I will be using an image of fire on a black background. This works great when using images with very contrasting colors like lightning, fire, fireworks, ect. Load your image into Photoshop.

Open the Channels tab (next to the Layers tab) and find the layer that has the most contrast between the subject you want to keep and the background. Click once on the layer you choose to select it. After it is selected click once more on it, and without letting, go drag it down with the mouse over the ‘New Layer’ icon and release to create a new layer.

Notice the name of your new layer.

Click on the RGB layer to select all 4 again, and click on the eye of the new layer to hide it. Then go to Select –> Load Selection, and in the drop down box choose your new layer and hit OK. Now your image should have a moving dotted line around the selection.

Switch back to the Layers menu, make sure the correct layer is still selected and hit ‘Delete’

*if the wrong selection was deleted it is because you have a white background which, to Photoshop, is considered the solid color as opposed to the blacks transparency. Just hit Edit –> Undo to undo the deletion and the go to Select –> inverse and then hit delete.

Now it should look like this:

Add your background to the composition, make sure it is underneeth your original layer.

Doesn’t that look good. There is one last thing we can do to blend it in a little more. Go to Layer –> Matting –> Remove Black Matte. That removes anything else left over from your original background.

Now you should have something like this:

Now go and experiment and see what great images you can create.

This is what your header will look like after installing and activating the theme:  (your links may be different depending on what you have already created)

First open the header file in wp-content/themes/epsilon/header.php using a text editor or, which I will be using, Dreamweaver.

Locate the following code:

This DIV tag contains the Blog Title and Tagline.

If you wish to delete the tagline, which in this case is TEST BLOG, just select and delete the following line from the above code:

Now for that pesky Blog Image:

The easiest way to change it would be to create a picture of your choosing with the same dimensions  as the one provided, which for quick reference is 300w X 55h.  (If you do do this make sure you create a PNG file which the one provided is.) Then name your image ‘logo.png’ and save it in the folder wp-content/themes/epsilon/images overwriting the one provided and upload it to your server.

The second, and more difficult, way gives you more control over the overall appearance. To go this route, open the stlye sheet (wp-content/themes/epsilon/style.css in your text editor and scroll down and locate the following code, which is around line 74:

This is the “brains” of the blog title, and where you will do your damage!

I will explain what a few of these line of code are, then create a quick example for you and then let you go from there.

height:100px; - is the height of the entire header. You will need to adjust this accordingly to the size of your image so that the logo does not overlap the category links.

width:500px; - is the width of your image. Make this match the width of whatever you create.

font-size:45px; – is the size of your text if you didn’t have a picture. You need to also make this the same size as your image as this is the size of the clickable link around your image.

background:url(images/logo.png) no-repeat; – is the link to your image. Chage this to whereever your image is and to the name of your image.

The rest of it is fine left alone, if you do decide to play around with any of the code make sure you create a backup of the file encase you get carried away, mess something up, and can’t figure out how to correct it! This is always important when modifying any files.

Now for the example

I used photoshop to create the following image with dimensions 400w X100H, named it ’sweetblog’ and saved it as a png.

I uploaded it to the same place as the original image and in my style.css file I change the following code. (compare it with the top to see the changes, I color coded them red for easy comparison)

This is what I have now

Well there you have it, now try it for yourself. If your have any questions just let me know and I will be glad to help you out.

Example of flashing lights

Download Scene File

Starting Off

• First, create a Null Object by clicking Objects -> Null Object. Name it anything you want, I used flashing lights.




• Right click on the Null Object and choose Cinema 4d Tags -> Expresso




• This is what it will look like:

• Click once on the Xpresso Tag to open the Attributes Window on the lower right hand column.




• Click on User Data -> Add User Data. Change the name to Speed, the Data Type to ‘Float’, the Interface to ‘Float’, the Unit to ‘Real’, the Min to ‘1′ and the Max to ‘100′ and leave the step at ‘1′.




• Next create 3 Omni lights. Make them any color you want and under the ‘General’ tab, choose Visible Lights -> Visible and check “No Illumination”.  Leave everything else the same.




• Separate the lights and place them where you want them and rename them 3 different names like “light1, light2 and light3.

Xpresso

• Now for the fun part…..Double click on the Xpresso tag on your null Object to open the Xpresso window.

• Drag the Xpresso Tag onto the Xpresso Screen. Left click on the red box and choose User Data -> ‘Speed’.




• Right click on the screen and choose New Node -> Xpresso -> General -> Time.  Right click on the Time Port and choose ‘Delete Port’  then left click on the red box and choose ‘Frame’.

• Right click on the screen again and choose New Node -> Xpresso -> Calculate -> Math. With the Math Box selected, in the lower right hand column change the Data Type to Integer and the Function to Divide.

• Right click on the Xpresso screen and choose New Node -> Xpresso -> Calculate -> Math. With the Math Box selected, in the lower right hand column change the Data Type to Integer and the Function to Modulo.




• Right click on the Xpresso screen again and choose New Node -> Xpresso -> Logic -> Compare. Hold down the ‘Ctrl’ Key and then click and drag the Compare Node to make a copy. Make as many copies as there are lights to control, in our case 3.




• Now drag each on of your Light Objects onto the Xpresso screen. On each one, right click on the blue box and choose General -> Visible Light.




• Right now your Xpresso screen should look like this:

• Now to connect the Dots. Click the red dot under the Time node, and without letting go, drag the line out to the top blue input under the Math:Divide Node and release.




• Connect the rest as follows:

Xpresso/Speed -> Math:Divide/lower input
Math:Divide/Output -> Math:Modulo/top input
Math:Modulo/output -> each Compare/top input
each Compare/output -> the respective Light/visible light

• This is what you should have:

• Click the Math:Modulo Node and in the Attributes screen change the input to the number of lights your controlling. In our case, 3.




• Click the top Compare Node and make sure the input is at 0. Change the  second Compare Node’s input to 1, then the third’s input to 2. If you have more lights you would just keep adding up one on each node.




• Now close the Xpresso screen and click once on the Xpresso Tag on your Lights Null Object to open the Xpresso User data at the bottom of the screen. Click on the User data and change the speed to what you want. (The lower the number, the faster the lights flash)

Finished

Congratulations! You have just fininshed the tutorial and hopefully when you hit play the lights flash. If they do not, go back through this Tutorial again and make sure you did not leave anything out.

I have included the scene file which you can download here.

The file was created in Cinema 4d v 10 and may not work in earlier versions.