: Warped distortion effect What's the best way to achieve an effect like this cover? I was thinking to basically start with random grayscale rectangles, a layer of thinner rectangles set to multiply,

@Holmes874

You can check my illustrator add-on here for the vector object: graphicriver.net/item/distorted-vectoreffect/10916541

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@Turnbaugh909

tried my hand using just rectangle shapes. applied shear, then massaged two layers (one noise, one halftone copy of shapes). its about subtle mixing of these layers and levels. also 'wind' is your friend in this, too. my process is just warping the heck out of things.

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@Sue6373160

I'd just go with the classic move-picture-around-on-a-photocopier trick. Google "photocopier distort" as that's basically what this is. I don't think it's really worth the effort of trying to fudge it in Photoshop when it's so fun and easy to do it properly. A computer scanner would also work but it'll never give the rough quality that an old black and white photocopier will though.

If you really want a Photoshop only method then Filter > Distort > Shear... is probably your best friend. You have to rotate the image to do it different directions.

I took my image from the newspaper photo thing yesterday (How to make scanned newspaper effect?) and messed around with the Shear tool and a little bit of the other distort options to make the following image. I also found Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask... was nice to finish it off.

Here are a couple random variations:





Still no where near as good (or as fun) as doing it properly! I don't have a photocopier within reach of my bed though sorry!

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@Deb5748823

Stock Footage

This is my third attempt:



I applied Wave, Shear, Gaussian Noise, Polar Coordinates, to three rectangles and the results (after 15 minutes) are unrealistic.

I highly recommend that you use Stock Footage. Even in professional compositing packages like After Effects or Nuke realistic noise is very complex to implement.

I googled TV signal noise and in less than 30 seconds I found many images and videos similar to your cover.

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@Shakeerah625

I would probably just start with columns and use the smudge tool.



quick and dirty

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