In this tutorial, I will show you how to use a photo of a pumpkin to carve a jack-o-lantern in Adobe Photoshop.

Tutorial Author: Maxwell Langdon - PixelHiveDesign.com

What is the purpose of this tutorial?
To learn that blending options can go above and beyond simple text effects. At the end of this tutorial you will have a jack-o-lantern program. The majority of the jack-o-lantern effect is accomplished using a single blending style that you can save and apply to endless carving ideas. It would probably be a good way to prepare for your next real jack-o-lantern carving. Grab your KNIVES!... err your Pen Tools... yep your about to carve a virtual pumpkin... geek. Hey, don't feel too bad, I'm the one who thought of this $*&@!

We will create the jack-o-lantern from a photo shot in Maine last year. Decent pic nothing special... let's photoshop it!

Download pumpkin.jpg and open it in Adobe Photoshop.

I did not have a night photo of a pumpkin, so we'll just fabricate one. Note: If you would rather just get to the jack-o-lantern effect, download the night version of the photo at the end of this step and go to step 3.

With the 'Background' Layer selected, create a new levels adjustment layer...
Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Levels...

With the 'Levels' Layer selected, create a new brightness/contract adjustment layer...
Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Brightness / Contrast...

Looks pretty good, except that the lighting on the rocks is still too uniform and bright. Let's fix that by selecting the rocks and gradually fading them into darkness with a black gradient.

Select the Lasso Tool and make a selection around all of the rocks. For more selection control, zoom in while near the pumpkin.

Now that you have the rocks selected, create a New Layer and select the Gradient Tool. Change the properties to:

Click somewhere around the pumpkin's stem and drag down to the end of the photo to finish off our night conversion.

Here's the final night version of the original photo.

We need a carving in order to apply the jack-o-lantern effect so grab the pen tool and create your own design. If your not familiar with the pen tool, you could visit my "Transform Transformers Logos into Vector Shapes" which will teach you pen tool basics.

Here is my carving design for the tutorial ready for the effect.

Select your carving design layer and open the Layer Blending Options: Right click the layer and select "Blending Options" or
Layer > Layer Style > Blending Options...

Outer Glow:

Simulates the candle light shining through the pumpkin carving.

Inner Glow:

Gives the pumpkin a thicker shell.

Bevel and Emboss:

Solidifies the carved effect.

Gradient Overlay:

Provides the candlight glow effect.

Aligning the glow properly is a bit tricky to explain but here goes; after your finished with the gradient overlay settings but before clicking 'ok' to finalize the blending options, use the "Move Tool (V)" to click on the jack-o-lantern graphic on stage and drag the gradient overlay down so that the glow originates where the candle flame would be located. Whew... now there is a sentence but also there is your jack-o-lantern effect. Save the style if you like and click 'Ok'.

The Jack-O-Lantern Carving:

There are lots of little things you could do to touch up the effect and overall scene. For example, let's have the jack-o-lantern cast a glow across the rocks in front of it. It will help blend the effect into the environment.

Use the circular selection tool to select the area in front of the jack-o-lantern for the glow.

Select the gradient tool, set the foreground color to F4B010 and use the following properties:

Create a new layer and click and drag down to apply the orange gradient glow: (see below)

Now we have a glow but it is too sharp.

So let's apply a Gaussian Blur to fade out the edges of the light:
Filters > Gaussian Blur
Radius: 5 pixels

Another final touch is 'carveing' an entry into the top of the pumpkin. Select the layer with your Jack-O-Lantern effect. Use the lasso tool to make a thin selection taking care to follow the terrain of the pumkin and then fill it in with any color. The effect is automatically applied.

Remember the main jack-o-lantern effect is a combination of blending options in a single style. This means you can easily apply the effect to different carving ideas. You can also carve / paint a layer with the jack-o-lantern style already applied and see the effect generated in real time. As always, if you have any questions feel free to contact me on my personal site, PixelHiveDesign.com. You will find more of my tutorials here.

Tutorial Author: Maxwell Langdon
Co-founder: TutorialQuest.com
Owner: PixelHiveDesign.com

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I spent some more time working on the overall scene: