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Create a night scene with Fireworks

You don’t have to be Van Gogh to create a beautiful night scene. Fireworks® artist Angelo Sabal will show you how you can easily create a realistic night sky using Fireworks.

To start, create a new Fireworks document that is 681 x 207 pixels, and has a resolution of 100 pixels, and then make the canvas color black. You’ll complete the image by adding clouds, stars, and a full moon.

Requirements

To complete this article, you will need the following software and files:

Fireworks 8

Prerequisite knowledge:

General knowledge of Fireworks

Create the night clouds

First, use the pen tool to draw the outline of a cloud. The curves don't need to be perfectly smooth, as long as you can close the vector path. It’s best to use white for the stroke color.

outline

Now remove the stroke outline, and add a cone gradient fill to the shape. For the gradient colors, I used #7B86AC and #9AC5D8. Then, change the texture to Sand, and increase the percentage to 19.

gradient fill

gradient fill2


Next you’ll add a live effect to the cloud object. Choose Filters > Alien Skin Splat LE > Edges. Choose Pixels as the Edge Mode, set the Feature Size to 33, the Margin to 5.31, and the Edge Width to 40.20. Leave the other options at their default settings.

live effect

live effect2


Add another live effect to the same object by choosing Blur > Gaussian Blur and then entering a value of 6.

gausian blur

Next, you’ll duplicate the cloud object: Select the object, and then copy and paste it. Remove the live filters you’ve applied, and then apply the live filter Eyecandy 4000 LE, and choose Marble. Make the following changes:

  • Set Vein Size to 73.28
  • Set Vein Coverage to 47
  • Set Vein Thickness to 67
  • Set Vein Roughness to 52
  • Make the background color white, and the vein color black
  • Change the layer mode of the duplicated object to Fuzzy Light, use Feather for the edge, and apply a value of 40-50.

duplicate cloud

duplicate cloud2


Now you’ll add more clouds, and make each one look different. This is where it gets really fun; duplicate the clouds at least five times. To customize the clouds, follow these steps:

  1. Select the grouped object, choose the subselection tool, and move a duplicated cloud object.
move cloud
  1. Change the shape of the original cloud object and alter the points of the vector path using the subselection tool.
subselection tool
  1. Select a duplicate cloud object. Try experimenting with different values for both the Vein Size and Vein Coverage. You may also want to adjust some of them using the Hue/Saturation live effect, or distort or rotate some of the clouds.

change clouds

For an added effect, now you’ll add a background to the clouds. Create a simple shape (you can also use the rectangle or circle shape) using the pen tool, then change the edge to Feather, with a value of 41. Change the fill color of the shape to a radial gradient, and use #5BACEE and #355C9F for the colors.

add background

Change the opacity level of the object to 72, and then lock the selected object.

change opacity


Change the opacity level of the background from 100 to 72, and try scaling the object until it covers most of the clouds. For the object here, the width is 715 and the height is 411.

scale object

Create the stars

To create the stars, start by drawing a circle with a width and height of at least 46. Change the edge to Feather, and feather it to 37. Use colors #FFFFFF and #355C9F for the radial gradient. Change the Opacity of one of the colors (in my example, color #355C9F) from 100 to 19.

stars

Now select the star object, and change its height and width and 7. Now you can start duplicating the stars by selecting, and then copying and pasting, them. You may also want to change the height and width of the other stars (just remember that both values must be equal and should be between 2 to 7). If you want to make a star brighter, just select the star object, duplicate it once or twice and group the duplicates.

duplicate stars

Once you’ve made all your stars, arrange them in the scene.

arrange stars

Create a full moon

In this last section, start by using the ellipse tool to create a circle with a height and width of 173. Choose Live Effects > Shadow and Glow > Glow. Assign #A6C8D8 as the glow color, and then set the Opacity to 65 and the Softness to 21.

create moon

Change the fill color of the moon from white to a linear gradient. For the colors, choose #C1E4E5 and #FFFFFF. Move the linear gradient handle around just enough to add some shades of blue.

change color

Next, to create the moon craters, use the pen tool to draw a shape. Change the layer mode from Normal to Negation.

create craters

Change the fill type of the shape to Pattern > Oil Shape 1. Change the Edge to Feather, and set the feather to 23. For the texture, choose Sandpaper and set it to 42%. Select Transparent.

texture moon

alter crater

To add another crater, follow the same steps you used to duplicate the clouds (that is, duplicate the crater object, and then resize it and alter some of its points.

duplicate crater

Now we have a good night scene.

final image

final image2

Where to go from here

For more information about Fireworks, check out the following resources: