Premonition Studios > Tutorials > Adobe Photoshop Tutorials > Seamless Fractal Snowflakes

Seamless Fractal Snowflakes

Create a new image. The size does not matter much but I will use 200x200 for this tutorial. Press D to set the foreground and background colors to their default. Filter > Render > Clouds once then Filter > Render > Difference Clouds a few times.

Step 1

Filter > Artistic > Film Grain using the default settings.

Step 2

Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur with a radius of 10 pixels. Filter > Artistic > Fresco using the default settings.

Step 3

The base of the snowflake is complete. To add the fractal snowflake look, simply duplicate the layer, flip the duplicate horizontally, set its blending mode to Difference, and merge the layer down by pressing Ctrl+E.

Step 4

Repeat the above step by duplicating the layer, flip it vertically this time, set its blending mode to Difference, and merge down.

Step 5

We are almost done. Just duplicate the layer once more, press Ctrl+I to invert the duplicate layer, and set its blending mode to difference.

Step 6

Now it just needs some color. Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation (or Ctrl+U), check the Colorize box, slide the hue bar to around 200 and the saturation bar to around 25.

Step 7

Our fractal snowflake is complete and it tiles seamlessly! I normally like to take this method a bit further and add a few more effects and some text to my result.

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Comments

  • Mine turned out more like an alien than a snowflake, but nice anyway!

    Comment by JonFrog on September 12, 2005

  • nice mines turned out hott

    Comment by niece on August 19, 2005

  • I didn't get a snowflake,more like a rorshach... or whateve, ink blot. Still looks good!

    Comment by id_ on August 17, 2005

  • I like the effect, but instead of difference blend mode at the end, try Screen or Hard Light. Or don't blend it at all. That might produce a more interesting result. Of course it's all random. But nice tutorial. I created an action out of it just for fun.

    Comment by Rob on August 17, 2005

  • Not bad for new photoshop user n_n

    Comment by MO on August 17, 2005

  • I hate to admit that this is a very interesting tutorial, but following instructions to "T" I cannot get this right.

    Comment by Diane on August 17, 2005

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