Give your images a sun-kissed look by adding beautiful flares and glows! This action pack is ideal for backlit photos and will make a perfect addition to wedding, lifestyle, event, and landscape images.
Photoshop | PRO Photoshop Actions | Easy
5 Sample Images | 16 Photoshop Actions | 1 PDF Guide
Learn how to make light sources brighter, adjust the colors, and add a realistic glow–all with the power of Channels, Adjustment Layers, Blending Modes, and more!
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 PDF Guide
Not to be underestimated, gradients are powerful tools that can be used to color tone, add lighting effects, and transform your photos.
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Medium | 3 hours
12 Sample Images | 4 Photoshop Gradients
Learn how to create a custom brush out of any shape in Photoshop! Aaron breaks down how to make a brush from scratch and how to use the Brush Settings Panel to add natural variation for realistic effects.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Tools & Techniques | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 Photoshop Brush | 1 PDF Guide
Natalia Seth shows us how she created the paint splash effect in one of her most popular conceptual portraits. Learn how to make accurate selections, adjust color, and match lighting for composites.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Compositing | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
6 Sample Images | 1 PDF Guide
Learn how to create rain, snow, and atmosphere from scratch and how paint in photo-realistic hair for perfect cutouts. Watch 15 in-depth examples of how to use some of the 35 custom Photoshop brushes included with this tutorial!
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Medium | 6.25 hours
26 Sample Images | 35 Photoshop Brushes
Learn how to use Blending Modes, Smart Objects, Layer Masks, and Adjustment Layers to seamlessly blend multiple exposures. Work through six different examples, combining two, three, and four exposures together.
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Medium | 1.5 hours
21 Sample Images
Having a soft, out-of-focus background is an extremely effective way of drawing the viewer’s eye to your subject. This is best done in camera, but we’ll show you how to do it in Photoshop.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 PDF Guide
Easily create a beautiful photo mosaic effect that is the perfect finishing touch for those occasions where you’ve taken photos of a group of people or an event.
Sample Images Included
Lightroom, Photoshop | Text & Graphic Design | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
301 Sample Images | 1 PDF Guide
The popular cinematic look is no longer a style only reserved for the movies. Learn an incredibly easy method to give your photos a striking cinematic look.
Sample Images Included
Blending Modes control how different layers blend, interact, and create a combined image. Join us as we go in-depth with each of the 27 Blending Modes to add clouds to a clear sky, make colors pop, and learn to sharpen an image like a pro.
Photoshop | Tools & Techniques | Easy | 3.25 hours
72 Sample Images | 1 Custom Texture
In this tutorial, we not only show you how to create your own double exposure effect, but we also demonstrate how to pull it off using video in Photoshop.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Video & Animation | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
2 Sample Videos | 1 PDF Guide
Using this Photoshop Brush you can add beautiful and realistic light rays, dust, and particle effects to any image!
Free Brush Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Custom Brush
Sometimes the default brushes in Photoshop don’t do the trick. That’s why we’ve created this custom brush that can quickly and easily add atmosphere and dimension to a photo!
Free Brush Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
Atmosphere Brushes
We all need a smooch from time to time. Now you can add one to any picture in Photoshop with this easy-to-install brush.
Free Brush Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Custom Brush
Create a winter wonderland in seconds with this Photoshop brush full of holiday cheer! Perfect for holiday posters and cards.
Free Brush Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
1 Custom Brush
Add interest to any sky by adding realistic clouds to any sky with this exclusive Photoshop brush!
Free Brush Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
1 Custom Brush
Add creamy, beautiful bokeh to your photos in Photoshop using this simple technique! Help your photos look magical and make more friends in the process.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
3 Sample Images | 1 PDF Guide
Follow along during our photoshoot where we pour black liquid on Aaron’s head, then take the image into Photoshop for finishing touches, including blacking out his eyes.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
1 Sample RAW File | 1 PDF Guide
Learn how to draw more attention to your subject by adding a Tilt-Shift Effect to your photos!
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Medium | 30 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 Sample PSD | 1 PDF Guide
Sometimes a dark and dramatic sky is the perfect fit for an image. Learn how to make an accurate selection of the sky and then add some drama to those shadows and highlights.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Color & Tone | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 PDF Guide
Add a beautiful starry sky to any image using stock photos. Use a clipping mask to make sure the stars only appear where they should.
Sample Images Included
Learn how to add a bit of mystery to your photos by creating fog and light beams from scratch, using the Phlearn Fog Brush! Download the custom brush, and start adding fog to your own images.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Photo Effects | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
1 Sample Image | 1 Photoshop Brush | 1 PDF Guide
Create two amazing images using some of the most fun and powerful tools and techniques in Photoshop. Make perfect cutouts with the Pen Tool, match colors, dodge and burn, and learn advanced sharpening.
Photoshop | Compositing | Easy | 4 hours
8 Sample Images
Learn how to convert any photo into a 3D Texture and apply it to Text and photos. This technique will allow you to change the lighting direction of any texture!
Photoshop | Text & Graphic Design | Easy | 15 mins | 1 video
4 Sample Images | 1 PDF Guide
A film border can be a great way to add a vintage look to your image. Whether you scanned your own film or found a stock photo, we’ll show you how to add it to any image.
Add Depth and movement to photos by adding Motion Blur to Backgrounds. This Simple Technique will make Action and sports photos more dynamic.
Photoshop has an awesome tool for adding Fire to photos. We’ll show you how to work through the effect for adding realistic looking fire to your images.
Create a soft and dreamy look by adding a slight blur to the edges of a photo and adding a soft blur to the Light in a photo.
The Spin Blur allows you to add radial movement to a static image. In this episode, we use the Spin Blur to rotate the wheels and tires of a car, making it look like it is moving!
Have you ever wanted to replace a person’s head with an animal head? Well if so, you are in luck. In this tribute to Father’s Day, we show you how to turn your dear dad into your DEER DAD.
Sample Images Included
Photoshop | Compositing | Easy | 30 mins | 1 video
Sample Images
What You’ll Learn
Good visual effects are built from the same things a photographer works with on set: light, atmosphere, and depth. These tutorials teach the effects as lighting and physics first and Photoshop tricks second, which is why they hold up at full size.
- Light. Glows, highlight bloom, light rays, sun flares, neon, and painting light onto a subject so it matches the scene.
- Atmosphere. Fog, haze, rain, snow, dust, smoke, and depth of field, layered so the subject sits inside them rather than in front of them.
- Elements. Fire, water, lightning, sparks, and particles from stock and from scratch, with the blend modes and masks that make them believable.
- Stylized effects. Double exposure, dispersion and pixel stretch, portrait slice, glitch, 3D and long-shadow text, and film and vintage looks.
- The finish. Grain, vignette, color grading, and sharpening that make an effect feel like part of the photograph.
Where to Start
Begin with the Special Effects Learning Path, which sequences the fundamentals of light and atmosphere before the showpiece effects. For the deep dive, the PRO course Advanced Lighting Effects in Photoshop is the one most people come back to. Many effects here start with a clean cutout, so the selection tutorials in Tools & Techniques are worth a look first.
Free and PRO Tutorials
Free tutorials are complete lessons, not previews. PRO tutorials go deeper and longer, and they include the sample images, RAW files, actions, and presets used in the lesson so you can follow along on the exact same file. A PHLEARN PRO membership unlocks every PRO tutorial on the site, including all of the ones in this category.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do my effects look pasted on?
Usually because the effect ignores the light already in the photo. Match the direction and color of the existing light, add the effect on its own layer with a soft mask, and let it interact with the subject through blend modes like Screen and Soft Light. The light tutorials here show each step.
Do I need plugins or stock images?
No plugins. A few tutorials use free stock elements for fire, smoke, or particles and show where to find them; most build the effect entirely inside Photoshop with brushes, gradients, and filters.
Which blend modes are used for effects?
Screen and Linear Dodge for light, Multiply for shadows and darkening, Soft Light and Overlay for contrast and color, and Blend If for fitting an effect into the tones of a photo. The blend-mode tutorials in this category explain each.
Where to Go Next
Visual effects sit on top of a solid edit and often a composite. See Compositing for placing subjects in scenes, Color & Tone for the cinematic finish, and Text & Graphic Design for painterly and illustrative looks. The PRO library is at PRO Visual Effects.
Learn Effects in Order
The Special Effects Learning Path teaches light and atmosphere first, then the showpiece effects.
On This Page
PHLEARN PRO
Every PRO tutorial in this category, with sample and RAW files, plus the full PRO library.