Art and Design of Images

For the die-hard smoker, this accessory will underscore just how bad-ass you are.

For those who would like to quit, perhaps this metaphor will help supress your cravings.

Are you trying to quit smoking? Tired of patches, gum, tablets, and other nicotine replacement therapies?  Well, instead of giving in and smoking a cigarette, why not try creating one for a change? It keeps your twitchy fingers busy, helped me to quit smoking (or, at least, it got me started - I had to do the hard part myself). So fire up Photoshop, and see for yourself what wonders you can do with a bit of effort, patience, and willpower… 

Step 1 - The Base
Create a new document of any size. Add a new transparent layer on top of the background, select it, and make a selection using the Rectangular Marquee Tool with an aspect ratio of 10:1. Fill that with white (#FFFFFF). Then, create a new layer, name it ‘Filter‘ and make a selection with an aspect ratio of 3:1 exactly over one of the ends of your white bar and fill that with an orange-brown colour (#D79311). You should end up with something resembling the image below.

Step 2 - Texture
Create a new layer on top of the others, and fill it entirely with white (don’t worry, your cigarette will start to take shape soon). Go to Filter > Noise > Add Noise and set amount to 400% and check monochromatic. After that, scale the ‘noise’ layer until it resembles the image below.

Then, control-click your ‘filter‘ layer, invert the selection and hit delete. Set the blending mode of your ‘noise’ layer to color burn and set opacity to 6%. Create a new layer and do exactly the same as before, but now scale it just a little. Control-click your base layer, invert the selection and hit delete. Drag this layer beneath your filter layer.

Step 3 - Making It Real
All done with the previous steps? Alright, let’s move on. Create a new layer on top of the others and name it ‘gradient‘. Control-click your cigarette layer (the one illustrated and created in step 1), Edit > Fill it with white, and set Opacity to 38%. Now, right-click your gradient layer and go to ‘Blending Options’. Create a gradient like the one below, and then press the OK button.

Step 4 - Dressing It Up
We are almost finished with our project. All that remains is to add some small details. Start by creating a new layer and name it ‘top‘. Now take your Pencil Tool and set your foreground color to a dark brown (#3F2100). Now start adding some details at the end of your cigarette. Also take a slightly lighter color (#7D4100) and randomly make some extra details at the end of your cigarette like below.

For the finishing touch, create a new layer and make a selection of about 2px wide (depending on how big you made your cigarette). Edit > Fill that with the same gradient as before and leave Opacity at 100%. Now just apply a black Outer Glow to your base layer around 7px in size and set opacity to 18%. You can also add some text to personalize it a bit further. And thats it… We’re done!

Of course, you can go much further than we have here.  If so inclined you can even go right ahead and create a whole box.  Enjoy your smoke! 

There are a lot of amazing cigarette imaginations.

As you can observe, cigarettes aren’t only for smoking. In my pictures you can see cigarette in a great hypostases.

In this case are used Photoshop.