How to Make an Album Cover

For this tutorial we are going to be creating an Album Cover Artwork in Photoshop.
I’ll try to make this as simple as possible.

Let’s break this tutorial down:

Setting up Photoshop (Canvas, Resolution)
Getting the Photos & Masking the Photos
Darkening the Photos
Adding the Sun & Glows
Adding Water Reflection
Adding Stars
Write your Text & Add Your Logos
Bring the Image to Life (Final Adjustments)

Step 1. Setting Up Photoshop

Create a Photoshop Document with a size of 3000px x 3000px (square) and a Resolution of 150 Dpi

You’ve got a Perfect Square!

Step 2. Getting & Masking the Photos

Water Image (Sea)

Sky

Stars

Once you’ve downloaded the images, bring the Water Image / Sea Image in first and crop it to fit the canvas. It should look like this.

Next we’ll bring in the Sky image and place it over the Sea Image. You’ll should only be able to see the Sky image now.

I have increased (transformed) the size of this image to increase the size of the clouds and make sure the trees and buildings are below the horizon line of the sea. We will be masking out the trees and the buildings.

While your Sky image is selected, click on the layer mask icon at the bottom of the panel.

You should see a layer mask added to your photo. Make sure the layer mask is selected. Notice how the layer mask is highlighted when selected.

Press G on the keyboard to pull up the GRADIENT TOOL (G), now place the cursor over the mouse and drag from top to bottom.

Don’t forget your foreground and background should be set to black & white.

You’ve now masked the “sky” and got rid of the trees and buildings.

Bring down the Opacity of the sky to 50%

Step 3. Darkening the Images

Add an Exposure Adjustment Layer & a Black & White Adjustment Layer above the images.

On the Exposure Adjustment Layer bring down the exposure to around -2.5 and the Gamma to 1.13

Step 4. Adding the Sun & The Glows to the Sun

Select the Ellipse Tool and draw a circle above all of the layers in your panel.

Fill the Ellipse with a Yellow Color – #ffa123

Just as we did with the Sky, we need to mask this circle (sun) so it looks like the Sun is rising from the water. Refer to Step 2 of this tutorial. I already showed you how to mask. 🙂

Time to make the Sun Shine!

Yellow Glow – #ffda0c

Orange Glow – #ff8a0c

Create a New Layer and call it Orange Glow

Press B on the Keyboard to Bring up the Brush Tool and select a Soft Round with the Hardness set to 0 and the Opacity set to 100% and a Color #ff8a0c.

Oh! Make sure the BLEND MODE of the LAYER IS SET TO HARD LIGHT. This is very important.

Make sure that the size is slightly bigger than the Circle/Sun. (Brush size will vary depending on the dimensions of the album cover)

Place your brush in the middle of the Circle/Sun and left click once to add the Orange Glow – #ff8a0c

Create a New Layer and call it Yellow Glow and follow the exact steps as you did for the Orange Glow. (Make sure the blend mode is set to Hard Light)

Step 5. Adding Water Reflection

Just like you did with the glows on the sun, use those same colors and paint on the water.

Press B on the Keyboard to Bring up the Brush Tool and select a Soft Round with the Hardness set to 0 and the Opacity set to 100% and a Color #ff8a0c.

Oh! Make sure the BLEND MODE of the LAYER IS SET TO OVERLAY. This is very important.

Make sure that the size is around the same size as the Circle/Sun. (Brush size will vary depending on the dimensions of the album cover)

Create a New layer and paint with the same yellow #ffda0c but this time CHANGE THE BLENDING MODE TO Linear Dodge (add) and bring down the opacity to 50%

Finally we will create a New layer and paint with the orange again #ff8a0c but this time CHANGE THE BLENDING MODE TO OVERLAY with an Opacity of 100%. and paint towards the bottom edge of the canvas. This adds a nice reddish orange to the water and gives the image a little more depth.

It’s good practice to group all your layers and name them appropriately.
Bring all your Water Reflection/Glow Layers below the Sun Layers.

I put all the layers in groups to create a little order in the layers panel. With so many layers it can get a bit daunting and chaotic.

For a little drama, I added a white silhouette of a man. I did a google search by typing
man standing silhouette and I got exactly what I was looking for. Because the Silhouette was in BLACK I inverted the silhouette to white (ctrl or cmd + i) bring down the opacity to 60 (use your discretion).

Step 6. Adding Stars

Bring in the STARS photo and place it in the canvas. Transform it so it fits nicely in the canvas. I prefer to have the stars as small as possible.

Change the Blending Mode of the layer to “Screen”, this way every thing that is BLACK will be REMOVED and only the white will show. Bring down the Opacity to 50%.

Erase a little bit of the bottom portion so. the transition is smoother and you don’t see the harsh edge of the image. You can use the masking technique I showed you earlier.

Step 7. Adding Text & Logos

I don’t think I need to explain how to do this, if you’ve come this far, you probably know how to add text in photoshop. It can’t get simpler than that.

As for the logos, I made up some logos using simple text and added it to the image to make it look like a legit album cover.

Step 8. Bringing the Image to Life

This is where we’ll add the final adjustments to make the image pop.
First off download the GRADIENT MAPS. I’ve included. Pretty Basic Gradient Maps but I want to save you the trouble.

Download Gradient Maps

Once you’ve downloaded the gradient maps. We will add a Gradient Map Adjustment layer

By default you should see the Gradient Map Adjustment set to Black to White.

Change the Blending Mode of the Adjustment Layer to Overlay at an Opacity of 40% (incase you don’t see the Black to White Adjustment layer, I’ve included it for you)