Now you might have to repeat this process a LOT more times to get satisfactory results. In the Wind effect dialog box, check “Blast” and select whichever direction you want the sorting to happen in. Now with your duplicate image selected, go to the “Filters” menu, on to “stylize” and select “Wind”. But for the sake of convenience, I’ve used the same image here. You can use any busy image that has a lot of colors (basically any image that has many different pixels, so that they look different when they’re sorted). It isn’t necessary here that you use the same image. Bring that layer to the top and rotate it by 90˚. Remember the duplicate we made of the original image? We use that now. Now that our stage is set, we will finally start the pixel sorting (sorry to keep you waiting for this long, but in the end it’s gonna be worth it). Note that you can also use an image as the background here. Following our theme, I’ll go ahead and use a pink color. On a layer under our recently edited image, add any solid color or gradient. This will allow us to change the background according to whichever theme we wish to go with, in this case the Japanese pop look. Now on the original image layer, use any tool of your choice (magnetic lasso tool, pen tool or even the old fashioned eraser 😛) to separate your subject from the background. Step 2ĭuplicate the image layer, we will use this second copy in some time. There’s no specific requirement here, but your job would become a lot easier if the subject is clearly differentiated from the background and has good lighting. Some of you requested me to give a lowdown on how I made this, so here it is: Step 1Ĭhoose an image you’d like to add this pixel sorting effect to. If you follow me on Instagram, this was the #017 artwork of my daily art series. Here’s the original stock image so that you can follow along .

Here I am going to show you how you can get a neo-Japanese pop look using this effect and some basic photoshop techniques. You can get this same look for your portraits, and it’s really easy to do. Several brands, especially clothing lines have their social medias filled with portraits like these. The Pixel sorting effect is really common these days in pop culture and design industry.

Effects pixel sorter