Adding a Realistic Rainbow to a Picture

For this project we added a realistic rainbow to our picture. We took a picture on a dark rainy day and decided to put a rainbow in it. Below is the picture we used, and what it turned out to be. We followed the steps listed to create our "rainbow picture."

Before                              After

The steps we used to create this effect were:

1. Open the picture in Photoshop.
2. Add a new blank layer and name it rainbow.
3. Select the rainbow gradient
-click the gradient picker in the options bar at the top of the screen
-click on the small arrow on the top right.
-click on special effects then click append.
-choose Russell's rainbow.
4. Select "radial gradient."
5. Drag out a rainbow with the gradient tool.
-holding shift will make it easier to drag horizontally.
-drag out a radial rainbow gradient from right to left in the image.
-when you let go of the button on your mouse, the rainbow will appear.
6. Change the blend mode of the rainbow layer to "screen."
-go to blend mode options in the top left of the layers panel.
-change it to screen. This blends the rainbow into the picture.
7. Apply the Gaussian blur filter.
-go to the filter menu in the menu bar at the top of the screen.
-choose blur.
-then choose Gaussian blur.
-drag the radius slider at the bottom of the dialog box towards the right to increase the amount of blurring being applied to the rainbow. The rainbow should look more realistic.
8. Add a Layer Mask.

-click the layer mask icon.

9. Choose the black to white gradient.

-right click on the picture.

-click on the black to white gradients thumbnail to select it.

10. Choose "Linear Gradient" from the options bar.

-go back to the options bar and click the linear gradient, the icon.

11. Drag a black to white gradient on the layer mask.

-hold down shift and drag the black to white gradient form the base of the rainbow to the top of the image.

-the rainbow no longer extends all the way to the bottom of the photo because of the layer mask.