Love, Pinkcheeks: diecast

Tutorial: Diecast Cars On The Run!

Hello! I'm totally getting addicted to diecast cars lately and for the love of these tiny cars, I'm gonna share how to create a motion blur effect to your static diecast image! The motion blur effect creates a dynamic appeal to your usual photograph of your diecast car, making it look like it's on the run.
Also, it gives life to your cars coz hey, it's not everyday that you see a photo of a Hotwheels Lamborghini speeding off the runway right? ;)

Let's get started, so first, choose the image that you want, but remember not all images are applicable, you need to consider the angle as well (that's just my photographer side kicking in when it comes to angles LOL!) I choose this picture of the three bulls, taken at our concrete pavement outside our house. I used a Canon EOS 500D (as always) but taking pictures using a digicam or a phone camera will also do. The magic is done on Photoshop hehe;)

So from this...

..to this! Looks awesome isn't it? They looked like they're on a race! :)

1. For starters, duplicate your original image first because you will create the blur effect on the 2nd layer. I'll let you know why you shouldn't forget this step later.

2. Next, go to Filters tab in Photoshop and from BLUR, select Radial Blur. The reason for this is that it creates a longer streak of motion lines, compared to Motion Blur, thus making it look more realistic.

3. I set my blur values to 70 with zoom blur method. Then drag the point of the Blur Center to where you would want to start the motion streaks. I set mine to the center of the image.

4. Your output should be like this for now. :) Next, this is where the magic begins. Since you have two layers now (remember the 1st step?) you need to create a layer mask for the cars to show after it has been blurred by the effect. Select Add Layer Mask at the bottom part of the Layers panel.

It's the small circle in between Effects and Create Adjustment Layer

5. Next, on the brush panel, select Soft Round Brush and you may adjust the Opacity according to your liking. Mine was set to 92% with 58% fill so that when masking the image, the brush wont affect the edges of the blur streaks too much.

6. Lastly, brush all the way until you uncover your cars and remove the blur effect. Make sure that your brush color is black so that you will see the effect immediately. Also, the reason I didn't push it to 100% opacity is because I still want to retain faint blur streaks on the sides of the Lamborghini which you will notice on the backside of the orange Aventador.

Voila! This is the finished product! Pretty cool! I hope you liked my mini tutorial, it's my first time doing tutorials like this (due to insistent public demand, LOL!) coz a lot of eager peeps have been asking me how did I come up with an effect like that after I posted it on Facebook haha!

I'm just sharing what I know about post processing and this is how I do it though. I respect if you have other methods, but if you do, please share it to us! Don't forget to like my fanpage on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/lovepinkcheeks for my love for Toy Photography! :)