Make a Claymorphism Tattoo Flash Sheet

Open Lopsy. In the New Document dialog, set Width to 1200 and Height to 1600 pixels, keep the White background and click Create.

Double-click Layer 1 and rename it Paper. Lopsy puts everything inside a top-level Project group, and new layers land above whichever layer you have selected.

Pick the Gradient tool, click Advanced… and set two stops: #E6F4EC at the start and #C6E3D4 at the end. Click Done. With nothing selected, drag from the top of the canvas straight down to the bottom.

Keep the paper pale and calm. The clay pieces will carry all the colour.

Add a layer named Border. Pick the Rectangular Marquee and click once on the canvas without dragging. A dialog asks for exact corners: enter From 40, 40 and To 1160, 1560. Set the foreground to #3D2442 and choose Edit → Fill. Then choose Select → Shrink…, enter 6, and press Delete. That leaves a 6 px frame.

Make a second rectangle the same way, 16 px further in (56, 56 to 1144, 1544). Fill it, Shrink by 2 and delete again. Now you have the classic flash-sheet double line.

Add three guides by clicking on the rulers: one on the top ruler at 600 for the centre line, and two on the left ruler at 300 and 1420. Those mark the top and bottom of the design area.

Select Border and click New Group at the bottom of the Layers panel. Name the group Hero, then click Add Layer and name it Heart. The new layer lands inside the group.

Pick the Lasso and drag round a big heart, centred on the middle guide. Its top should sit a little below the top guide and its point a little above the middle of the sheet (it's about 520 px wide). Then make the outline:

1. Select → Grow… by 7 px, set the foreground to the plum #3D2442 and Edit → Fill.
2. Select → Shrink… by 7 px, set the foreground to coral #FF7A6B and fill again.

Deselect with Ctrl+D. Growing and shrinking measure true distances from the edge, so the outline comes out even all the way round and the corners stay soft.

This is the trick that turns a flat shape into clay.

1. Hold Ctrl (Cmd on a Mac) and click the Heart layer's thumbnail. That selects everything on the layer. Choose Select → Shrink… by 7, so the selection is the coral area without its outline.
2. Click Add Layer, name it Heart Shade, set the foreground to the darker coral #CC5156 and choose Edit → Fill.
3. Pick the Lasso. With a selection tool active, the arrow keys move the selection outline and leave the pixels alone. Press Shift+↑ and Shift+← seven times each to slide the outline 70 px up and to the left.
4. Choose Select → Feather… and enter 60, then press Delete and deselect.

The delete removes most of the dark copy and fades it out across the feathered edge. What's left is a soft crescent along the lower right of the heart. Choose Layer → Merge Down to fold it into Heart.

The highlight is the same move the other way round:

1. Ctrl/Cmd-click the Heart thumbnail and Shrink by 7 again.
2. Add a Heart Shine layer and fill it with the pale coral #FFC7BB.
3. With the Lasso active, slide the outline 30 px down and right (Shift+↓ and Shift+→ three times each).
4. Feather by 40, press Delete, deselect and Merge Down.

That leaves a thin bright rim on the top-left edge.

Finally, click the heart's effects button (the sparkle icon on its row) and turn on Drop Shadow: colour #4A2D55, Blur 22, Offset X 8, Offset Y 16, Opacity 34.

From here on, "give it the clay treatment" means all four moves: outline, shade, highlight, shadow. Scale the slide and the feather to the size of the piece. For a 60 px eye, slide about 10 px and feather about 12.

This screenshot and the next were retaken from the finished project, so the Layers panel already shows the later layers, hidden.

Click Heart, then add these layers one at a time, so each lands above the last:

• Ears: two small circles where the upper corners of the head will be, so the head will hide about half of each. Give them the clay treatment in fur #A8957C.
• Inner Ears: a smaller circle inside each ear in #6E5444. Skip the outline, and just shade the lower right.
• Head: an egg shape about 280 px wide, filling the middle of the heart. Make it a little wider at the bottom so the cheeks look full. Give it the clay treatment in fur, with a slightly bigger Drop Shadow (Blur 20, Offset 7 / 14, Opacity 34).

Keep the ears small. Big round ears high on the head turn a quokka into a teddy bear.

Add these layers above Head:

• Cheeks: two wide ovals in #E3D3BC, low on each side of the face and almost touching in the middle. No outline, but do shade and highlight them so they puff out. These are the quokka's famous smiling cheeks.
• Eyes: two small dark ovals in #3D2442, set wide apart, with a tiny highlight.
• Lids: over the top half of each eye, lasso a half-oval whose bottom edge slopes down towards the nose. Grow by 4 and fill plum, then Shrink by 4 and fill #7D6A55, the same outline move with a thinner line. The slope is what makes the face grumpy.
• Nose: a big rounded triangle in plum between the cheeks.
• Mouth: a short, thick downward arc under the nose.

Click Mouth and add:

• Banner Tails: two ribbon ends sticking out a little lower than both ends of the banner, each with a V-shaped notch cut into its outer end. Lasso them in cream #FFF6E8 and give them the clay treatment.
• Banner Folds: a small dark triangle in #A87C90 at the inner end of each tail, just under where the banner will sit. It reads as the fold where the ribbon tucks behind itself.
• Banner: a gently arched band about 560 px long and 76 px tall, centred on the guide, low enough to cover the tip of the heart. With the Lasso, drag the top edge as a shallow upward curve, come down the right end, drag the bottom edge back parallel to the top, and close it at the left end.
• Paws: two small fur ovals resting on the banner's top edge, near its ends.

Keep the paws near the ends of the banner. The lettering goes in the middle.

Select Paws and pick the Text tool. Choose Titan One, size 46, colour plum. Click in an empty part of the canvas and type NO SMILES, then press Tab to commit.

Now pick the Pen tool. Press a little in from the left paw, slightly below the middle of the banner, and drag a little up and to the right to pull out a handle. Then press the same distance in from the right paw and drag down and to the right. That draws a gentle arch that follows the banner. Click ✓ Commit path in the options bar.

Make the arch about as wide as the text: the type starts at the path's first anchor.

Click the NO SMILES layer, pick the Text tool, and choose Path 1 in the Text path dropdown in the options bar. The letters jump onto the arch and tilt to follow it.

Check that the lettering sits in the middle of the banner, with the same gap above and below, and that it doesn't touch the paws. If it doesn't, drag the path's anchors or handles with the Pen tool, and the text follows.

Select Border, click New Group and name it Swallow. It's the most fiddly design on the sheet, so take it piece by piece. Lasso each part on its own layer, from the back to the front:

1. Swallow Wings: the back wing, swept up and back, with three rounded feather notches.
2. Swallow Tail: two long streamers forking out behind.
3. Swallow Body: a plump teardrop with the head at the front.
4. Swallow Belly: a coral #FF7A6B stripe along the underside.
5. Swallow Throat: a cream patch under the beak.
6. Swallow Front Wing: the near wing, swept down and back.
7. Swallow Beak in butter #FFD166, and Swallow Eye, a small plum dot.

Give every piece the clay treatment and a small Drop Shadow (Blur 12, Offset 5 / 9, Opacity 28). Overlapping shadows make each piece look pressed onto the one below.

Keep your lasso strokes round and smooth. Clay doesn't have sharp corners.

Make a Dagger group the same way, above Border. It's easier to build the dagger straight and tilt it afterwards.

• Blade: a long tapering point in #B9AEEA. Then lasso a thin strip down its middle, feather it by 2 and fill it with #8C80CC for the fuller.
• Grip: a rounded bar in coral. Pick the Brush at size 5 in plum, click on one side of the grip and Shift-click on the other to draw a straight wrap line. Draw three.
• Guard: a rounded crossbar with a ball at each end, and a ball pommel on top, all in butter on one layer.

Select the Dagger group row and pick the Move tool. A box appears around the whole dagger, with a round rotate handle just outside each corner. Drag the top-right one down in a slow arc until the dagger leans about 18° to the right.

Press Ctrl+D to commit. Rotating the group turns the blade, grip and guard together. The drop shadows are worked out again after the rotation, so they still fall down and to the right.

Add a Moon group with a Crescent layer. Draw a circle about 215 px across with the Elliptical Marquee, then hold Alt (Option) and drag a slightly smaller circle offset up and to the right. Holding Alt subtracts it, leaving a crescent. Give it the clay treatment in butter #FFD166.

On a Moon Face layer, draw a small closed eye as a plum arc and a soft pink cheek: an oval feathered by 4 and filled with #FFB0B5.

The moon is a bit big for the space under the swallow. Select the Moon group, pick the Move tool, and hold Cmd (the Windows key on a PC) while you drag the bottom-right corner handle up and in to about 72% of the size. Holding the key keeps the proportions.

Press Ctrl+D to commit, then nudge the group with the arrow keys until it sits under the swallow, clear of the banner tail.

Add an Anchor group with an Anchor layer and build it from separate pieces in teal #36B5A2:

• the ring at the top (a circle with a smaller circle subtracted)
• the long shank
• the crossbar, with a ball at each end
• the curved arms (a thick arc)
• two arrowhead flukes and a ball at the bottom

Outline and shade each piece separately. Where pieces overlap, the outline of the newer piece runs across the older one, so it looks like clay parts pressed together.

Add a Rope layer above Anchor. Pick the Brush with Hardness 100:

1. At size 28 in plum, click where the rope comes out of the ring, then Shift-click a chain of points down the anchor in a loose S shape. Each Shift-click draws a straight segment from the last point.
2. Switch to size 17 and coral #FF7A6B, and repeat the same chain of points on top. The plum shows round the edge as an outline.
3. At size 3 in plum, Shift-click short diagonal strokes across the rope about every 16 px for the twist.

For the rope to wrap round the anchor, it has to disappear behind the shank once. With the Rectangular Marquee, select a narrow box exactly as wide as the shank and its outline, over the middle crossing. Start and end the box where the rope is clear of the shank. Press Delete.

Add a Rope Shine layer, brush a thin #FFE9E4 line along the upper-left side of the rope at size 4, delete the same box, and set the layer to 60% opacity. Give Rope a small Drop Shadow.

Add a Rose group with these layers:

• Leaves: two short teal leaves at the lower left and right. Brush a darker #1F6E64 vein along each one.
• Petals: seven overlapping coral circles in a ring, then a large circle in the middle. Outline and shade each one as you go, so every petal overlaps the one before.
• Cup: a deeper #E8555A oval in the middle.
• Bud: a smaller coral oval. Then brush a plum spiral on it at size 5, Shift-clicking round and round from the centre outwards.

The spiral is a classic tattoo rose centre, and it keeps the rose from looking like a target.

Add a Dice group. On a Die A layer, make a rounded square about 150 px wide in cream: draw a square marquee, then Select → Shrink by 30 and Grow by 30 to round the corners. Give it the outline, shade and highlight, but leave the Drop Shadow until the die is tilted.

Add a Pips A layer and fill five small plum circles in the five pattern. Then choose Layer → Merge Down, so the pips become part of the die and turn with it.

A single layer needs a selection before the Move tool shows its handles. Draw a rectangular marquee round the die, pick the Move tool, and drag just outside a corner to tilt it about 14° anticlockwise. Press Ctrl+D to commit, then add the Drop Shadow. Adding it after the tilt means it still falls straight down and to the right.

Make Die B the same way, a little smaller, overlapping the first die's lower right corner, with three coral #E8555A pips. Tilt it about 12° the other way.

Make a Fillers group with a Stars layer. Lasso small five-point stars in butter and four-point sparkles in cream: drag slowly from point to point and the little wobbles disappear under the outline. Give them a 5 px outline. Put them only in real gaps: inside the moon's curve, between the two rows of designs, beside the dagger blade and above the swallow.

Space them out. Flash sheets look crowded enough without stars touching the designs.

Make a Price Tags group with a Tags layer. Under each design, drag a rectangle about 96 × 44 px (112 px wide for three-digit prices). Then Shrink it by 21 and Grow it by 21: shrinking that far squashes it to a thin line, and growing it back gives perfectly round ends. Give it the clay treatment in cream. Line the tags up: the three in the middle row share one baseline, and so do the three at the bottom.

For each price, select Tags, pick the Text tool with Titan One at 28 in plum, click just above the tag and type the price. Press Tab, then switch to the Move tool and nudge the text with the arrow keys until it's centred in its pill.

Select Border and make a Title group. With the Text tool, choose Caprasimo, size 96, coral #FF7A6B, and type GRUMPY QUOKKA in the empty space at the top. Commit, then use the Move tool's Align center horizontally button, or the arrow keys, to centre it about 40 px below the top border.

In its effects, turn on Stroke (#3D2442, Width 7) and Inner Glow (#FFE6DC, Size 9, Opacity 75). The pale inner glow puffs the letters up like the clay pieces.

Click Duplicate Layer. The copy lands on top and stays as the coral face. The original, now underneath, becomes the extrusion:

1. Click the lower GRUMPY QUOKKA row and rename it Title Extrusion.
2. In its effects, turn off Inner Glow, turn on Color Overlay in plum, and add a Drop Shadow (#4A2D55, Blur 18, Offset 7 / 14, Opacity 34).
3. With the Move tool, nudge it 3 px right and 8 px down with the arrow keys.

The plum copy now shows below each letter as a solid edge, so the type looks like it was rolled out of clay.

Select a raster layer first, so changing the font doesn't restyle the title. Then set Sniglet at 30, plum, weight ExtraBold, and type TATTOO FLASH · SHEET No. 7 above the title. In the Text panel, set Letter spacing to 4. Centre it between the border and the title.

Make the footer the same way, with letter spacing 2: WALK-INS WELCOME · NO REFUNDS ON REGRET, centred below the bottom row of tags. Keep it at least 50 px above the inner border line.

Flash sheets are pinned to the wall. Choose View → Show Grid. A Grid size slider and a Snap checkbox appear at the right end of the options bar. Set the grid to 8 px and make sure Snap is ticked. Make a Pins group and layer. Then drag a 32 px circle with the Elliptical Marquee over each corner of the border. Snap pulls each circle exactly onto the grid, so all four sit at the same spot on their corners.

Fill them with the outline and coral steps. Then untick Snap and hide the grid before you shade them, otherwise the shifted selections snap too. Add a small white dot to each pin for a glossy highlight.

Add a layer named Clay Grain and drag it to the very top of the Layers panel, above the Hero group. Set the foreground to mid grey #808080 and Edit → Fill the whole layer.

Choose Filter → Add Noise… and set Amount 100, Mono and Gaussian. Then run Filter → Gaussian Blur… at radius 3 to clump the noise into soft lumps.

Choose Filter → Emboss… with Angle 135 and Strength 70, and apply it. Emboss shades each lump from one side, so the noise looks like a pressed, slightly bumpy surface instead of static.

Then boost it with Filter → Brightness/Contrast…, Contrast 70.

Open the Clay Grain layer's effects, set the Blend dropdown to Overlay, and lower the layer's opacity to 70%. Grey disappears in Overlay mode and only the bumps stay, so the whole sheet takes on the slightly lumpy surface of real plasticine.

Step back and look for anything crowding something else. On this sheet three things needed fixing:

• The swallow's tail touched the inner border line. Select the Swallow group, pick the Move tool and press Shift+Right twice to move it 20 px right.
• The $60 tag then sat off-centre under the swallow, and $50 was too close to the banner's left tail. On the Tags layer, draw a marquee round the tag, switch to the Move tool and nudge it with the arrow keys (20 px right for $60, 15 px left for $50). Press Ctrl+D, then nudge each price text by the same amount.
• A tiny point of the heart's outline showed under the middle of the banner. Select Heart, draw a small marquee just under the banner's bottom edge, and press Delete.

Last checks before you export:

• Every design has a price tag directly under it, and the tags line up in rows.
• Nothing touches the border. Keep at least 20 px between any design and the inner line.
• The banner text has the same space above and below.
• All shadows fall the same way, down and to the right.

Finish with File → Quick Export PNG, and save the layers with File → Save Project.