Stars out of stars?

[PlasticSpanner]

Can anyone suggest a way of getting a pointy star shape from a real star "blob" in PS?

I've tried the shapes tool and the Marque tools but nothing looks right. I'm looking for a similar result to that with a 8 point star filter for an SLR that I can selectively apply.

Thanks for any help!

 

[pursuer]

I know there are photoshop actions for sale that add diffraction spikes. Here is an example:
http://actions.home.att.net/Astronomy_Tools.html

Have you considered adding real diffraction spikes while shooting with the string method?

 

[PlasticSpanner]

I remember reading about that but dismissing it as WAY too much work and quite fiddley! Also at the time I naively thought I wanted pure, un-altered images of the night sky!

 

[Meysha]

I've lost thelink for it at the moment. But I found a site, where you can actually download light star shapes.... with different amounts of lines coming off etc. What you then do is you copy and paste the image (which is black and white when you download it) and then you put it over your light source in the photo... eg candle, star etc. Then you change the blend mode to.... hmmm I can't remember, something like screen or soft light... and then ta da. You've got your little twinkly bit.

Try goodtutorials.com I think that's where I found the tute for it.

 

[PlasticSpanner]

Thanks Meysha! not a direct tutorial there but enough to give me some ideas as to how to go about it!

Do these look anything like OK?

Pursuer:- Are "Noels Actions" worth $15? I've seen them before and wondered if anyone had used them and if they're any good.

 

[JeLeAk]

prob a dollar short and a day late, but have you tried lense flairs as well?

 

[jeroen]

For realistic stars far away:
Take the pencil tool and tip in some very small white dots. Far away stars don't have a star shape...

For bigger, star shaped stars:
Brush a dot on a transperent layer.
(In Photoshop) Go to Filter->Blur->Motion Blur.
Set the Angle to 0.
Play a little with Distance for the right result. The amound depends a bit on the resolution of the image.
Press okay.
Now duplicate your layer and rotate everything on the new layer using the Free Transformation tool. Repeat that a few times.
Link all layers and press Merge Linked in the Layers tabmenu.

Good luck.