1. Open a new image by going to File> New. Any size will do, as long as it’s not tiny. The background contents should be the default, white. Click OK. Set your colors to the default (black in the foreground, white in the background) by typing D on your keyboard. Then choose the Type tool from the toolbar or get it by typing T on your keyboard. Click on your image to start typing (this will automatically put your text on a new layer).

2. To make the © using a PC, hold down the Alt key and type 0169. On a Mac, press Option + G. Then type in a copyright notice (your name, your company, etc.) as you want it to appear. Pick a font you like — you’ll be stuck with it.

3. Now hide the Background layer. Do this by clicking the eye icon to the left of the Background layer’s name on the Layers Palette. Make sure your Type layer is still selected (click on it if not). Then select your text: Go to Select > Color Range, move the Fuzziness slider all the way to 200, and click OK.

4. Then make your custom brush: Choose Edit > Define Brush Preset. Enter a descriptive name for the brush (like MyCopyright), and click OK.

5. To test your new brush, open an image you’d like to stamp. Grab the Brush tool (type B). Then, from the Options bar at the top of your screen, pull down the Brush menu and scroll to the bottom. The one you just made is the last on your list. Click on it to select it, then click the spot in your image where you want to stamp your copyright. If it’s too small to see, increase your brush size.

Pretty amazing stuff, done with Photoshop 7 and a tablet of course, this kind of stuff is virtually impossible with a mouse.

You can find the artists site here (Nico Di Mattia):

http://www.speed-painting.com/

And grab the wallpaper version of John Locke here.

I found this a while back on Digg I think, it’s really neat!

Creating your own Planet style pictures from Panorama shots. Most compact cams have a panorama mode and even the newer phone cameras have the feature which allows you to easily stitch a few shots together.

Our pal Dirk wrote up a tutorial that shows you how to turn any panorama or landscape photograph into a full-fledged planet!

Best of all, once you’ve selected an image to work with, the process takes only 5 minutes. (Launching your new planet into solar orbit may take a bit longer.)

360 degree shot of San Francisco taken from the Coit Tower made into a planet.

Pretty neat eh?

You can find the full tutorial and examples here:

How to Create Your Own Planets Using Your Panoramas

There is also a big Flickr set of examples and a Flickr Group dedicated to this.

One of the videos that made Extreme Photoshop makeovers famous.

The neck extension part is the one that freaks me out..

It just shows the power of creative lighting, good makeup and hair, a good clean photograph and a LOT of post processing.

The girl looks just about average to begin with, but so striking on the billboard.

I can recognise most of the moves, quite a lot of perspective transformation, can you see them all?

Awesome work, done with Photoshop.

I’ve mastered some of these techniques, but certainly not to this degree of expertise.