Creating the poster

The first thing to do is to choose the right picture. I spend quite some time choosing the best picture (like choosing a model for a TV ad). There are loads of themes and colours. I decided to go with the red and white coz it's simple and nice. Not too colourful as well.

Unedited cupcake image

| Step 1 |
Before designing the poster, i set the image to:

1. CMYK colour (which is mainly for printing)
2. Resolution 300
3. Size: 29.7cm x 42cm (A3)

| Step 2 |

I opened the image in Photoshop CS2

| Step 3 |

Since I wanted my image to look glossy and dream-like, i searched for 'Photoshop Tutorial' for glossy effect and came across something called 'Surreal Soft Focus Effect'. I followed through some of the step by step process and got a satisfying outcome. The trick is the more you try, the better outcome you'll get. My outcome was different than the effect in the tutorial coz I played around with it a lil bit.

First I make a duplicate layer of the cupcake image (Hit Crtl+J) and change the name to 'Blur' . Then go to Filter - Blur - Gaussion Blur.

Gaussion Blur Effect

Then set the layer mode to Overlay. To get the desired Glossy effect, I duplicated the 'Blur' layer a few times to make it more 'dream-like'. There are a few more steps to complete the 'Surreal Soft Focus Effect', but I stop here coz this is exactly what I wanted.

Glossy Cupcake Image

Tadaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!

To view the Photoshop Tutorial, go to http://freephotoshopguides.com/. For the full 'Surreal Soft Focus Effect', click here.

| Step 4 |
It's now time to add some lighting. And as usual, I'll create a duplicated layer instead of using the original one (in case if I mess up).

Adjusting the lighting


The 'Soft Omni' light effect

Somehow I dont like the lighting effect. I need something light and tasty. Something that gives the dreamy-fantasy-cupcake-world look. So I'm gonna stick with just the Glossy effect.

| Step 5 |
I created another layer and make the Fill brown. This will be the background colour of my poster. Then I cropped the cupcake image and place it on the brown background.

Cropped Image on brown background

| Step 6 |

Next I added text. I chose pink text over brown background because pink is a light colour and it stands out on dark colours such as brown. In my opinion, pink and brown makes the poster look yummy! It suits the product.

According to my experience working in a web publishing department, there should not be more than 2 types of font in a design. So I decided to use just one font for the whole description. I chose 'Century Gothic' coz it's simple and it's easy to read.

Every text in the poster is double-layered (linked together) to make it sharper and stronger. With just one layer, the texts are dull.

Text added describing the product & service

| Step 7 |
If you notice, there's a few flower images that has a a watermark effect on the poster. For that, I pasted a vector image from Flutterby's business card (the raw material given by Kayla) and set the blending mode to 'screen' with 6% fill. I did that to make the poster looks filled but not too busy.

| Step 8 |
I added up Flutterby's cupcake logo and recreate the font similar to the original logo (the logo pasted will not have a sharp text). The font used for the logo is Bickham Script Pro (90pt) - double layered.

Logo without text

Logo with text

| Step 8 |

To make it more interesting, I re-create a vector graphic from Adobe Illustrator CS2. The reason for me to re-create (although I have all of Kayla's raw materials) is because Kayla did the whole design in Adobe Illustrator CS3 and created an outline (to print the image). I was unable to paste it in Adobe Photoshop due to 2 reasons :

1. The file was created in CS3 (It says that I will loose some data if open in CS2).
2. Outline was created.

So instead of installing Adobe Illustrator CS3, i decided to have a lil fun with Adobe Illustrator CS2. I used the pen tool to trace the image.

Tracing process using 'Pen' tool in Illustrator

Then I copied the image and paste it to Adobe Photoshop. The vector image was resized (using the transform tool) by going to Edit - Transform - Scale / Rotate. I hit Crtl+T for the shortcut. When I'm happy with it, I rename the layer as 'Curve'. I also added some small butterfly images (from Kayla's raw material) to make it more attractive.

Tracing outcome

| Step 9 |

For final touch, I changed the 'Blending Options' of the texts, adding a couple of effects such as 'Drop Shadow', 'Outer Glow' and 'Inner Glow'. This should give some weight to the texts making it more attractive.

'Blending Options' Effects

| Final Outcome |

There you Go!

Since I set the image to CMYK (mainly for printing), the colour isn't that accurate on the web. Anyway, I can say that I am 98% confident that there will be no changes for the poster. However, nothing is fixed untill the final submission.

Now I can move on with the video! =)