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40 Beautiful Grunge Photoshop Tutorials

By Jacob Gube, October 28th, 2008 in Tutorials | 113 Comments | Forum

By Jacob Gube

Grunge is a popular trend that gives designs a more organic and realistic look. It also provides a stark contrast to the simplistic, polished and rigid Web 2.0 trend, opting instead for a less uniform and more elaborate form of design.

We’ve discussed grunge style in modern Web design before, as well as tips and tricks to achieve the grunge look. Now, it’s time to put theory into practice by finding ways to infuse grunge themes into your artwork using Photoshop. In this collection, we present to you 40 excellent, high-quality grunge Photoshop tutorials. So fire up Photoshop and get ready to get your hands… dirty!

Beautiful Grunge Photoshop Tutorials

Antique Ace of Spades
This tutorial shows you how to create an old, stained playing card by using Blending modes.

Creating an Old-Collage-Effect Poster
Create a textured, old-school collage poster by following this excellent Photoshop tutorial.

Quick Grungy Poster
Learn how to create a grungy poster by using smart filters and a few image adjustments.

Creating a Stunning Old-World Look in Photoshop
In this Photoshop tutorial, you’ll learn how to create an old-world look using stock vectors imported into Photoshop.

Design a Unique Grungy Website Layout Tutorial
This tutorial will teach you how to design a cool grungy website layout. As well as walking you through the various Photoshop techniques it outlines general design principles and provides pointers for your own grunge designs.

Dark Grunge Photo Effect
In this Photoshop tutorial, you’ll see how to “grunge up” a photo using a variety of filters and photo adjustments.

Creating Grunge Brushes
In this step-by-step tutorial, you’ll learn how to create your own custom Photoshop brush that you can use to add grunge accents to your images.

Crazy Movie Poster
Recreate the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie poster using your own images in this tutorial.

Creating “Smokey Dancer”
This tutorial involves isolating the subject using the Lasso tool, some image adjustments and texturing effects.

Design a Grungy Floating Island
This tutorial by PSDFAN creates a grungy floating island by using a few Blending modes.

Distressed Effects in Photoshop
Explore different techniques in Photoshop that give your artwork some wear and tear.

Grunge Vector Layout
Combine grunge with another popular design trend (vector illustration) to create this stunning layout.

Photoshop Expertise
This tutorial shares a method for giving your artwork some texture and depth.

Filter-Free Art in Photoshop
Create a beautiful, grungy photo montage using only the Layer palette in Photoshop.

Photo Transfer Edge Effect
Apply a distressed border onto existing images by following this brilliant Photoshop tutorial.

Creating an Urban-Style Piece of Artwork
Create this organic and edgy artwork by using some stock photos and some crafty filters.

Artistic One-Eyed TV Man in a Grunge Vector Design
In this Photoshop tutorial, you’ll learn how to create a grunge-style wallpaper using stock textures and a couple of custom shapes to add some accents to the artwork.

Urban City Scene on Grunge Background
Create an urban city scene set on a grungy, distressed background.

Design an Old-Style Safari Map
This tutorial uses some basic Photoshop techniques to create a textured, old-style safari map.

Dramatic Gritty Effect
Add some grit to an image by following this excellent grunge Photoshop tutorial.

Create an Impressive Mock-up of a Grunge Box
Learn how to build a realistic worn-and-torn crate using the Vantage Point Photoshop filter as well as a few other Photoshop techniques.

Creating Old Paper with Custom Brushes
Learn how to create a custom brush using folded paper to give your artwork distressed accents.

Add Stock Textures to Images
Learn how to add a bit of grunge to your artwork by using stock textures.

Burnt Parchment in Photoshop
Give your borders a scorched, uneven look by following this Photoshop tutorial.

Easy Photo Grunge Effect
Give photos a simple grunge effect by adjusting Layer styles and using some filters.

Grunge Portrait
This Photoshop tutorial uses some basic Photoshop techniques to create a grungy portrait.

Daguerre Effect
Learn how to achieve the Daguerreotype look using this Photoshop tutorial.

Designing a Typographic Concept Poster
In this Photoshop tutorial, you’ll learn how to create a grungy, aged poster design.

Pencil It In
This tutorial shows you how to create a hand-drawn look that uses scanned images.

Grunge-style layer tutorial
This tutorial uses Layer styles to achieve a gritty grunge look.

Grunge and Textured Art Tutorial
Use this Photoshop tutorial to add a grunge effect to your photographs.

Create an Awesome Illustration Using Custom Brushes
In this tutorial, you’ll find out how to use custom brushes to create a textured black and white illustration.

Hero Header Part II
Learn how to create a grunge element using Photoshop filters and a stock image.

Create a Fantastic Decaying Metal Sign
Using a variety of filters (five of them to be exact), you can create a rusting metal sign.

Create a Cool Music Logo on a Grunge Background
Add a bit of grunge to your brand by using a variety of Photoshop techniques and using a free high-resolution brush set.

Design a Cartoon Grunge Website Layout
Mix cartoons with the grunge design trend to create a unique website layout.

The Dark Knight Grunge Wallpaper
This step-by-step Photoshop tutorial walks you through the creation of a Dark Knight-inspired wallpaper.

Building Textures from Scanned Art
This tutorial uses stock photos and a watercolor-washed scanned image to achieve an abstract, paint-splattered design.

Making a Grungy Business Card
Make your business card stand out by giving it some texture with the help of this Photoshop tutorial.

Ultimate Grunge Design Tutorial
This tutorial walks you through the creation of a grunge website layout that has rough edges and a distressed background texture.

How to Create a Grunge Web Design in Photoshop
Witness the steps involved in creating a beautiful grunge-themed website design in this brilliant Photoshop tutorial by PSDTUTS.

Want to find more Photoshop tutorials?

This is the fourth part of the “Beautiful Photoshop Tutorials” series by Jacob Gube. If you enjoyed this article, you may also want to consider:

Part 1: 30 Beautiful Photoshop Text Effect Tutorials (on Six Revisions)
Part 2: 30 Beautiful Photoshop Illustration Tutorials (on Six Revisions)
Part 3: 35 Beautiful Vintage and Retro Photoshop Tutorials

About the Author

Jacob Gube is a Web developer/designer and author of Six Revisions, a blog on Web development and design. If you want to connect with the author, you can follow him on Twitter. (al)

Published in Tutorials, October 28th, 2008
Tags: grunge, photoshop, Tutorials

1.

edsonworks (October 28th, 2008, 4:39 pm)

brilliant concept and designs, congrats to all designer who made all of this cool Grunge Style design. I’m inspired in your designs. keep it up and thank you I learn a lot. :)
2.

Steven Snell (October 28th, 2008, 4:42 pm)

Nice collection Jacob.
3.

archknight79 (October 28th, 2008, 4:49 pm)

Cool! Keep it going! Nice one dude :D
4.

theglue (October 28th, 2008, 4:53 pm)

This is great! Really awesome! :)
5.

Arthur Brown (October 28th, 2008, 4:59 pm)

This is truly a great collection of grunge tutorials and examples. Way t go as always.
6.

ellidrew (October 28th, 2008, 5:14 pm)

I get so much from your tutorials!
Thanks for collecting them and making them readily available.
7.

adam foster (October 28th, 2008, 5:31 pm)

awesome used the PSDTuts before. Another cool post guys =]

Adam
8.

Tom Ross (October 28th, 2008, 6:20 pm)

Wow, I’m honestly stunned that 6 of the 40 are mine! Thanks so much for the feature, and the other tutorials in the list will make great reading for me this week :).
9.

Paulo (October 28th, 2008, 7:21 pm)

Again the same? Come on
10.

Curt Simon Harlinghausen (October 28th, 2008, 7:43 pm)

I like it. Especially the moke ups and the
Quick Grungy Poster. Simple, but great.

Stay tuned for more happy days.
11.

Nirvana (October 28th, 2008, 8:09 pm)

check out .. Link [jeevkola.deviantart.com].

Try not to Copy :)
12.

Alvaro (October 28th, 2008, 9:29 pm)

Great to see two of my tuts in the list! thanks… :D
13.

Tschai (October 28th, 2008, 9:52 pm)

Great tuts indeed….

PS: It’s getting annoying to see so many lazy people with a FaceYourManga-avatar ;)
14.

Muhammad Ahmad (October 28th, 2008, 9:54 pm)

awesome job
15.

Celina Gomes (October 28th, 2008, 10:47 pm)

Amazing! It will really help to improve the photoshop knowledge as each tutorial has a detail study of working. Thanks for sharing
16.

Naldz Graphics (October 28th, 2008, 10:48 pm)

Nice post.thanks for the include:)

Ronald
17.

FBrushes.com (October 28th, 2008, 11:42 pm)

I love grunge design. Nice post though. Love them all!
18.

laurence from france (October 29th, 2008, 12:08 am)

superbe ! merci
19.

gNcWebmaster (October 29th, 2008, 3:14 am)

Wayy it’s awesome collection. Thanks
20.

Jim Fitzsimmons (October 29th, 2008, 4:38 am)

Wow. These are fantastic!!
21.

Justine (October 29th, 2008, 7:19 am)

I’ve got enough this grungy or retro stuff, web is full of this! Does anyone design something else?
22.

HERO (October 29th, 2008, 8:06 am)

Great roundup! You guys always do such a fantastic job. Thanks so much for including pshero.com in your list! I’m flattered to be counted in such distinguished company!
23.

Simon Day (October 29th, 2008, 8:48 am)

Grunge has a place in design no matter how much people may hate it. I would never expect to see the BBC homepage in grunge but for a designers homepage I say why not?

I beleive there is a lot of skill involved in creating a truly creative grunge look and while there are a number of poorly designed sites where you cannot find the naviagtion for all the tea in china there are some true masterpieces out there. Grunge is one of the few designs left that can still make me go “wow” when I see a masterpiece.
24.

crypta (October 29th, 2008, 9:53 am)

beautiful!!!
25.

ashvin (October 29th, 2008, 9:56 am)

wonderful tuts collection! Thanx
26.

Shawn (October 29th, 2008, 11:21 am)

Flipping brilliant ;-) Keep it up guys!
27.

bangbouh stock (October 29th, 2008, 11:55 am)

good resource. thanks!
28.

Tyler Bramer (October 29th, 2008, 1:17 pm)

Thanks for featuring my Realistic Burnt Parchment tutorial! A lot of these tutorials and works look great, I’ve read a large amount of them before this and they are simply wonderful.
29.

Fabryz (October 29th, 2008, 2:42 pm)

Tagging for future inspirations =D
30.

jbcarey (October 29th, 2008, 3:00 pm)

stop it…. I can’t keep up as it is!
31.

jg (October 29th, 2008, 10:21 pm)

Awesome collection. Can’t wait to try some of these out. Thanks again Smashing. :)
32.

Alex (October 30th, 2008, 4:12 am)

Oh boy, can’t believe that this trend is surging again. Grunge in webdesign is really soooo hardrockin’ 2002. Let dead dogs lie.
33.

dMullins (October 30th, 2008, 10:08 am)

Lol, grunge.
34.

irka (October 31st, 2008, 5:25 am)

i love you, smashing mag!
35.

tsauri28 (November 2nd, 2008, 2:16 am)

waw… thank’s. the article is very useable for me..
36.

anton (December 23rd, 2008, 1:40 pm)

wow
37.

kamlesh khatri (March 25th, 2009, 9:24 pm)

great collection, thanks for sharing it.
38.

Tom (March 26th, 2009, 8:00 am)

I noticed that the link for ” Artistic One-Eyed TV Man in a Grunge Vector” is incorrect. It’s at naldzgraphics.net not naldzgraphics.com. Thanks for the great collection!
39.

Erick Werther (June 18th, 2009, 8:15 pm)

WOW!!!!!!!! THIS SITE IS AWESOME!!!!!!!

Thanks a lot for the tutos and designs!!!! =D