Like many of our readers, I am the resident Photoshop expert among my friends and family. Every year, around this time, I am asked to do at least one custom helmet for a friend’s fantasy football team. I usually poke around Google, looking for a template that allows me to be a good friend while working quickly so it does not become a distraction. Until this year, my search has been fruitless.
A few weeks ago, I found V2 Revolution Helmet, an Photoshop template from Fraser Davidson (aka rezland). The PSD file is very well organized and easy to use. Building a custom helmet takes only four steps.
- Copy an original logo or other image into appropriate layer in the template.
- Recolor the helmet background using the provided Color Overlay layer effect.
- Recolor the face mask; also a Color Overlay layer effect.
- Save for the Web at the desired resolution.
With clean source images, you can have a complete helmet within five minutes. Davidson has set up the template to wrap images around the helmet and apply lighting effects. Once you have the image in place, use the color picker to select colors from the logo to finish out the helmet background and face mask. The result is a professional-quality render of a football helmet.
Working with 300 dpi source images graciously provided by my friend Stan!, a professional cartoonist it took me about 30 minutes to produce the twelve helmets shown above. No cartoonists on speed dial? Draw from the Creative Commons. Or, use your own photos to make creative and unique helmets, like these two I threw together from my Instagram images.
Need another angle on a football helmet? Davidson has two other templates a Reverse 3/4 and Three Up available as well. Best of all, he offers all three templates free for non-commercial use.
I hope you found this little diversion fun and useful. If so, please share your helmet creations in the comments below.
Many thanks to Stan! for the use of his artwork on the helmets above. You can see the originals in 10×10 Toon, his webcomic about pop culture, gaming and geek life.
Very cool! Thank you!
@Spellbound – Very glad to know you found it useful!
Doug I keep pasting the logo onto the helmet color layer and it won’t let me move the logo…which layer should you paste it into???
Are there any step by step guides on how to do this please?
The account at deviant art is deactivated, and I’m trying to find a good base helmet template to make a few custom little football helmets myself. Any ideas?
See my latest comment below. :)
It appears that the templates are not available anymore. His deviantart account is dead in the links you provided above. Do you know where I can get them?
See my latest comment below. :)
I see a couple others have asked, but the links to the template are no longer good. Do you still have this file to provide for download? I’d appreciate it.
Michael – I do have the original PSD. But, as it is not my work it is not appropriate for me to post it without the creator’s permission. I will look around and see if he has posted it elsewhere. If I find a good link, I’ll post it here.
I reached out to the creator. Will let you know what he says.
See my latest comment below. :)
Can you post the PSD files someplace they are no longer available.
WE cannot as they don’t belong to us.
See my latest comment below. :)
Folks,
I am very happy to report that Fraser Davidson, the original designer of the helmet template, has given me permission to share the PSD with the community. You will find the link below.
If you use this template, please make a point of saying thanks to Fraser on Twitter at @FrazDav.
Thanks,
Doug
LINK: http://dougd.me/FrazDav_FF_Helmet
Are there any step by step guides on how to do this please?
Very cool! Thank you!
@Spellbound – Very glad to know you found it useful!
Doug I keep pasting the logo onto the helmet color layer and it won’t let me move the logo…which layer should you paste it into???
The account at deviant art is deactivated, and I’m trying to find a good base helmet template to make a few custom little football helmets myself. Any ideas?
See my latest comment below. :)
Can you post the PSD files someplace they are no longer available.
See my latest comment below. :)
WE cannot as they don’t belong to us.
It appears that the templates are not available anymore. His deviantart account is dead in the links you provided above. Do you know where I can get them?
See my latest comment below. :)
I see a couple others have asked, but the links to the template are no longer good. Do you still have this file to provide for download? I’d appreciate it.
See my latest comment below. :)
Michael – I do have the original PSD. But, as it is not my work it is not appropriate for me to post it without the creator’s permission. I will look around and see if he has posted it elsewhere. If I find a good link, I’ll post it here.
I reached out to the creator. Will let you know what he says.
Folks,
I am very happy to report that Fraser Davidson, the original designer of the helmet template, has given me permission to share the PSD with the community. You will find the link below.
If you use this template, please make a point of saying thanks to Fraser on Twitter at @FrazDav.
Thanks,
Doug
LINK: http://dougd.me/FrazDav_FF_Helmet