This tutorial looks at some grunge and sketch overlays to add a little artistic styling to an architecture image and break away from the “fresh from the rendering engine” look that too many architecture presentations have. Sometimes, illustrations need a little extra texture, and other times models just don’t have a ton of detail in the early stages of design. This will quickly add some interest to those illustrations.

 

 

 

 

To begin, open an image in Photoshop. Below, is the image I will be using. There isn’t much color in it, however images with color will work fine too.

 

grunge_original_image

 

 

 

Next, open a grunge texture in Photoshop. These textures can be found all over the internet. Just do a Google search for “grunge textures” and you should find plenty.

Position the texture over the architecture rendering, on its own layer.

 

grunge_over_original

 

 

 

Finally, set the layer blend mode to “Overlay.” Other layer blend modes would work too, depending on the look you are going for. Overlay is usually a good place to start.

 

grunge_overlay_original

 

 

 

The final result gives the subtle feel of a hand rendered illustration.

 

grunge_final_alex

 

 

 

The same steps can be used with a sketchy texture. Simply replace the grunge texture with any sketchy texture and again set the blend mode to “Overlay.”

 

sketch_over_original

 

sketch_final_alex