Tutorial Photoshop Combine textures with vectors

Combine textures with vectors

Sometimes vector art, although infinitely flexible, appears too crisp and unnatural. A little wear and tear is the perfect remedy, says Derek Lea.

When you work with Illustrator and Photoshop together, you have the best of both worlds. Illustrator has an impressive set of vector drawing tools and features, enabling you to create wonderfully detailed, sharp illustrations with ease.

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However, sometimes the sharpness inherent within vector art is also its downfall. Vector graphics can look too perfect, especially when reproduced at scale.

Adding the necessary imperfections is where Photoshop comes in. Blending modes, masks and Alpha Channels can give a convincing distressed effect to your vectors. In reality, a scratched surface would be neither uniform nor consistent across the surface area. That is why we'll use a number of real-world image resources as the basis for this effect, achieving a tactile imperfection.

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