Create realistic lens flares

[marianmpunkt]

Hey guys,

i wondered if there is a way to create realistic lens flares and i am talking about realistic ones.

I know the lens flare render filter and there are thousands of brushes, but they don't really meet my requirements.

I am talking about color and shape, randomness and contrast. When you are playing FIFA18 and you pause a game, there is a stunning "rain on the camera" effect which i wanted to create in Photoshop. I already tried to do some, basically created a white, red and blue layer on a black background and set the blend mode to screen, but somehow it is not what i wanted.

Does anyone have an idea of how can i get close to those "lens flares"?

Here is an example of what i am talking about.

Thanks in advance!

Cheers

[JJMack]

Have you tried Filter Render>Lens Flare

[DaveJCummings]

Check Filter>Render>Lens Flare,  and tweak the lens type, & brightness until you get the effect you desire

[D Fosse]

Guys, he already said he knew about Render > Lens Flare. There aren't that many options there, so let's assume he tried those.

[DaveJCummings]

You can edit the color and contrast of the lens flare by creating the lens flare on a separate layer and use Hue/Saturation & Contrast/Brightness to play around with it

[Randy Hufford]

Try Colin Smith video How to Create a hyper realistic non-destructive Lens Flare effect in Photoshop - PhotoshopCAFE

[Mikey_Mic]

There's a very cool plugin called Red Giant Knoll Light Factory. A way to go for the best realistic lens flares!

[Trevor.Dennis]

https://forums.adobe.com/people/Mikey+Mic  wrote

There's a very cool plugin called Red Giant Knoll Light Factory. A way to go for the best realistic lens flares!

Nice look range of products, but soooo expensive!  Light Factory alone is $199. 

Something not exactly a lens flare, but possibly interesting, is Pro Digitals Star Filter Pro.  So starting with a stadium picture like this

Add some dark sky.

Burn down the bright spectators

And run a path where we want the lights to go. (I have set the path colour to red for clairty

Fill a new layer with black.

Make a small round white brush and stroke the path on the black layer (we use the black background so we can see what is happening when we make the flares)

Stroke the path we made with the white brush.  Adjust spacing to suit.

Note: I have set the blend mode to Screen so the black disappears.

OK now apply Star Filter Pro.  You can see it has a stack of options.

I have also selected the pitch area, copied it to a new layer and set to screen to make it look lit.

This is _very_ quick and dirty.  If I was doing it for real, I'd have made the path in three parts. 

Set brush size to fade and get some perspective going on.

Hmmm... I've done it now.

I'm not going to give every player multiple shadows though

Prodigital Starfilter Pro 4 was created by Noel Carboni who used to be a regular poster on these forums.

Hey, it only cost $37.  That is outstanding value IMHO

StarFilter Pro 4 Plug-in by ProDigital Software

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[Chuck Uebele · Accepted solution]

Make a layer with a soft white brush. You can create an rainbow gradient and spherize it to make it round. Merge the gradient with the soft white brush. Set the blend mode to linear light and adjust the fill opacity NOT the normal opacity to the level you want. The flare on the right is with a normal blend mode at 100% opacity. The one on the left is the same, but with linear light and a reduced fill opacity. You can duplicate the layer to give a more intense look.

[marianmpunkt]

Allrighty, thanks for your answers.

I am currently working on a proper solution and i think i might go Chucks way.

Thank you all!