FINISH THE BLACK AND GREEN
CREATE, SELECT AND FILL THE MAIN SECTIONS OF THE ARTWORK.
The Cutout filter gives a smoother, simpler outline to the black areas. Adjusting the values within the Cutout filter gives different results, so if you’re using a different photo then try out different settings to see what works best. You may not want to include all of the dark areas in your black layer (for example, there are too many small lines above the eyes), so pick just the areas you want with the Magic Wand Tool.
APPLY CUTOUT FILTER
01 Go to Filter > Artistic > Cutout, enter Number of Levels: 2, Edge Simplicity: 5, Edge Fidelity: 1, click OK to apply. Press A to select the Magic Wand Tool, set it to Add and Tolerance: 0, use it to select all the areas you want to include in your black layer.
FILL WITH BLACK
02 Now add a new layer (Shift-Cmd/Ctrl-N) at the top of the layer stack, name it Black. Fill it with black (with black loaded in the Foreground colour palette, press Shift-Backspace, choose Use: Foreground colour and hit enter), then press Cmd/Ctrl-D to deselect.
CUTOUT AGAIN
03 Hide the top two layers (click the eyeball icon) and go to the desaturated photo layer. Go to Filter> Cutout again, but this time change the Number of Levels to 4 (leave Edge Simplicity at 5 and Edge Fidelity at 1). Click OK.
ADD THE GREEN
04 Select the Magic Wand Tool and click on the background. Press Shift-Cmd/Ctrl-I to invert the selection. Add a new layer directly below the Black layer, name it Colour. Then fill it with your chosen colour (the green used here is R:0, G:117, B:6). Finally, deselect (Cmd/Ctrl-D).
ERASE TO ADD REFLECTIONS
05 Make only the Black and Colour layers visible, all other layers should be hidden. Use the Eraser Tool on the Colour layer to remove colour where you want white to show through, for example reflective shines on the eyes and nose.
ENLARGE THE CANVAS
06 In order to increase the background space to make room for the paint texture we will be bringing in next, select the Crop Tool and use it to enlarge the canvas to your desired size. You can set specific dimensions in the entry fields in Tool Settings.