Design a Halftone Jazz Album Cover from a 1940s Photo

Choose File → New, make a 1500 × 1500 px document and click Create. Record covers are square, and 1500 px is plenty for the coarse dots you'll use.

Double-click Layer 1 and rename it Paper. Set the foreground colour to #EEE4CC and choose Edit → Fill. Then run Filter → Add Noise... with Amount 20, Mono and Gaussian. That gives the cream a faint newsprint grain, so the finished cover looks printed rather than flat.

With View → Show Rulers on, click once on the top ruler at 80 and again at 1420 to drop two vertical guides. Those are the left and right margins. Then click the left-hand ruler at 70 for the top margin, and at 1244 to mark the top of the black band that will run along the bottom.

Guides are clicks, not drags. To remove one, click the ruler on the same spot.

On the Wikimedia Commons file page, open the 1,024 px preview, copy it and press Cmd+V in Lopsy. It lands at full size (about 1,024 px wide) in the top-left corner on a new layer. Press Cmd+D to drop the transform handles, then rename the layer Drummer.

Pick the Lasso and trace around the drummer:

• up the edge of the hat;
• along the top of his raised arm;
• around his fist and up and down the stick;
• back down the underside of the arm and his side;
• across his lap just below the hands.

Zoom in to follow the hat brim and the fingers carefully. Leave the cymbals and the background behind. The bottom edge can be a straight line, because the black band will cover it later.

Choose Select → Inverse, which selects everything except the drummer, and press Delete. Then Cmd+D to deselect. Only the drummer is left on the layer.

The flash in the original photo has lit Catlett's face so brightly that it would halftone almost blank. You'll put the tone back before turning anything into dots.

Draw an Elliptical Marquee around his face, from the hat brim to the chin. Choose Select → Feather… and give it 14 px, so the change blends softly into the neck and hat.

Run Filter → Brightness/Contrast... with Brightness −18 and Contrast +25, then deselect.

The face is now a true mid-tone, which halftones to medium dots. Keeping the dark tones dark matters for an honest likeness. If you brighten a dark-skinned face here, the dots will make it look pale.

Draw a Rectangular Marquee around the whole figure and switch to the Move tool. Transform handles appear on the selection.

Hold Cmd and drag the bottom-right handle down and to the right until the drummer is about 1.7 times bigger, roughly 1,040 px wide. Holding Cmd keeps the proportions. Press Cmd+D to commit the scale.

Drag the drummer with the Move tool until:

• his raised fist touches the right-hand guide;
• his hat sits roughly in the middle of the page, a little below where the bottom of the title will be;
• his lap runs below the band guide.

The top of the drumstick ends up well below the top guide. The title will sit behind his hat and fist.

Choose Layer → Duplicate Layer, click the copy in the Layers panel, rename it Ink Plate and hide the original Drummer with its eye icon. Keep the original: you'll use its outline several times.

On Ink Plate, run:

1. Filter → Unsharp Mask... with Radius 14 and Amount 1.6, to boost the local contrast that halftones need;
2. Brightness/Contrast at −22 / +30.

Then Cmd-click the Ink Plate thumbnail to load its outline, choose Select → Inverse, set the foreground to white and Edit → Fill.

The white surround gives the edges of the figure clean, full-strength dots instead of half-transparent grey ones. Do this fill after the tone changes, so the white stays pure white.

Choose Filter → Halftone... and set:

• Dot Size to 8;
• Angle to 45;
• Softness to 1.

Tick Preview to check the face, then click Apply.

Dark areas become fat dots that run together, and light areas become pinpricks. 45° is the classic angle for the black plate.

Halftone leaves a faint speck in the middle of every white cell, so the white surround is now covered in a light dot screen. To clear it, Cmd-click the hidden Drummer thumbnail, choose Select → Inverse, click Ink Plate and press Delete.

Deselect. Click the effects (fx) icon on the Ink Plate row in the Layers panel to open the Layer Effects drawer. Turn on Color Overlay and set it to #1B1A1F, then set the drawer's Blend dropdown to Multiply. Every dot is now one flat ink colour. On Multiply, the black dots overprint anything you put underneath them, the same way real ink does.

Now for the echo. Duplicate the Drummer layer again, click the copy, rename it Ghost Arm, and hide Drummer and Ink Plate while you work.

With the Lasso, draw a shape around the raised forearm, fist and stick. Cut across the upper arm near the shoulder, and leave plenty of room around the stick. Then Select → Inverse and Delete, so only the arm is left.

A stroboscopic photo shows the same arm at several points in its swing. To swing this one around the shoulder, draw a big square Rectangular Marquee centred on the shoulder. With the Move tool, transforms rotate around the centre of the selection, so the shoulder becomes the pivot.

Grab the round rotate handle just outside the top-right corner and drag clockwise about 9°, then press Cmd+D.

An echo should fade out towards the shoulder rather than stop at a hard cut. Here's how:

1. Duplicate Ghost Arm, name the copy Ghost Shape and hide it. You'll use its outline in a moment.
2. On Ghost Arm, repeat the Unsharp Mask and Brightness/Contrast settings from the black plate, then fill the surround white the same way.
3. In the Gradient tool's Advanced... editor, make a two-stop gradient from white at full opacity to white at zero opacity.
4. Choose Select → All, then drag the gradient from the cut end of the sleeve about a third of the way up the arm.

The sleeve now fades to white. White prints no dots, so the echo will dissolve into smaller and smaller dots. (The white surround hides the paper for now; it goes away in the next step.)

This is the same routine as the black plate, with a different angle and ink:

1. Run Halftone with Dot Size 8, Angle 15 and Softness 1.
2. Cmd-click the Ghost Shape thumbnail, choose Select → Inverse, click Ghost Arm and press Delete to clear the specks. Deselect.
3. Open the arm's Layer Effects drawer, turn on a Color Overlay of cobalt #2747C9 and set Blend to Multiply.
4. Set the layer's opacity to 85%, and show Ink Plate again.

The echo should read as a second, lower position of the arm, not a misprint. With the Move tool, drag Ghost Arm to the right until its hand runs off the edge of the cover. Then marquee the bit of stick that pokes out below the echo fist and delete it, because on its own it looks like a drip.

Click Paper and add a new layer above it called Sun Disc.

In the Gradient tool's Advanced... editor, set three stops:

• black at the left end;
• #3A3A3A at about 55%;
• #8C8C8C at the right end.

Set the type to Radial.

Draw an Elliptical Marquee circle about 580 px across, centred just right of the drummer's head. Keep its left edge clear of the text column. Drag the gradient from the centre of the circle to its edge.

Ending on grey rather than white gives the sun a crisp round rim of medium dots instead of fading away.

Deselect and run Halftone with Dot Size 16 and Angle 75. Add a Color Overlay of orange #E8562A.

With the Move tool, nudge the layer two pixels right and one up with the arrow keys. Real presses never line their plates up perfectly, and that tiny misregistration is part of the look. Where the black dots cross the orange, you get overprint for free.

With orange dots behind his face, he looks speckled. The fix is a knockout: remove the orange ink under the head only.

1. Cmd-click the Drummer thumbnail to load his whole outline.
2. Pick the Elliptical Marquee, hold Shift and Alt, and drag an oval around his hat and face, down to the collar.

Shift+Alt intersects, so you're left with just the head part of the silhouette.

Click Sun Disc and press Delete, then deselect. His face now prints on clean paper inside an orange halo, while his shoulder and arm still overprint the sun.

Click Sun Disc so the new type lands just above it in the layer stack.

Pick the Text tool and set:

• font Anton, size 586;
• colour #1B1A1F.

Click in an empty spot near the top and type GHOST, then press Tab to commit. Switch to the Move tool and drag it so its left edge sits on the left guide and its top on the top guide, then fine-tune with the arrow keys. At this size it runs right across to the right guide.

Rename the layer Title GHOST. Click Rasterize Layer at the bottom of the Layers panel, then run Add Noise at 10 so the solid black has a little ink texture too.

The drummer should sit in front of the title, with his hat breaking into the O and S and his fist into the T. Cmd-click the Drummer thumbnail again, click Title GHOST and press Delete to knock his silhouette out of the letters. Then deselect.

One piece of the T's stem is left floating below his wrist, where it reads as a stray black block. Drag a Rectangular Marquee over that part of the stem, from the wrist down to the baseline, and press Delete.

Deselect and look at the edges. The letters should stop crisply at his outline, with no dots showing through. The word still reads as GHOST, and the drummer now sits in front of it.

Click Sun Disc again. In the Text tool, choose Instrument Serif, set Font style to Italic, size 180, colour cobalt #2747C9, and type (notes) in an empty spot. Rename the layer Title notes.

Place it under the G about 30 px below GHOST. Let the opening bracket hang a few pixels past the left guide: round and slanted shapes look indented if they sit exactly on the line.

The leader's name is the second thing a jazz fan looks for. Click Sun Disc, then set BIG SID CATLETT in Barlow Condensed, Bold, size 54, black. Give it Letter spacing 2 in the Text panel, rename the layer Leader, and place it on the left guide about 40 px under (notes).

For the tracklist, click Sun Disc again and set Barlow Condensed SemiBold at size 22, Letter spacing 1 and Line height 1.82, which gives 40 px between lines. Type the seven titles in black as one text layer, each on its own line, and rename it Tracks:

1. BRUSH FIRE
2. RIMSHOT WALTZ
3. PARADIDDLE FOR PEARL
4. GHOST NOTES
5. FOUR ON THE FLOOR
6. THE QUIET HAND
7. BACKBEAT, NEW YORK

Then set the numbers 01 to 07, one per line, as a second text layer in Barlow Condensed Bold, size 22, Line height 1.82, in orange #E8562A, and rename it Track Numbers. Matching the size and line height keeps every number level with its title. Put the numbers on the left guide and the titles about 12 px to their right.

Keep the longest title at least 70 px clear of the drummer's elbow.

Click Track Numbers, Shift-click Tracks and choose Layer → Group Layers. Rename the group Tracklist.

With the group selected, drag it with the Move tool so the list starts about 40 px under the name. Both columns move together and stay aligned.

Click Ink Plate and add a layer called Band above it, so the band covers the bottom of the photo.

Drag a Rectangular Marquee from just off the left edge of the canvas at the band guide to beyond the bottom-right corner. It snaps to the guide. Fill it with #1B1A1F and run Add Noise at 10, just as you did on the title.

Add a layer called Notation above Band. Zoom right in on the left end of the band.

With the Lasso, draw a small tilted oval, about 20 px wide and 14 px tall, slanting up to the right like a printed notehead. At this zoom it's an easy shape to trace. Fill it with the paper colour #EEE4CC and deselect.

Marquee the notehead, then press Cmd+C and Cmd+V. The copy pastes in place on a new layer. Drag it with the Move tool about 74 px to the right, and choose Layer → Merge Down.

Do it twice more, so you have four heads for one beat of sixteenth notes.

Pick the Pencil at size 3. For each notehead, click just right of the head, then hold Shift and click about 46 px straight above it. That draws a straight stem.

Switch the Pencil to size 7 and draw two beams the same way, joining the tops of the four stems. Two beams mean sixteenth notes.

Drummers write ghost notes in parentheses. The groove here is the classic one: a normal stroke on the beat and three quiet ones in between.

Click Notation, pick the Text tool and click in an empty part of the canvas. Type ( ) (a bracket, four spaces, a bracket) in Instrument Serif regular, size 40, orange. Rasterize it and rename the layer Parens.

Move it so the brackets hug the second notehead and its stem. Then copy it, paste a copy onto the third head and another onto the fourth, and Merge Down each copy so all the brackets stay on Parens.

Marquee the whole beat on the Notation layer and copy it. Paste it three times, moving each copy about 295 px further right (the width of one beat), and Merge Down each one. Then do the same on the Parens layer. You now have a full 4/4 bar.

Add a Staff layer just above Band, so the lines sit behind the notes. With the Pencil at size 2, Shift-click five lines 14 px apart, from the left guide to the right guide. Place them so the noteheads sit in the third space up, which is where snare drum is written.

Add a thin final barline at size 2 just before the end, then a thick one at size 7 right at the end. Finally, at size 6, draw two short upright bars across the middle two spaces at the start of the staff. That's the percussion clef.

Finish the bar:

• Accents: on the Notation layer, with the Pencil at size 3, draw two Shift-click strokes to make a small > under the first note of beats two and four. Those are the backbeats.
• Time signature: set a 4 in Anton at size 32 in cream, rasterize it and rename it Time Sig. Move it just right of the clef so it fills the top two spaces, then copy and paste a second 4 into the bottom two spaces and Merge Down.

The bar now really is snare drum notation: a backbeat groove with ghost notes in between.

In Barlow Condensed SemiBold, size 30, Letter spacing 4, set:

• RECORDED IN NEW YORK CITY · 1947 in cream, starting on the left guide;
• NIGHTINGALE RECORDS · NR 4701 in orange, ending on the right guide.

Seat both lines so the space below them matches the space above the beams, about 45 px each.

Add a Badge layer above Ink Plate. Draw a circle with the Elliptical Marquee, about 176 px across. Line its right edge up with the right guide and its bottom with the last line of the tracklist. Then:

1. fill it with cobalt;
2. choose Select → Shrink… by 7 and fill with cream;
3. shrink by 3 more and fill with cobalt again.

That leaves a thin cream ring just inside the edge. Add two small cream dots at 3 and 9 o'clock with tiny elliptical selections.

Pick the Pen tool. You'll draw the arc in three click-drags, each one dragging in the direction the text should travel:

• start at about 10 o'clock, a little inside the cream ring, and drag up and to the right;
• at 12 o'clock, drag straight to the right;
• at about 2 o'clock, drag down and to the right.

Click the ✓ on the options bar to commit the path. Don't press Enter: that strokes the path onto the active layer. Shorter drags give flatter curves.

Text runs along a path in the direction it was drawn. If the bottom text followed the circle clockwise, it would be upside down. So draw the bottom arc left to right under the centre:

• start at about 8 o'clock and drag down and to the right;
• at 6 o'clock, drag straight to the right;
• at about 4 o'clock, drag up and to the right.

Make this arc slightly bigger than the top one. The letters will stand on it, pointing inwards, so they fill the same ring as the top text. Commit it with ✓.

Click Badge, then type MICROGROOVE and LONG PLAYING as two separate text layers in Barlow Condensed SemiBold, size 18, Letter spacing 4, cream, anywhere for now.

Click the MICROGROOVE layer, pick the Text tool and choose the first path in the Text path dropdown on the options bar. Do the same for LONG PLAYING with the second path.

Both words should be centred on 12 and 6 o'clock. If one isn't, drag its arc's first anchor with the Pen tool until it is.

In the middle, set 33⅓ in Anton at size 48, with RPM in Barlow Condensed at size 16 underneath, both cream and centred. Then select all the badge layers, group them, and deselect the path in the Paths panel.

Group the band, staff, notation and credit layers too, and collapse the groups to tidy the Layers panel.

Then turn on View → Show Grid for a last alignment check. Look for:

• the left edges of GHOST, (notes) (allowing for the bracket's overhang), the name, the tracklist and the band credits all on the same line;
• the badge and the right-hand credit on the right guide.

Turn the grid off again. As a last check, press Cmd+Z ten times and then Cmd+Shift+Z ten times: you should step back through the grouping and the badge and land on exactly the same cover.

Save with File → Save Project, then export with File → Quick Export PNG.