Perspective in Photoshop pt2

This post is some thoughts on the actual tools I'm using. Now, I'm a firm believer in that it's better to use a small number of tools but to master them well, than the other way around. Photoshop is filled with powerful (some useful, some not so much), but I will stick with the following simple tools.

• The brush or the pencil. 
• The line-tool
• Rectangle-tool
• Ellipse-tool (for the more advanced stuff ;-) )
• The Ruler-tool

Mind you, there are no shortcuts here (well, there are some, I must admit). You need to know how to draw in perspective. That is, however, not rocket science, and with a decent book, you'll pick it up in no time.

This process is also called straight line perspective, and that suggests that we need to be able to draw straight lines. 

• If you use the brush or the pencil, you can either hold down Shift while you are drawing, to get straight lines, either vertically or horisontally. Another feature is that if you click somewhere on the canvas, and then hold down Shift and click on another place, you will get a straight line between the two points.
• If you use the Line-tool, I usually set it up so that it draws directly, without going via a path. Not always though, there are occasions where it helps a lot keeping it as a path first.

So, let's start out simple, and do a basic 1-point perspective box.

Set up one vertical guide and one horisontal one. Where these intersect is where your Vanishing Point will be. 

Use either the line-tool or a brush/pencil to draw the horizon on a new layer (don't use the background one). Since it snaps to your guide, it shouldn't be any problem.

Draw a simple rectangle face on. This will be the side facing you. My advice is that you let the lines overlap, since that makes it a bit easier to build the block. Remember, this is just the construction phase.

Next, draw a line from one of the corners to the vanishing point. You have to be careful at the end which is at the corner, since it doesn't snap. Repeat this for the other corners as well

Draw a straight lines to give the box volume.
At this stage you have a complete box constructed. It Doesn't look particulary good. You could erase the lines sticking out, but I usually just create a new layer and trace the construction lines. Tip: Lower the opacity of the layer with the construction lines to make it easier to see what you are doing.

This was a very easy image to get us started, but I will continue to add in posts to give you more tips on how to work with perspective drawings in Photoshop.