Motorcycle Rendering Tutorial for Photoshop, creating a 'photoreal' 2D motorcycle
The
Path Selection Tool (A) can be used to select a whole path. With the path selected you can then transform or scale the path, but not with the Path Selection Tool itself (use the Edit menu in the Photoshop Taskbar).
Together with the Pen Tool (P), the Direct Selection Tool (A) is the tool that you will use a lot when creating the paths. This tool is used to control each individual control point of each path.
Click on a path with this tool and you will probably see the control points show up as well as 2 handles. With this tool, click on a piece of path between two control points, and the handles of those points controlling that piece of path will show up. If you click on a control point, both handles of this control point will show up.
This tool can be used to modify the control handles of each point, as well as the position of each point. So this is a very powerful tool that you can use to really create the shape that you want.
A good approach to creating paths is to quickly and roughly create a path with the Pen Tool and then after you have created this path, get it to fit properly with this Direct Selection Tool (A).
Here you can see that I made the steering arms using a combination of sharp control points (just clicking) and smooth control points (clicking + dragging).
Now you will probably encounter the situation that you have accidentally created a smooth point where you want a sharp corner or vice versa. No problem, use the 
Convert Point Tool (press and hold the Pen Tool button to find it) to change the point after you have finished creating your shape. Using this tool you can click on a point to convert it to a sharp control point and click + drag to convert it back to a smooth control point.
Last thing that I want to point out in this screenshot is the Paths dialog that is shown. Sometime during the creation of all your paths it will be likely that you deselect your 'Work Path'. This will promptly hide all the paths and you will most likely panic Don't worry, you can simply re-select the 'Work Path' and all your paths will be shown again.. I wish Adobe would simply use a hide/unhide button as they do with the Layers... this would be far more consistent and less confusing.
Well it appears I have created all the paths that I need now (most likely you'll find out later that you need to create even more.. no problem, but tedious, yes ).
Use the Path Selection Tool (A) to select a path and make sure you have created a new layer for this bit you're about to colour. Click the right mouse button and chose 'Make Selection...'. Leave the settins as they are in the popup dialog you're shown next and press OK. You will see you now have a selection that you can fill with the colour of your choise.
Repeat this procedure with your other paths and try to keep track of the layer order at the same time. Make sure you create layers with proper names, because you'll likely end up with over 30 layers and you don't want to spend 10 minutes finding the right layer..
In this screenshot you can see that I have 2 black objects overlapping eachother, namely the foot support and the circular shape behind it. I created two seperate layers for this to make it easier later to add highlights.. prevent using objects on the same layer as much as possible if you're really lazy and don't like puzzles (re-ordering layers all the time).
Before starting the shading of each surface, which means adding the highlights and core shadows, we have a nice opportunity to play with the colours of our bike. Make sure you decide on a colour before we commence with the shading. Of course you can modify the colours when you are finished (because we keep our layers seperate), but it will make life easier if you chose a colour that isn't too hard to shade.
I liked this yellow but then remembered that it is usually a bit of a pain to make shadow areas in yellow look good and not dirty, so I switched to something easier.
Copyright © Renze Rispens
Edit by Stryker
Homepage: http://www.renzerispens.com
Source: http://www.productdesignforums.com
