Tutorial

1. Create the night clouds

First, use the Pen Tool to draw the outline of a cloud. The curves don't need to be perfectly smooth, as long as you can close the vector path. It’s best to use white for the stroke color.



Figure 1: Completed Tutorial

2. Now remove the stroke outline, and add a cone gradient fill to the shape. For the gradient colors, I used #7B86AC and #9AC5D8. Then, change the texture to Sand, and increase the percentage to 19.



Figure 2: Completed Tutorial

3. Next you’ll add a live effect to the cloud object. Choose Filters > Alien Skin Splat LE > Edges. Choose Pixels as the Edge Mode, set the Feature Size to 33, the Margin to 5.31, and the Edge Width to 40.20. Leave the other options at their default settings.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

4. Add another live effect to the same object by choosing Blur > Gaussian Blur and then entering a value of 6.



Figure 4: Completed Tutorial

5. Next, you’ll duplicate the cloud object: Select the object, and then copy and paste it. Remove the live filters you’ve applied, and then apply the live filter Eyecandy 4000 LE, and choose Marble. Make the following changes:
• Set Vein Size to 73.28
• Set Vein Coverage to 47
• Set Vein Thickness to 67
• Set Vein Roughness to 52
• Make the background color white, and the vein color black
• Change the layer mode of the duplicated object to Fuzzy Light, use Feather for the edge, and apply a value of 40-50.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

6. Now you’ll add more clouds, and make each one look different. This is where it gets really fun; duplicate the clouds at least five times. To customize the clouds, follow these steps:
• Select the grouped object, choose the subselection tool, and move a duplicated cloud object.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

7. Change the shape of the original cloud object and alter the points of the vector path using the subselection tool.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

8. Select a duplicate cloud object. Try experimenting with different values for both the Vein Size and Vein Coverage. You may also want to adjust some of them using the Hue/Saturation live effect, or distort or rotate some of the clouds.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

9. For an added effect, now you’ll add a background to the clouds. Create a simple shape (you can also use the rectangle or circle shape) using the pen tool, then change the edge to Feather, with a value of 41. Change the fill color of the shape to a radial gradient, and use #5BACEE and #355C9F for the colors.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

10. Change the opacity level of the object to 72, and then lock the selected object.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial

11. Change the opacity level of the background from 100 to 72, and try scaling the object until it covers most of the clouds. For the object here, the width is 715 and the height is 411.



Figure 3: Completed Tutorial