Make Repeating Seamless Tile Backgrounds with Photoshop

This tutorial is a guest post by Pixblix.com

1. Not every image will lend itself well to a repeating background. I like to select a portion of an image that already has a bit of a pattern to it and also has similar colors, say for example a group of flowers. For this tutorial, I’ve chosen an 800×600 portion from a picture of spring fruit tree blossoms. For now it is much easier to work with a larger image than a tiny one; you can resize the tile when it is finished. The objective of this tutorial is to modify the photo so that the bottom edge matches up with the top edge and the left edge matches with the right creating a seamless, repeating background when it is tiled.

   

2. Turn the photo inside out so that all of the corners are inverted to the center of the photo. Do this by choosing the Offset filter:
3. 

4. Calculate the horizontal and vertical offset values by dividing the dimensions of the photo in half. The photo is 800 pixels wide, so for horizontal, enter 400. The photo is 600 pixels high, so enter 300 for vertical. In the undefined areas box select wrap around.

   

5. As you can see the photo is now inside out with all four corners in the center. There are now four seams in the middle of the photo.

6. To make the photo into a seamless tile, the seams must disappear. Use the clone, heal, patch, smudge and paint tools to blend the seams until they are no longer visible. First, duplicate the layer so that you will not be working on the original layer (the original will act as a back-up in case you make mistakes). Start with the bottom vertical seam. Match the blue of the sky perfectly by selecting the paint brush tool and then selecting the dropper tool (using the alt key) as you hover over the area you are painting over. Slowly paint out parts of the branches that don’t match up on the opposite side of the seam. Then, clone in some extra edges of the flowers to cover the seam. The smudge tool works well to slowly tug at small parts of the branches to pull them out and cover the seam. Work slowly, using the clone, blend and patch tools to match each side of the seam until the seam completely disappears.

   

7. Now do the same to the other three seams until they completely disappear. Duplicate the layers so that you will have a separate layer for each quadrant. One way to cover part of the seam in the middle left is to enlarge the group of flowers directly beneath it. This gives you a much clearer and less smudgy result than simply cloning and healing. First, select the bunch of flower using the lasso tool:

   

8. Then, copy the selection and paste it on top. Using the transform tool (located under Edit) slightly enlarge the bunch of flowers so that they cover the portion of the seam directly on top of them.

   

9. Next, keeping the enlarged bunch of flowers selected, nudge them into place so that the branches match up as closely as possible. Deselect. Then, using the erase tool (varying the opacity) erase around the edges to blend the selection in. Use the clone and healing tools to blend any remaining edges as necessary.

   

10. Continue to work on the remaining seam areas until they are all completely undetectable. Using the paint tool and matching the sky color exactly, paint away sections of branches or flowers that do not match with anything on the opposite side of the seam. You can also use the smudge tool to make portions of the branches longer and match them up to other branches, or hide them under bunches of flowers across the seam. Use the clone, healing and patch tools to add on to clumps of flowers to extend them and blend them into the branches to cover the seam.

    

11. Finally, we’ve gotten rid of all four center seams.

    

12. We’re almost finished creating the seamless tile, but now we need to turn the photo right side out again. Do this by repeating the offset command from the 3rd step. Enter the values exactly as you did earlier.

13. Sometimes when the photo is turned right side out again, a tiny seam can appear in the center if the image was worked too close to the edges. Fix this seam the same way as the others.

14. The final step is to flatten and resize the image to the background tile size that you need. I decided to make this one 400×300 just because I think it looks the best in that size.

    

15. The image tiles seamlessly!

    

This tutorial was created by Pixblix.com. Pixblix is a free collection of original web graphics, backgrounds, stock photos, and clipart. Our goal is to create a site that is easy to navigate and offers only useful images. All of our content is licensed for commercial use and is 100% free and original.
http://pixblix.com

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