Photoshop Blueprint Effect

[Karleen Chura]

Createa new layer and drag it below the main image layer. Fill this layer with a dark blue, such as #051340. Change the blending mode of the image layer to Screen to render the black background transaprent, leaving just the white outline against the blue background.

In order to add a grid to the blueprint, we first need to make a pattern swatch. Create a new document at around 80x80px in size. This size may vary depending on the scale of your document. Draw a quick marquee over your image to represent a grid square and note the size.

Close the document and return to the blueprint effect. Create a new layer and select the Fill tool. Change the dropdown menu in the header from Foreground to Pattern, then choose the newly created swatch. Click anywhere on the canvas to apply it to the layer.

Use the marquee tool to draw a selection around the main image that lines up perfectly with the grid pattern. Right click and select Stroke, then enter 5px in the options, along with the colour white and Center.

Add a layer mask to this grid pattern layer. Hold the ALT ley while clicking the mask to edit its contents. Download and open one of my Dust and Scratches Textures, then paste it directly into the mask. Scale and rotate it to fit.

Click with the Selection tool to escape from the mask editing mode back to the main document, then with the mask still selected, press CMD+L to open the Levels. Move the sliders towards the right to boost the contrast to the extreme, then move the white Output Levels slider to the left to bring back the grid pattern until it appears subtly over the image.

Finish the effect off with a dirty paper texture, like one of the royalty-free paper textures from Bashcorpo. Paste it into the document, rotate and resize, then desaturate and Invert the paper texture image.

This tutorial is right up my alley. I am a residential designer and just started writing blog posts about the residential design process. This technique will be a great option for my post featured image. Thank you very much.

Chris,

Tried this out when I got home today. Took a bit longer than I had hoped, but it turned out great! Thanks for sharing this! I am going to post in on my Instagram page for people to check out. If you would like to check it out, my Instagram page is oldestyle_design_co

Thank you so much! This is such a wonderful tutorial, very well explained and easy to follow. You know when you need something, and it comes to you in just the right time? This tutorial was that to me, so thank you so much for taking the time to do it!

I have a PDF document that is a general arrangement drawing (the original CAD file isn't available so the manufacturer sent me a PDF file instead). The background is white and the drawing itself are black lines. Very normal of course. Is there a way to use illustrator to manipulate the PDF document and and arrive at an image with a "blueprint" effect? Basically, taking the white background...make it blue...and take the black lines comprising the drawing and make them white?

Opening a PDF in Illustrator for editing, especially one that wasn't created in an Adobe app to begin with, isn't worth the risk in a case like this, so don't do that. Instead, Place the PDF (I'd use InDesign myself, but the same can be done in Illustrator), then draw a blue-filled rectangle over it and set the rectangle's Blend Mode to Screen.

2 ADD STROKE; FILL WITH WHITE

Select all the text with the Selection tool (V). Near the bottom of the Toolbox, click on the Stroke option to make it active. Go under the Window menu and choose Swatches to open the Swatches panel. Then select the blue swatch in the Swatches panel, as shown here, to set the stroke color. Set the Stroke size to 5 pt in the Control panel. Now simply set the Fill color to white.

5 DRAW BLUE LINE ABOVE TEXT

Next, select the Pen tool (P) in the Toolbox and click a point just above and to the left of the text. Hold the Shift key and click a second point to the right of the text. Set the Stroke color to the same blue color we used for the text. Then in the Control panel, set the Stroke size to 7 pt. Lastly, select the line and position it right along the top edge of the top line of text.

8 ADD ARROWS, DOTTED LINES, AND NUMBERS

Arbitrarily place arrows on the lines that you drew in Step 7. Just copy-and-paste numerous copies of the arrow and drag them into place. Use the Selection tool to vary the size and rotate them as necessary. Now add some small, meaningless numbers around the text to give the idea of measurements. Then add some simple, dotted lines using the settings in the Stroke panel, as shown here. We also used the Pen tool to draw an additional element to our original arrow.

10 ADD GRADIENT MESH TO MASK

We need to do a little more work on the mask, so make sure that the mask thumbnail is highlighted in the Transparency panel (indicated by a thick, black line). Select the mask shape and go under the Object menu and select Create Gradient Mesh. Enter 6 for Rows and 6 for Columns. Set the Appearance to Flat and Highlight to 0%. Click OK. (Did you know that you could have a gradient mesh mask?)

11 CHANGE POINTS ON THE GRID TO WHITE OR GRAY

Using the Direct Selection tool (A), select various points of the mesh and set their colors to white or any varying shade of gray to allow all or some of the blue to come through. The mask works similar to that of a layer mask in Photoshop where black will completely mask a shape, white reveals everything, and gray will show some transparency. The goal here is to give the effect of the blue powder on a blueprint. Note: Make sure the Fill is active in the Toolbox.

Hi all! My problem is just that. When editing in photoshop, everything looks right. This particular image is very blue with a blue tint throughout the entire photo; however, when exported to jpg (via export as well as save to web) the image comes out with a purple tint. When putting the jpg image next to the photoshop version there's a huge noticeable difference in tones.

Yes, when I look at the photo in photoshop itself, and compare it to the JPG using a color managed viewer (fast picture viewer) or to the photo uploaded to my website/phone, they all look purple-ish and not blue like when viewed in photoshop.

I was not embedding the profile when exporting to jpg, only covert to sRGB was ticked; however, I just did a test and ticked embed profile also but the same issue occurs, so it seems to have no effect. (Should I always have embed profile selected while exporting? I have never done so before but my other photos appear fine via website, etc)

Thank you again. What do you mean by the "start over". My edit is complete for this particular image. I did try to export with "embed selected" but there wasn't any difference. Did you mean create a new document and re-edit it? or?

Also, if all my previous images, from photoshop, were exported without ticking "embed", do they all need to be exported again? (Keep in mind all previous images looked accurate on my website, phone, and instagram) It's just this blue image.

I notice that when using "windows photo viewer" the image looks exact to that of photoshop. When viewed in a "color managed browser", my phone, or website, they all look purple. Not sure why windows photo viewer looks correct in comparison to photoshop.

Do you really mean the Windows Photo Viewer, or do you mean the Photos app, which is the default image viewer on Windows 10. The Photos app is not color managed. (but the Windows Photo viewer is color managed)

Also, be aware that Windows 10 is known to install low quality monitor profiles when doing updates, so go to Control panel > Color management to verify that the profile created by calibration is set as default.

In the Export dialog, as well as in Save for web, make sure that both Convert to sRGB and Embed color profile are checked. You are probably viewing the image, with ProPhoto embedded, in an application without color management, which will result in wrong colors.

Thank you for the reply. I did not have embed color profile selected, only covert to sRGB for "export". I just ticked that option as well and did a test but the same issue still occurs. (Should I always have embed color profile selected, as I have never before and my other images appear fine on my website, instagram, etc)

And you can uncheck Ask when opening for Profile mismatches in the Color settings. Photoshop will display correctly regardless what profile is embedded in image. There is no need for the embedded profile to match the working space.

Interesting! They both appear the same blue to you? I see a quite noticeable difference between the 2 images on both my monitor and my phone looking at the comparison. If you look at the rocks, or shadows, i see the left image is more blue, while the right image is more purple.

Maybe that's what it is! A green cast vs magenta cast. You're right, it isn't a big difference but yes noticeable. Why do you think that is and is there anything I can do about it? Any way to correct this?

It has to be set to the actual monitor profile, so there shouldn't even be an option to change this in Fast image viewer. Color management relies on the application converting the image's embedded profile to the monitor profile, and if it converts to a different profile, colors will be wrong.

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