HOW TO MAKE A HORROR THUMBNAIL/TITLE SCREEN

Horror is a very popular genre for games, movies and even books(ewww), and so I wanted to let you know how to make a good looking tape style cover!


Step 1-Get started-For this tutorial I will be using gimp(since I do not really have photoshop, plus I tried it at a friend's house and found it way too complicated >_<). Open a new image. Since we are going for an rpg maker vx ace one, I'm gonna make it 544x416. You can make it as big as you wish.
Make sure the ''background'' layer is filled with black.


Step 2-Fog Effect-For this part, open up a new layer and select the whole image. Now go to filters--->Render--->Clouds--->Solid noise. You should see this:

Play around with the X and Y size as much as you wish, and click ok.
Now set the opacity of this layer to around 20.

Step 3-Text & Underline-For this part, I will turn on a grid just to be able to have the line in the middle. Now with the rectangle tool, select a small rectangle and fill it white. Make sure you do this on a new layer. It should look like this:

Now, add the text over the line.(You can turn off the grid now btw). Select the text and cut it, and paste it above the line. It should look like this:
(I moved the line a little bit to position it in the middle)

(It is up to you what the text will say. Just make sure it stays on the line, so 5 letter words fit the best.)

Step 4-Glow Effect
Duplicate the layer with the text and the line twice. Select the first layer and go to gaussian blur. Set the blur radius to 70. For the next layer set it to 30 and for the top layer set it to 3. It should look like this:

Looks good already, right? Well, it's gonna get better!

Step 5-Tape Effect
Create a new layer and fill it with the pattern ''fine stripes''. It should look like this:

(You can also use normal stripes, but they are a bit too thick for my preference)
Now merge down all the layers, and select the image. Go to filters--->Disorts--->Video and choose Wide Striped(make sure additive is on). It should look like this:


Step 6-Blood
For this step download and install this: http://project-gimpbc.deviantart.com/art/Blood-Brushes-by-KeRen-R-32864474
(A tutorial on how to install it can be found here.)
Now add a new layer and paint the corner with the blood brush of your choice. Mine looks like this:

The little circle at the back was bothering me so I erased it. You don't have to.
Anway, the saturation makes the blood stand out too much, so select the layer and go to colors--->colorize and do enter the folloing:



And finally this is what it looks like:


And here's an alternate version I made before this tutorial:

(I used stripes instead of wide stripes in ''video'' and removed more parts from the blood, and also made the text and line seperately, and also the blood opacity is around 90 instead of 100 and it is below the tape effect not above it.).

And that's it! I hope you liked this tutorial, and I am really looking forward to your creations!