No-pictures Tutorial - Making a T-Shirt in PS

Hi!

Seems a lot of people here would like to see how to make a simple T-shirt in Photoshop. So, since I'm really sick today, and can't do anything about my day job, here's one (without images) that explains one of the ways I do it. (There will be a much better one, with images, sometime after I recover from this cold/flu.)

1. Open the file with your favorite templates, and save it as Shirt.psd. This is to avoid writing over the templates.

2. Make a new layer, under the templates (hold down Command/ctrl and click on the New Layer button to make a new layer below the selected layer). This is where you will build your shirt.

3. Fill the layer with a color, any color. You should be able to see the templates clearly over the color. If you can't, change the Blend Modes until you can. (Multiply or Screen, for instance.)

4. Take the Pen tool, and click on the Paths icon, in the middle of the group of three on the left side of the Options bar, as shown below. (This will enable you to make Paths, not Shapes. The instructions won't work with Shapes.)



Click once right above the neck, in the middle, where there are no polygons (grid lines.) Click again to the left of the neck, in the open area. Click next to the neck, above the left shoulder line where you want the t-shirt neck to start. Then click exactly on one of the left shoulder grid lines for the template. Click in the center of the chest, where you want the deeepest dip of the collar, and without letting go of the mouse button hold down the shift key and drag to the right until the curve takes the shape you want for your neckline. This will enable you to make a nice, smooth opening with a minimum of fuss. In this use of the Pen tool, you only need the one drag, so it shouldn't give anyone any problems.

You should have a line that goes around the outside of half the "template" neck intersects the "template" at the shoulder, and then follows half the neckline of your shirt. You shouldn't have anything in the Layers palette except the layer you started with, that is just filled with a color, and the "template" layers. If you have Shapes, delete them, click on the Paths icon, and try again.

5. Tap the A key to get the Path Selection tool (the black arrow. If you get the white one, hold down the Shift key and tap A again to cycle through the tools,) and click on the path to select the whole thing. (It will have solid squares at each point.) Copy and Paste, so you have two of them, and then go to Edit > Transform Path > Flip Horizontal.

6. Click on the point that corresponds to the point that was exactly on the grid line, hold down the Shift key to constrain movement, and drag it to the opposite shoulder, making sure it's exactly on the grid line once again.

7. Look at the two center points, zooming in if you like. If there's a gap there, get the pen tool, click on the first, and then click on the second to join them. If they meet, you're fine, and don't need to do anything. If they cross each other, get the Direct Selection tool (the white arrow,) and move them until they meet. To see the points without the rest of the templates in the way, hold down Option/alt and click on the eye next to the active layer in the Layer Palette to hide the non-active layers. Do it again to make them all show back up. Don't forget to check the top points, over the neck, too.

8. Repeat this process for the back of the neck, making sure that you use exactly the same shoulder points that you used for the front. (This is the most critical part of the entire process, so take your time, zoom in, and be very careful here.)

9. When you have them both done, click on the Layer Mask icon in the Layer Palette, to add a layer mask. This is FAR better than erasing things, since you can easily un-erase if you decide that you have to later.

10. Hold down Command/ctrl and click on the work path in the Paths palette, to load your paths as a selection. Then click on the Layer Mask, to make sure you are working in it, and fill the selection with black. To do that, look at your colors, in the toolbar on the left. One should be black, and one white, since you're working with the mask. (If they aren't, tap D to make them so.) The black is probably on the top, as the foreground color. If it is, then hold down Option/alt, and tap Delete/Backspace to fill with the foreground color. If black is the background color, hold down Command/ctrl and tap Delete/Backspace to fill with the background color.

11. Save the Path (you may want it later, to make a binding for the neck.)

12. Use the New Path icon to make another Path, take the Pen tool again, and click out by the hand, then outside the arm, but next to the place you want the sleeve to end, on the grid exactly where you want it to end, across the arm and on the grid again for the other side, and back out to the hand to encompass the entire lower arm (where you DON'T want the sleeve to be) inside the path. You don't need to drag at all for these, since you don't need curves. But clicking exactly on the grid line will give you much more accuracy than trying to draw.

12. Repeat for the back of the arm, but don't overlap the two paths, unless you want to lasso and delete a section later, and then make them both into selections, click on the Mask so you'll be working on it, and fill them both with black, to hide the sleeves on the lower arms and hands.

This is what it should look like at this point, with the Paths showing for clarity.



13. Now, if you want, you can start to get fancy. (Or you can just upload this, but it will be REALLY plain.) You can hide the parts that are outside the shirt, for instance, by setting the Magic Wand to Tolerance 0, Contiguous and clicking outside the polys in one of the template layers, then Contracting the selection (Select > Contract) by 5 or 6 pixels, and filling the Mask with black again, to hide the area between the parts. (Doing it like this will leave a white border on the mask. Just use the Paint Bucket tool (g) to fill it with Black, or make the selection by clicking with the Magic Wand, inverting, Expanding (not Contracting) and Inverting again. I find the Paint Bucket to be faster.)

14. You can make a t-shirt texture by tapping Command/ctrl+J to duplicate the layer, then going to the Filter menu and adding Noise (FIlter > Noise > Add Noise,) then clicking the link between the layer and its mask, to unlink them (so you don't blur the mask, too,) and adding a vertical Motion Blur (Filter > Blur > Motion Blur, choose 90°, and whatever Pixel Length you think looks nice.) Play with the Blending Modes and Opacity to get the effect you want on your shirt. (You might also want to make a separate blur, at 0°, to get the correct orientation on the sleeves.)

15. You can make a contrasting collar, by making a New Layer on top of the other Shirt layers, clicking on the Path in the Paths Palette, choosing a hard-edged brush, and then clicking the Stroke Path icon in the tool palette. If you have the Brush tool selected when you do this, it will automatically use the Brush. Otherwise, hold down the Option key while you click, and choose Stroke with Brush (but don't enable Simulate Pressure. You want an even stroke, so it will match on the shoulder seams.) This works really well if you've made a custom brush that looks like knit binding, by the way. Hold down the Option/alt key and drag the layer mask from one of the other layers to add it to this layer, too. (You do want to do this, because the brush sizes won't match perfectly between the front and back, so you'll have a bad seam if you don't.)

16. You can also add a design to the front, of course. Or do pretty much anything else you want to do to it.

17. When you have it to suit you, hold down Command/ctrl and click on that layer mask you've been using for all the layers, then just go to Select > Save Selection and click OK on the default. You are ready to save as a 32 bit Targa (.tga) file, and upload to Second Life.

Be sure to check the seams on the figure in the Preview window before you spend your Lindens to upload! If you need to add more fabric, just draw on the mask for those layers in White. To decrease it, use black. But if you did this carefully, and clicked exactly on the grid lines, there should be little or no tweaking necessary.

This is what it should look like when you check the seams.



You may notice a white halo at the top of the neck. If you want to avoid that, create a New Layer at the top of the stack, Load the Alpha as a Selection (Select > Load Selection) making sure to enable the Invert button when you do so, and fill the selection with black. That will give you a black mask over your shirt, and when PS makes the .tga file, it will blend the semi-transparent pixels with black. So you'll have a black shadow, not a white halo, on your shirt.

Anyway, that's how I do it, more or less. Hope someone finds this helpful!

(edited to include missing instruction)
(edited to include images and a little more instruction)

Hi Robin,

I hope you feel better soon. Thanks a bunch for posting this tutorial. I don't use paths that much and so its a nice refresher on how to use them.

I have a few questions of course Hopefully you can help answer them.

1) When I create a separate path from the one I'm working on I get a new layer. Is this ok or do these layers need to merged into one mask/alpha channel before saving.

2) your instructions don't mention anything about the sides of the body. Do I need to make a path for those?

3) I'm baffled as to why some of these layers created from the pen tool are not showing up in the over all mask.

I've loaded up what I have done with a little bit of interpreting to get what I think you are instructing. I would love to have feedback from folks.

Thank You,

El Quasimodo

Ooops. My bad. You aren't making Paths, you're making Shapes, because I forgot to tell you to click on the Pen tool, then click on the middle icon in the group to the far left of the Options bar, (the Paths icon,) to make Paths.

If you do that, the rest of it will suddenly make much more sense to you, because you'll just have a path, not a filled Shape object.

So nothing will make any more layers, since Paths don't make layers, and you won't have to do anything about the sides, since the Paths won't interact with them, and you won't see anything at all on your image (except the path) until you Fill or Stroke something.

I'm going to go edit the original instructions as soon as I post this.

I'm really sorry about that. Sigh. That's why I can't work on my day job when I'm sick. I make a lot of mistakes. Probably shouldn't have posted this, either. But ah well, I'll just keep going back and fixing things.

Thank you so very much for posting your image, though. It made it so simple to see where I'd gone wrong in the instructions!

Want to try again, with the right directions this time?

So would that also explain why I wasn't able to select the stroke tool under the path pallette?

Yes, I'm afraid so. I'm so sorry. I promise, I won't post anything long while I'm this sick again. (Or something like that, only English.)

NO worries, that's what I get for trying to learn PS over PSP at the same time I'm trying to learn to sew.

Post away and thank you so much for these little tutorials...they are termendously helpful for those of us beating our head against the wall.

Oooo! Real Life sewing! I love sewing. I think that's why I started to make clothing in SL; because I enjoy it so very much in RL.

Thanks so much for being understanding, by the way. And please, don't hesitate to post any questions you might have. Even if I'm brain dead, someone here will be able to answer.

(edited to add second paragraph.)

In this case it's SL sewing...trying to learn the basics of PS at the same time I'm trying to make things in PS...if you only knew how many times I sat there trying to make a neckline seam from scratch...LOL

Ah! In that case, I really do need to get the tutorial with pictures done. Maybe tomorrow. I can't sleep tonight, which I'm taking as a good sign, since I've been doing nothing else for the last 3 days.

But, basically, you wear the templates as an AV skin or shirt, and see where you want things like the neckline to be. I recommend drawing right on the snapshot of the AV wearing the templates. That will show you exactly where on the "template" you want the neckline, arms, etc.

Then use the Pen tool, as described above, to draw those curves, making sure that they match exactly on the grid at the shoulders, front and back. As long as they match exactly, you won't have a "jag" where the seams don't match up on the Avatar.

I use the pen tool because it's more exact than a brush; so it's easier to get the perfect match. You can use brushes if you prefer, though. (Even though I think you should at least try the Pen tool. (Just three bites of those vegetables. You won't know if you like them if you don't try them. ) Hummm. Maybe I've been a parent too long. )

But, anyway, it's really not hard.

Someone else said that it's not as easy as Cafe Press just putting a design on a shirt. But maybe it should be, for people who don't really want to do more than that. Anyone want me to post a plain basic t-shirt, as a layered Photoshop file, to dissect or to just plop a picture on and use?

Actually, I prefer the pen tool to the brush...or at least I think I will once I master it. I love the idea of vector as a way of making it easier to adjust things. Before PSP CS2, I was thinking of Xara as the program to learn (totally vector graphics), but then I would have also had to deal with finding ways to translate it into TGA and get the alpha's addressed. And, since CS2 is an industry standard, the knowledge is never wasted.

I've been doing most of my design directly on the templates...the whole concept of trying to draw it on a snapshot and then fit it to the template is enough to send me back to that bourbon barrel...which by the way I hear is excellent if you are sick.

ROFL! I have a friend whose recipe for cold medicine starts "Take the juice of one bottle of burbon." Actually, that's the whole recipe. He claims that it doesn't do a thing to lessen the severity or duration of the cold, but you don't care much that you're sick.

Drawing on the snapshot is just to help you visualize where the collar will be when it's on the Avatar. If you don't need it, then you don't need it, and I wouldn't worry about it, if I were you.

Finally..a Master willing to crack the door open for us novices.

Thank you so much Robin.

You are very welcome, Athene!

I've added a few pictures, which should make it a little easier to follow.

I hope you feel better soon!

El Quasimodo

Hi Robin!

Yes, please do feel better. Secret family recipie to combat flu and cold: ( note that sure and it sounds crazy but the stuff works!) One small glass of v-8 with a teaspoon of black pepper mixed in, as well as a 1/4 tablespoon of cayenne pepper. Swallow it fast, 3 times a day. Inside of three days you'll be feeling brilliant.

I have a question if I may, regarding step 5. I'm not able to click on the path to select the whole thing as you instruct. I've verified that I'm using the Path Selection tool but it simply refuses to do any selecting. And so, I tried using copy and paste anyway and ended up with an identical path that won't mesh even with Flip Horizontal.

Do you happen to have any insights on what it might be I'm doing wrong?

Yes please Robin that would be fantastic, that is exactly what I was after, I'm interested in putting a design on the Tshirt not the Tshirt itself..

Thanks, El and Athene!

Athene, thanks for the recipe. Maybe someone else here can use it. I'm afraid I can't, because I'm very allergic to cyanne pepper. I would have to stop breathing altogether, which would solve the problem, but not in an optimal fashion.

I'm not sure what you are seeing with the Path, but if it's copying and flipping, then it's doing what it's supposed to do. They aren't going to mesh, sadly. Paths in Photoshop still aren't up to the standards of Illustrator. You can make them, and the control handles behave exactly the same way; but you can't align the points, and you can't join points, like you can in Illustrator.

You can click on the Combine button, and it will combine two or more paths in one of four ways (depending on the way you've chosen in the Options bar, just to the left of the Combine button,) but I usually don't bother for things like this, because it's not really necessary in my experience. It just adds another step, and reduces the flexibility.

It's okay, though, because as long as you have the points touching, not shy of each other, when you make the selection it will look just the way it should. It's like filling open paths in Illustrator, more or less. You can even have the points overlapping, as long as you have the Combine Mode set to Add to Shape Area (the icon on the far left in the Path Selection Options bar.) So that's not really a problem.

I am puzzled about why you don't see the filled squares at the corners of a path when you click on it with the Path Selection Tool. I couldn't reproduce that, no matter what I tried. The thing is, if it's not allowing you to select the path, you are going to have to make a new Path for each part. Otherwise, you'll have a lot of duplicate paths, since it will copy and paste all the subpaths in any active Path.

Have you tried to hide all the other layers, and just work with the path with the color layer only showing? It's possible that you are just missing the squares in all the business of the grids from the "templates."

It's the only thing I can think of, anyway.

And Ethan, great. I'll do that as soon as I feel better.

Hi Robin.

I surely do hope you fell better.

I was missing the squares, lol. Once I did it the way you suggested, it worked fine. I was also under the impression that once you did the flip horizontal the path would snap to, as it were, so that was just sure and me being blonde again. I have a few more questions if you don't mind taking on an impromptu apprentice.

1. Why do we put the template on top? The way I was doing it before followed this basic layout: Transparent background layer template. Fabric 1 layer. Shade layer. Highlight layer. Moosh them all together, get crap. Does having the template on top make the difference between seams and no seams? The biggest problem I have with my stuff ( and why none of it would sell) was because of visible seams on the sides and skirt lines. Even matching it over the min bleed through lines would still produce this and no matter what I did I couldn't remove them.

2. Is it necessary to paint on shadows? I tend to use Inner Shadow which admittedly looks crass on the avatar final. SL's lightining isn't enough?

3. How do I get cloth to look like cloth rather than paint? Is that just a Noise filter issue?

4. How much will I owe you for all this? Having someone that knows what their doing and giving of themselves so freely is a rare rare thing on SL. And I deeply appreciate it.

Thanks! I do seem to be improving. I'm hoping in another day or so I'll be back to what I consider normal.

1. I put the black mask on top for several reasons. First, I'm lazy, and this way it's not necessary to make sure that all the odd bits that go out of the lines on the lower layers have been removed. The template on top will cover it all up.

Second, I tend to use the Displace filter to make the wrinkles in the fabric. If I have the template on top, it's obvious if I forget to move the base fabric back into place after using the filter. (The filter works by moving the pixels on the "low" area a specified number down and to the right, while leaving those on the "high" areas in place. This makes great wrinkles; but if you don't move the whole layer back up and left, the seams on the shoulders and arms will no longer match perfectly.) The offset is very noticeable when it's surrounded by the black mask, so this gives me a visual check that I've done all the steps.

Also, if the mask is at the top, I can always reduce the opacity and check things through it, if I feel the need to do so. It's much easier to make a single layer semi-transparent than to change the opacity on several so you can see through all of them.

Mostly, it's just my workflow, I suppose. I always keep all the grids, guides, masking layers, selection layers (spare layers that hold information I would normally put in an Alpha layer), and so on at the top of my document. I'm showing you how I do things, and that's how.

It shouldn't make any difference to the finished product at all.

I'm not sure what you mean by "visible seams." Are you saying that you had black lines where the seams are? Can you post a picture of what you had, please? I've never had that problem, and, indeed, have to shade things to make seams where I want seams.

2. The shadows I paint on are fabric shadows; wrinkles, shadows under the collar and pockets, and so on. I don't use Avatar shading, because (so far) all my clothing has been unisex, and I'm not sure the Avatar shading would work well on both sexes. I could be wrong, I haven't done the experiments yet to find out, but until I do, I'd rather err by not having shadows than by having shadows that half the population won't want.

I wouldn't use Inner Shadow, though. That's designed to make things look like they are cut out of paper which is suspended above a background. Not exactly the effect we are after with clothing.

Are you doing that with your clothing layers? That could easily explain black "seams" on the edges of the map pieces.

3. There are several ways to make the cloth look like cloth rather than paint; but they all come down to texture. If the cloth is completely smooth and textureless, it will look like paint. If it has too much texture, it will look fake. In my experience, the best results come from making a texture, using the Displace filter to wrinkle it, and then reducing the Opacity on the texture to between 5-10%. You need just a hint; almost a subliminal texture, just as clothing seen from across the room has only a hint of texture.

You also need to be sure to put some texture in the shadows and highlights. If they are too smooth, it will ruin the illusion. If you break them up with texture, you won't have that problem. (This is most easily done by using Multiply and Screen as blending modes, but there are other ways to do it.)

However, how I get the texture varies depending on what type of cloth I'm going for, and it's really something that requires pictures. So I'm afraid that the complete answer will have to wait until I get a chance to finish the tutorial I'm working on.

4. Nothing. Just pass it forward. Besides, I'm hardly a rarity around here. Look how many hours Chosen spends answering questions here every day. You know those answers aren't whipped out in a couple of minutes! Or the Templates that Chip handed out for free, or all the others who take time out of their day, all the time, to answer questions. I'd say that people being friendly and helpful, and not expecting any return, was the norm. (As long as you steer clear of the Off Topic forum. Tempers run ... ummm... a little high over there.)

Hope this helps!

Hi Robin.

My brain lost out on your first answer, lol. What's the difference between the black mask and the template layer?

As for the seam issue, not so much black lines as that you can see where everything joins together. Well, maybe it would be black lines. What I mean is that if you put one of my shirts on, you can see where the back and the front come together instead of the article looking like one peice of cloth. It looks like two; as if someone had stapled the front and back together, lol. Does that make sense? Here's the screenshot....

....or not because the Forum won't let me upload it. "We're sorry, there seems to have been a slight error in the Forums database".

You see? it's a conspiracy. The universe absolutely does NOT want me to get better at this.

Hi Athene!

The Template layer has the actual map on it; the polys and subdivided polys, which are often referred to around here as the "grid." It's used to match lines and designs across discontinuous map areas. (The front and back of the torso, front and back of the arms, etc.) These layers are always hidden before uploading to Second Life.

The Mask layer is a plain black layer, with transparent areas that allow the finished clothing to show through. It's basically the same as the Alpha layer, but the areas that are white in the alpha are transparent. It's used to mask the sloppy bits of the layers below it, to give a nice, finished appearance to the image, and to provide a black shadow around the clothing at the neck and sleeve edges (which would otherwise get a white halo, due to the anti-aliased edges in the Alpha layer.)

Ummm, the front and back of the shirt should look like two different pieces of cloth. That's the way most shirts are made, after all. Look at the one you're wearing now. Two different pieces of cloth. right?

Where you don't want different pieces of cloth is on the front and back of the arms, since for most shirts this is just one piece, with a seam that originates in the armpit. The only way to avoid showing those seams, I'm afraid, is to match the fabric perfectly across them.

But try again for the picture. It might work this time. Or you can e-mail it to me. (my e-mail address is on just about every page of my website. And yes, this means I get the most spam of anyone. )

Hi again Robin.

How are you feeling?

I tried to follow your tutorial again. and my brain cell wasn't able to cope. Nothing at all worked the way your instructions outlined. Also, because I'm so used to working with the template layer as the base layer I had a really hard time trying to work in reverse.

My brain went splodey. Many times.

At this point I think it's best to thrown in the towel. Clothesmaking just won't work for me unless I could figure out some way to have a Master actually sitting with me and doing it, explaining step by step what they're doing and why. I learn visually...if I can't actually see something being done I find it almost impossible to grasp. So. Back to being the faceless offer nothing to SL mink.

Thanks very very much though for the tutorials, tips, and advise you and all the others scatter throughout this forum. They really do open a lot of doors and shed a lot of light on the complexities of creating for SL.

Love!

Hi Athene!

If you are happier putting the template on the bottom, then put it there.

Like I said, it works better for my workflow to have it on the top, and look at the fabric through it. But my workflow doesn't have to dictate yours. If you would rather reduce the opacity of the fabric, so you can see the template below it, then do it that way. (You might change your mind, when you're changing the opacity on multiiple layers, but you might not.)

However, in any case, this isn't somthing that you need to learn right now. Second Life is supposed to be about having fun. When it stops being fun, it's time to try something else.

I'll be getting the tutorials with images (and video clips) up one of these days. I'm not sure exactly when, but it's definitely on my 'to do' list. So keep your eye on these forums, and if you feel like trying again when it's ready, then try again then!

Robin,

Hope you're feeling better. I've been redoing how I do shirts with your guide, and it's makign a lot of sense. I've got one area of confusion still however.

Your step 13, where you start cleaning up and contracting masks...can you explain why? I'm not seeing any benefit there other than causing more work. Am I missing something elegant?

Hi Denrael! Nope; that's why the step is optional. No actual advantage to it at all, unless you are compulsive, which, sadly, I am.

Well, sometimes I am. Sometimes I get lazy, and just use the Mask (which is necessary, since it provides the "shadow" against the Avatar skin, or the layers of clothing beneath,) to hide all the junk.

I learned long ago, doing book and magazine covers, to hide the junk one way or another, because on one occasion (in 1983) the printer claimed not to know where the picture ended (in spite of the clearly marked Crop Marks,) and printed the junk on the cover. So I started to tape the edges of the paintings, so I could peel the junk away, and the edges were crisp and clean. An old habit which has stood me in good stead for many years now, and which I intend to keep.

I also see, in looking back over the tut, that I have two step 12s in there. Sigh. (Note to Self; Self, Don't do stuff when you are sick. Sick is the perfect time to lie on the couch and eat bon-bons. )