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How to Make Your Own Gritty Photo Textures

By Charles Yeager

Published: September 06, 2022 Last Updated: September 06, 2022

In this video tutorial, learn how to photograph your own glass textures and edit them in post. Includes free project files!

Recently, PremiumBeat released our Glass Textures Freebie Pack. The pack contains 25 high-resolution glass textures you can overlay on your photos and videos. We want to take you behind the scenes on how those glass textures were made and how you can make your own. Plus, you can make most of these textures with stuff you probably have around your house!

You can download the project file photos here and follow along step-by-step.

Download Here

What Equipment Do You Need?

You can probably adapt any gear to create glass textures like this, even a cell phone. But, I’m going to base my recommendations on the gear I’ve used, and a few other cost-saving alternatives.

Camera

To start, you are going to need a DSLR or mirrorless camera. These cameras will work better than point-and-shoot cameras and smartphones. This is because DSLR and mirrorless cameras most likely will have: high resolution, more depth of field, and the ability to take RAW images. All of these are important factors for creating glass textures.

Tripod

Next, you will need a tripod. Any tripod you have will work fine. Having a tripod will allow you to easily dial in the focus, and you can set the camera to a self-timer setting so the camera doesn’t have any micro shakes when you take the photo.

Lens Options

For lenses, the two most important factors are going to be having a narrow field of view and a shallow depth of field. Anything from a 50mm to a 200mm lens will most likely work, ideally with an f-stop of 2.8 or better.

Having a shallow depth of field is essential because we want a narrow focus on our glass plane, and we want the background and the reflections from the glass to fall out of focus.

Make Photo Textures - Closeup of macro lens — *A **macro lens** will work best for glass textures.*

The lens I used was a Canon f2.8 100mm macro lens. If you have a macro lens, definitely use that. Macro lenses work great for textures. However, I know most people may not have a macro lens, which leads us to our next piece of gear.

Macro Extension Tube Set

If you don’t have a macro lens, an easy solution is to buy a Macro Extension Tube Set. They are usually around $15. They work great on 50mm lenses because 50mm lenses will usually have an f-stop of 1.8 or better. This helps create a very shallow depth of field.

I tried out the 7mm tube extension on my 50mm lens for several texture images. The images are a bit soft around the edges, but I think the effect can look cool when you’re using these images as overlays.

Make Photo Textures - Macro Extension Tube Photo showing texture on a piece of glass — *The photo was taken with a 50mm lens and a 7mm macro extension tube.*

Where to Take the Glass Texture Images?

So, where to take the glass images? By far, the easiest thing to do is to take pictures of existing glass and windows around your house or wherever you live.

Around Your Home

If you have any single-pane glass on doors or windows around your home, that can be a great place to start. This is also convenient because you don’t have to “mount” any glass since the glass is already on a wall, door, etc.

Make Photo Textures - Home windows showing signs of wear — *Use windows around wherever you live.*

Face the camera straight toward the glass surface, and get as close to the glass as you can. (This is why macro lenses work so well.)

If you’re taking a window glass photo, you’ll probably want to be on the outside of the house facing inwards. That way, the interior looks darker, and the sun will help illuminate the dust and water spots on the glass surface. Again, be sure to use a shallow depth of field so the interior and reflections are out of focus.

Make Photo Textures - Window texture closeup — The texture on single-pane window.

Storage Sheds or Old Buildings

I also have old storage shed near my house, with some old glass on the door. That glass had some unique texture on it. Likewise, if you have access to any old buildings near where you live, those can also be a great place to take images.

Make Photo Textures - Glass from shed showing wear and tear — *Glass texture from a storage shed.*

Vehicles

Another excellent place to look is the glass on your car, because vehicles pick up all kinds of dirt and grime. Darker tinted-glass windows can work exceptionally well too. My vehicle is black so I could also make textures from the flat spots on the car’s surface, such as the door panel.

Make Photo Textures - Closeup of vehicle glass showing texture — *Using glass on vehicles can work great because of the tinted glass.*

Making Glass Textures in a Studio

If you want to make your own glass textures inside your studio, buying a large glass picture frame is one of the most straightforward solutions. Then you can remove the backing of the frame. (Acrylic picture frames can also work well.)

Make Photo Textures - Glass picture frame on a mount — *Glass picture frames can easily mount to stands.*

Picture frames are also straightforward to mount on a stand too because you can clamp them onto the frame. Then add your dirt, dust, and grime to the glass surface to create your own custom textures.

Other Helpful Gear

Here are some other gear options that aren’t required but can be super helpful.

Black Poster Board

You can place a piece of black poster board behind the windows or glass you are taking pictures of, so then you don’t have to worry about the background showing up. You can usually purchase a sheet of black poster board for a few dollars.

Flashlight

You can shine a flashlight on windows at different angles to make the dirt and texture stand out more.

Dark Towel or T-Shirt

You can hold up a dark towel behind the camera to help reduce reflections visible from the glass. Alternatively, you can wear a dark t-shirt and stand directly behind the camera or glass you are taking a picture of.

Make Photo Textures - Dark towel blocking reflections behind a pane of glass — *Block reflections behind the camera by holding up a dark towel.*

Processing the RAW Texture Images

Processing the RAW texture images is pretty simple. (If you want to try it for yourself, I’ve included some RAW texture images in the free project file.) When you open a RAW image in Photoshop, it will automatically launch Adobe Camera RAW, where we’ll process our image.

Make Photo Textures - Processing RAW image in Adobe Camera RAW — *Processing the RAW image in Adobe Camera RAW.*

The main settings you will need to adjust are under the Basic tab. I will usually increase the Contrast and also increase the value of the Whites and lower the Blacks. This should help the texture of the glass stand out more. You can also increase the Clarity if the texture looks a bit soft.

Make Photo Textures - Adjusting contrast and clarity settings — *Adjust settings to increase the Contrast and Clarity.*

Under the Optics tab, you can enable Remove Chromatic Aberration and check on Use Profile Corrections to remove any unwanted color fringing effects.

Make Photo Textures - Removing chromatic aberrations in the Optics tab — *Remove chromatic aberration under the Optics tab.*

Finally, you can make your texture black & white by clicking the “B&W” button at the top of the tab stack. Then you can click Open to open your texture in Photoshop and save it out to the image format of your choice.

Make Photo Textures - Glass texture in black and white — *Make the glass texture black & white if you prefer.*

Want to Animate Your Textures?

Now that you’ve created your own glass textures, how about animating them? Check out our tutorial How to Animate Glass Textures on Videos in After Effects. There you will learn several tips and tricks for overlaying glass textures on your videos.

Interested in the royalty-free tracks we used to make this video? Give them another listen:

“Vapor Wave” by Mountaineer
“Miami Nights” by Ben Beiny
“Retro Vision” by Konstantin Garbuzyuk