Tutorials
Create a Vintage Horror Movie Poster for Halloween

Last week I did a post for GraphicRiver call “The Scariest Movie Posters of All Time.” They were really just a showcase of cheesy old horror movie posters. Because I am such a fan of that style, I thought I would show you how to create poster with a similar style. Its really easy to do and produces an awesome finished product. I was inspired by one of the posters I saw on the list. Can you guess which one?

Step 1

Create a new document with the following settings: 8×10 and 72dpi and add your background color to white.

Step 2

Create a red box (#d72323) with a yellow stroke that is 7px wide.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial
Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial
Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 3

Find a nice picture with a lot of action to use for your background silhouette. I used this picture of a witch from ShutterStock.

Cut out the background as you see fit and add to the inside of your red box.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 4

Adjust the brightness and contrast to the witch layer. Use the following settings:

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 5

Add a black color overlay to the image as well.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 6

Use a Gaussian Blur and add a slight blur to your image.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial
Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 7

Find a nice picture with a lot of action to use for your background silhouette. I used this picture of a surprised bride from ShutterStock.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 8

Resize your image to fit the design. You will also want to cut out the background as you see fit.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 9

Once you have the picture resized, tilt the image just a little bit and get rid of any portion of the image that isn’t inside the red box.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 10

Destaurate the the image so that you have a nice back and white version of the photo.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 11

Adjust the brightness and contrast to the following settings:

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 12

A a yellow color overlay that matches the border color of your red box.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 13

Create a black box and rotate it slightly. This is where our movie title will go.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 14

Add your movie title into the black box. You will need to rotate it slightly to fit the same angle of your box from the previous step. I used a premium font called Calgary Script.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

You will also wan to create some additional content for your movie poster.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

Step 15

To finish of the poster and give it that vintage touch, we are going to add an image of some old, folded paper. I used this image of folded paper from ShutterStock.

Add the image as your top layer. Set the layer blend mode to multiply.

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial

The reduce the fill of the paper layer to about 50%

Vintage Horror Poster Tutorial
32 Comments
Jake

October 5, 2009 4:17 pm Reply

Hahaha Im a fan of megan fox too.

Austin Bankruptcy Lawer

October 7, 2009 5:46 pm Reply

That’s a great tutorial, and hilarious. Thanks for posting that.

Bustor

October 13, 2009 5:31 am Reply

What can I say ! appropriately made and designed !! :) )

Quicken Websites

October 13, 2009 6:00 pm Reply

Nice tut! I had fun) Thank you for sharing)

Mrs. Outlaw

October 22, 2009 11:07 am Reply

I’m telling your in-laws. :)

Don

April 17, 2011 7:17 am Reply

Why don’t the Pictures show up ?

    hunter

    May 2, 2011 9:44 pm Reply

    yeah, they’re gone

Don

May 4, 2011 1:31 am Reply

good so it is just not me. can the pics. please be re posted so that we can see them.

Amitp Shinde125

August 5, 2011 7:11 am Reply

hi..

Don

August 25, 2011 4:04 pm Reply

How Do We Find the Stroke to do in Step Two.

Don

October 3, 2011 8:12 pm Reply

how do we add the white border to the background ?

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