Add Rain to an Image

Stormy Weather was the recent monthly photo topic. Amy Lo had taken this picture:

but it didn’t match with the topic so she added rain using Photoshop Elements version 11 and got this picture:

which she submitted. You can click on the above thumbnails to see larger versions of both images. If you want to see the intermediate steps, you can download Amy’s Photoshop Elements .psd file by clicking here then clicking on the blue Download button.

Amy used the technique shown in this video tutorial which she summarized as follows:

1. Open picture with Photoshop Elements
2. Create new layer and name it Rain
3. Paint layer with black
4. Go to Filter, then Add Noise and set Amount: about 30 percent, Gaussian and Monochromatic
5. Go to Filter then Gaussian blur and set Radius: about 0.5 pixels
6. Using the Layers Menu and while pressing <Alt> add a Levels adjustment layer
7. Make sure to click “Use previous layer to create clipping mask”
8. Adjust the white and black level triangles until happy with the # of dots
9. Go back to the Rain layer and select Filter then Blur then Motion. Try Angle: 60 or 75 and Distance: 15 or 20 pixels.
10. Change the blending mode of the Rain layer to Screen and keep adjusting the level to get satisfactory rain effect.

Thank you Amy for sharing.