Blueprint Photoshop Tutorial

Take an ordinary photo and make it look like a technical blueprint with Photoshop.

Step 1

Open a photo into Photoshop. This Photoshop tutorial works best with architectural images that have strong edges. To open an image, go to File> Open and select the file that you want to open.

Step 2

To begin, we'll duplicate the layer by pressing Ctrl+J or going to Layer> Duplicate Layer. You should now have a new layer called "Layer 1".

Step 3

First, we need to remove all excessive tiny details that we don't want visible in the blueprint. For this, we'll use the Surface Blur filter. Go to Filter> Blur> Surface Blur.

Step 4

In the Surface Blur settings, adjust the settings so that you get results like the image below. The edges should still be visible but most of the tiny details should be gone.

Step 5

Now we'll convert this layer to an outline. To do this, go to Filter> Stylize> Find Edges

Step 6

Here's what the image looks like after using the Find Edges filter.

Step 7

Now we have the outline, but the problem with it is that the outlines are black and not white like it's supopsed to be in a blueprint. To fix this, simply invert the layer by pressing Ctrl+I or going to Image> Adjustments> Invert. This will create an inveretd layer and now the outlines are white. To make this layer blend with the layer below, set the blending mode to Screen. The Screen blending mode makes only the bright areas of the layer visible. So the white outlines will show but the black background will disappear to reveal the layer beneath it.

Step 8

Now we're going to add a new layer with the blue color. For this, we'll use a Solid Color layer. Why not just create a new layer and fill it with blue? You can do that, but it's not a good way of doing it. Using an adjustment layer will keep the filesize small and is good practice to use adjustment layers whenever possible. In the Layers pallet, click on the "New Adjustment Layer" button and a menu should appear where you can select Solid Color from the top of the list.

Step 9

A window should appear asking you to pick a color. Here, enter in 3953a4 in the HTML color field. This color is very close to the blueprint cyanotype color.

Step 10

We're done with the blue background layer, but the outline seems to not be completely white. To fix this, simply select the top layer with the outline and press Shift+Ctrl+U or go to Image> Adjustment> Desaturate to desaturate the outline.

Step 11

Here's the final results from this blueprint Photoshop tutorial.